And The Blog Silence Might Be Deafening...
About 9 AM this morning, after the local rush hour settles down, Missy the Turbo Pup and her entourage are blasting out of Knoxtown up I-75 toward a rendezvous with a 2-1/2 day technical training class in Indianapolis, Indiana.
This will be her...
Wait...how many states has the Turbo Pup visited since she was born in 2006?
Let's see...
Alabama, Georgia, Florida, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Mississippi (she was born there), Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia ...
So now with the addition of Indiana Missy the Turbo Pup will have traveled to SIXTEEN STATES in her soon to be three year long life.
Not bad for a little 11 pound miniature long haired Dachshund, eh?
I keep talking about getting some of those state stickers like people put on the back of their motor homes and travel trailers and putting them on the outside of her travel crate.
She's been crate trained since she was 2 months old and weighed 2 pounds, but we never lock her up in the thing. She just uses it like a den or "safety deposit box" and wanders in and out on her own hiding left over pieces of rawhide chews and wads of napkin and old paper towel tubes we give her to play with.
Still, if we have the room (thus far only one exception last summer) the crate, her bed, her blankets, and a giant assortment of toys go along with her in the back of the old Chrysler 300 when she hits the road.
Half the back seat is generally enough room for her royalness and her "lockers and sea chests" as I call them.
I get one seat and space in half of two suitcases along with room for a few hanging clothes, and of course the gasoline bills.
The weather over our route both ways looks good so far, and it will be good to get to interact in person with some of my technical peers for a change since I've basically been a hermit working alone from my office since my employer closed down last December 19th.
Time now to clean up my desk and do some final packing, and maybe catch another hour or two of sleep before hitting the road.
Wish us a safe trip and protection from the driving/texting morons...if you will...
Monday, November 09, 2009
Saturday, November 07, 2009
Engineer(s) Gone Wild?
One Went "Postal" In Orlando...
Anyone but me wonder what the heck was/is going on down in Orlando this week?
First I hear that some guy has run into an office building in downtown and shot the place up, killing one person and wounding five more.
Then I hear that the guy was shooting in the offices of an engineering firm and was an engineer himself.
I know that for various product related reasons that some people might want to kill engineers--like I for a while wanted to maim the guys that designed the 1984 Pontiac Fiero when it spent most of its first six months of my ownership in the Dealer's shop rather than in my Garage.
But still...
Engineers SHOOTING PEOPLE?
I thought that usually if an engineer wanted to kill you, their weapon of choice would be to BORE YOU TO DEATH.
You know--talking about interesting things like fluid flow and heat transfer coefficients, soil bearing capacity, electrical impedance, or the effect of long chain polymer chemistry on the tensil strength of ultra high density polyethylene (UHDPE for short.)
Although I can talk about all of that stuff, I generally don't break it out in casual conversation in a bar or at Thanksgiving dinner...BUT...
If I really wanted to hurt you I would generally assault you through your ears and mind (and possibly your eyes if you had to look at me while I was talking.)
On second thought, I guess that some people could think that engineers routinely kill people when airliners fall out of the sky or bridges collapse or their new white Toyota Prias squashes like a grape when it comes in contact with the front bumper of my old Chevy Suburban at 60 MPH.
Problem is, those events are hardly ever attributed to an actual engineering design flaw...they're usually owner and/or operator induced failures.
For instance, most "uncontrolled contact with terrain events" a.k.a. "air disasters" are initially caused by inexperienced pilots flying into bad weather or running a perfectly good airplane out of gas.
And military and commercial aircraft, while closely scrutinized, usually fail because of the enormous numbers of hours that they're in the air and issues relating to maintenance mistakes or the shear parts fatigue of their demanding daily operations.
And you certainly can't blame the engineers when they are technically unable to build a box with an electric motor and wheels that gets 50 MPG and can also withstand a potential assault by a 6,000 pound Suburban or a 80,000 tractor trailer rig when they try to occupy the same piece of asphalt.
All of these theoretical incidents involve owners and operators assuming what they believe to be an acceptable amount of calculated RISK based on the initial cost of the equipment and the operating and maintenance cost of the systems (plane, train, car, bridge, whatever) after purchase.
Bridges that have lasted 40 years don't fall down because of an engineering design flaw, they generally fail because the local, state, and federal governments take the gas taxes from the bridge users at the gas pump and spend the "highway" money in other areas like child welfare programs or "stimulus packages" rather than inspecting and repairing and possibly REPLACING the bridge before it drops a couple of mini-vans full of children into the Ohio River.
And modern airliners don't fly safely for 10 years and then have a wing or engine tear off while your tray table and seat back are in the upright and locked position. It's not the guy with the calculator and pocket protector's inadequacy.
Things end up breaking off these days as a result of everyone wanting to fly from Atlanta to Detroit for $199 a seat--a price less that the cost of the gasoline I'd burn in my Suburban-and the Airlines having to cut costs to provide that kind of ticket pricing and still stay solvent.
As a result of the flying public wanting cheap air fair, the airlines are forced to cut quality of service, charge fees for everything except using the restroom, and fly older and older planes by doing things like major rebuilds--called "life cycle extension programs."
Then they and their low fair paying passengers end up together in uncharted performance territory in a process of delaying or avoiding the purchase of new zillion dollar airplanes.
And what is the one additional thing that the safety of bridges and airplanes and automobile have in common?
G O V E R N M E N T.
We have the FAA (Federal Aviation Administration), the NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board), and the NHTSA (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration) all spending BILLIONS if not TRILLIONS of taxpayer dollars each year writing laws and rules and legislating things like that your car has to automatically lock the doors and turn on the headlights, yet about 44,000 people die each year in auto accidents.
And all of the states have passed seat belt laws, but don't a bunch of people still die while not wearing a seat belt? They drive at the risk of paying a "fine"--actually more practically a tax--for exercising their free choice and thereby assuming a level of risk they are personally accountable for.
...taking a big breath here...
Now back to my original point.
I bet $20 bucks that within the MONTH that some stupid eco friendly sniveling, booger eating, tree huggingliberal progressive politician is going to call for congressional hearings on gun control and trying to bring back the "Brady Bill" and the so called "Assault Weapons Ban."
They just can't help themselves, and with the events of the past week their "never waste an disaster" mentality will drive them over the edge again.
I repeat over and over and over that we don't need new laws limiting LAW ABIDING citizens rights of gun ownership and further, their rights to carry a gun.
IT'S ALREADY AGAINST THE LAW TO WALK UP AND SHOOT SOMEONE, and if more trained and licensed private citizens were allowed to legally carry guns into churches and theaters and on college campuses, most of the events making the news over the past ten or twenty years would have been limited else prevented outright.
Further, it was already ILLEGAL--an outright gun ban was in place-- on of all places the military base in Texas, yet that asshole simply drove on base with not one but two guns and shot a bunch of un-armed soldiers and civilians.
I somehow find it amazing that the military has taken a policy of locking almost every one of their guns and ammo up and relying on the MP's and private security forces to maintain their security functions.
I bet if the guy had walked into a US military base in 1944 or 1952, pulled out a gun and fired a shot, that twenty different people would have drawn their own weapons and blown his miserable head off.
Instead, in 2009 some guy walks into a government mandated "gun free zone" and fires OVER A HUNDRED FREAKING ROUNDS before someone manages to draw a bead on him and drop him (I wish they had killed the bastard so we won't have to spend ten million on a trial.)
I see it like this...most of these crazy spineless morons like the Texas and Florida (and Virginia Tech and Columbine) shooters would never walk into a Saloon in California in 1875 and start shooting if they knew that everyone else in the room had one if not two guns on their person, would they?
If they did they would get what they deserved and the only "due process" remaining when the smoke cleared would be to pick up the pieces and mop the floor.
Anybody agree with me here?
Yes?
No?
Well, finally, in closing (and in jest,) don't be surprised if, as a result of the Orlando shootings, some kook legislator will try to pass a new law designed to require Engineers to register in a database like "sexual predators." (I think maybe they call it the State PE Licensing Board...Roy)
As a result they'll also probably want to make us stay at least a hundred yards away from libraries and technical bookstores.
And then if someone opens a computer store in my neighborhood, being an engineer I'd likely be forced to sell my house and move at least a mile away.
These same kinds of laws and procedures and mandates are in effect today at government mandate in the name of "protecting women and children", and you see the outcome...children are still disappearing and dieing at an alarming rate.
Government can't control anyone but law abiding citizens, and all I'm saying here Ladies and Gentlemen is that you just watch what happens, and try to think logically and intelligently rather than reacting emotionally.
In my considered Redneck opinion, "There aught to be a law..." isn't always true, and I don't want to give up any more of my Constitutional and God given freedoms to our hysterical, power grabbing government.
Anyone but me wonder what the heck was/is going on down in Orlando this week?
First I hear that some guy has run into an office building in downtown and shot the place up, killing one person and wounding five more.
Then I hear that the guy was shooting in the offices of an engineering firm and was an engineer himself.
I know that for various product related reasons that some people might want to kill engineers--like I for a while wanted to maim the guys that designed the 1984 Pontiac Fiero when it spent most of its first six months of my ownership in the Dealer's shop rather than in my Garage.
But still...
Engineers SHOOTING PEOPLE?
I thought that usually if an engineer wanted to kill you, their weapon of choice would be to BORE YOU TO DEATH.
You know--talking about interesting things like fluid flow and heat transfer coefficients, soil bearing capacity, electrical impedance, or the effect of long chain polymer chemistry on the tensil strength of ultra high density polyethylene (UHDPE for short.)
Although I can talk about all of that stuff, I generally don't break it out in casual conversation in a bar or at Thanksgiving dinner...BUT...
If I really wanted to hurt you I would generally assault you through your ears and mind (and possibly your eyes if you had to look at me while I was talking.)
On second thought, I guess that some people could think that engineers routinely kill people when airliners fall out of the sky or bridges collapse or their new white Toyota Prias squashes like a grape when it comes in contact with the front bumper of my old Chevy Suburban at 60 MPH.
Problem is, those events are hardly ever attributed to an actual engineering design flaw...they're usually owner and/or operator induced failures.
For instance, most "uncontrolled contact with terrain events" a.k.a. "air disasters" are initially caused by inexperienced pilots flying into bad weather or running a perfectly good airplane out of gas.
And military and commercial aircraft, while closely scrutinized, usually fail because of the enormous numbers of hours that they're in the air and issues relating to maintenance mistakes or the shear parts fatigue of their demanding daily operations.
And you certainly can't blame the engineers when they are technically unable to build a box with an electric motor and wheels that gets 50 MPG and can also withstand a potential assault by a 6,000 pound Suburban or a 80,000 tractor trailer rig when they try to occupy the same piece of asphalt.
All of these theoretical incidents involve owners and operators assuming what they believe to be an acceptable amount of calculated RISK based on the initial cost of the equipment and the operating and maintenance cost of the systems (plane, train, car, bridge, whatever) after purchase.
Bridges that have lasted 40 years don't fall down because of an engineering design flaw, they generally fail because the local, state, and federal governments take the gas taxes from the bridge users at the gas pump and spend the "highway" money in other areas like child welfare programs or "stimulus packages" rather than inspecting and repairing and possibly REPLACING the bridge before it drops a couple of mini-vans full of children into the Ohio River.
And modern airliners don't fly safely for 10 years and then have a wing or engine tear off while your tray table and seat back are in the upright and locked position. It's not the guy with the calculator and pocket protector's inadequacy.
Things end up breaking off these days as a result of everyone wanting to fly from Atlanta to Detroit for $199 a seat--a price less that the cost of the gasoline I'd burn in my Suburban-and the Airlines having to cut costs to provide that kind of ticket pricing and still stay solvent.
As a result of the flying public wanting cheap air fair, the airlines are forced to cut quality of service, charge fees for everything except using the restroom, and fly older and older planes by doing things like major rebuilds--called "life cycle extension programs."
Then they and their low fair paying passengers end up together in uncharted performance territory in a process of delaying or avoiding the purchase of new zillion dollar airplanes.
And what is the one additional thing that the safety of bridges and airplanes and automobile have in common?
G O V E R N M E N T.
We have the FAA (Federal Aviation Administration), the NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board), and the NHTSA (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration) all spending BILLIONS if not TRILLIONS of taxpayer dollars each year writing laws and rules and legislating things like that your car has to automatically lock the doors and turn on the headlights, yet about 44,000 people die each year in auto accidents.
And all of the states have passed seat belt laws, but don't a bunch of people still die while not wearing a seat belt? They drive at the risk of paying a "fine"--actually more practically a tax--for exercising their free choice and thereby assuming a level of risk they are personally accountable for.
...taking a big breath here...
Now back to my original point.
I bet $20 bucks that within the MONTH that some stupid eco friendly sniveling, booger eating, tree hugging
They just can't help themselves, and with the events of the past week their "never waste an disaster" mentality will drive them over the edge again.
I repeat over and over and over that we don't need new laws limiting LAW ABIDING citizens rights of gun ownership and further, their rights to carry a gun.
IT'S ALREADY AGAINST THE LAW TO WALK UP AND SHOOT SOMEONE, and if more trained and licensed private citizens were allowed to legally carry guns into churches and theaters and on college campuses, most of the events making the news over the past ten or twenty years would have been limited else prevented outright.
Further, it was already ILLEGAL--an outright gun ban was in place-- on of all places the military base in Texas, yet that asshole simply drove on base with not one but two guns and shot a bunch of un-armed soldiers and civilians.
I somehow find it amazing that the military has taken a policy of locking almost every one of their guns and ammo up and relying on the MP's and private security forces to maintain their security functions.
I bet if the guy had walked into a US military base in 1944 or 1952, pulled out a gun and fired a shot, that twenty different people would have drawn their own weapons and blown his miserable head off.
Instead, in 2009 some guy walks into a government mandated "gun free zone" and fires OVER A HUNDRED FREAKING ROUNDS before someone manages to draw a bead on him and drop him (I wish they had killed the bastard so we won't have to spend ten million on a trial.)
I see it like this...most of these crazy spineless morons like the Texas and Florida (and Virginia Tech and Columbine) shooters would never walk into a Saloon in California in 1875 and start shooting if they knew that everyone else in the room had one if not two guns on their person, would they?
If they did they would get what they deserved and the only "due process" remaining when the smoke cleared would be to pick up the pieces and mop the floor.
Anybody agree with me here?
Yes?
No?
Well, finally, in closing (and in jest,) don't be surprised if, as a result of the Orlando shootings, some kook legislator will try to pass a new law designed to require Engineers to register in a database like "sexual predators." (I think maybe they call it the State PE Licensing Board...Roy)
As a result they'll also probably want to make us stay at least a hundred yards away from libraries and technical bookstores.
And then if someone opens a computer store in my neighborhood, being an engineer I'd likely be forced to sell my house and move at least a mile away.
These same kinds of laws and procedures and mandates are in effect today at government mandate in the name of "protecting women and children", and you see the outcome...children are still disappearing and dieing at an alarming rate.
Government can't control anyone but law abiding citizens, and all I'm saying here Ladies and Gentlemen is that you just watch what happens, and try to think logically and intelligently rather than reacting emotionally.
In my considered Redneck opinion, "There aught to be a law..." isn't always true, and I don't want to give up any more of my Constitutional and God given freedoms to our hysterical, power grabbing government.
Friday, November 06, 2009
Ultimate Home Workshop
I'm Now So Organized...I Can't Find Anything...
Sorry about the light blogging recently, but I have a good excuse...I'm happy to report that the last dust settled in my Basement yesterday afternoon.
OK...maybe the next to last dust.
That would be because like most men's home workshops...they're always a work in progress.
That said, I say that I'm finished with mine for now because:
A. I've run out of money
B. I'm tired of building the shop and I believe that it's time to actually get some WORK done in my "workshop."
In the past four weeks I've taken every single tool I own, and almost every single nut and bolt and nail--or at least the boxes containing same--and dusted them off and cleaned things out and sorted like things in with like things to the point that when everything went back on the shelves and bunkers and bins this morning I find myself wandering around in my own basement like an Alzheimer's patient in a Nuclear Plant (or maybe a shopping mall.)
For your enjoyment, here's a photo looking at the entry wall of the 20'x12' shop area. All of the doors in these pictures are recycled Luan doors I pulled out of the main house when I replaced them with painted 6 panel slabs last year.
The bi fold doors cover a computer workstation with keyboard shelf and room for a file cabinet and my technical books. Of course there's also the obligatory TV and radio...if I could get a recliner in the room Pat and Missy the Turbo Pup would never see me again except at dinner I'm afraid.
Here's a look at the old workbench that was in that spot in the basement when we bought the house. It's build out of giant salvage lumber from the original home owner's farm and weighs about 500# I guess. Like that red door there covering my paint cans and WD-40?
Here's the wall opposite the entry, again showing our old closet doors covering a whole wall of storage shelves that came with the house...
Here's the same wall with the doors open showing where all the tools and supplies I've carefully put away and then forgotten which storage tub they reside in...
And finally, here's the new electronics workbench, made out of the old master bathroom door and covered with a sheet of 3/4" plywood. If you look closely you'll notice that the legs fold up and the whole thing is hinged to the wall (the entire wall is made of old doors except about 6" in one corner) so it can fold down out of the way if I ever decide to build a 16' sail boat or an experimental airplane in my old age...
There's still new 50 Amp 220 Volt and 20 Amp 110 Volt electrical circuits to install for future equipment like a small welding machine and larger capacity air compressor, but in the mean time I'm settling for the rewired and extended 1963 electrical circuits augmented with a new #6 grounding wire/rod circuit in an effort to reduce the chances of frying either myself or the sensitive equipment that will take form on the new bench.
Any way...back to my original point, I need to build something...and to that end I've had UPS dropping off multiple boxes almost every day this week, and I did another trip today to the Home Depot electrical isle for things like wire ties and wire labels and other wiring management stuff.
There's still a wire and tool trip to Radio Shack and Granger and possibly Northern Tool, and in the mean time I'm still waiting on the touch screen PLC (Programmable Logic Controller) to arrive from Indianapolis.
Speaking of Indianapolis, coincidentally Pat and Missy the Turbo Pup and I will be up there next week for a three day training class on the PLC company's unique programming software. It's free if you'll pay your own per diem and we couldn't pass up the opportunity.
That, and we hadn't made a road trip in about a month and I didn't want to violate my personal and now company travel policies--one adventure every thirty days of at LEAST eight hours in round trip duration.
I'm so excited about this chance to advance skills I haven't used since back in the early 1980's, and things have come so far technically since then (i.e. SIMPLER TO UNDERSTAND THAN EGYPTIAN HIEROGLYPHICS) that I hope it's true that almost anyone with programming experience can become a PLC expert in short order.
I guess that it's time to do some paper work and a little news surfing...and why don't you join me in praying for the dead and wounded and their families out at Ft. Hood--yet additional victims of another wild eyed believer in that ever peaceful religion of Islam.
(&%$#@!ing towel heads...)
Sorry about the light blogging recently, but I have a good excuse...I'm happy to report that the last dust settled in my Basement yesterday afternoon.
OK...maybe the next to last dust.
That would be because like most men's home workshops...they're always a work in progress.
That said, I say that I'm finished with mine for now because:
A. I've run out of money
B. I'm tired of building the shop and I believe that it's time to actually get some WORK done in my "workshop."
In the past four weeks I've taken every single tool I own, and almost every single nut and bolt and nail--or at least the boxes containing same--and dusted them off and cleaned things out and sorted like things in with like things to the point that when everything went back on the shelves and bunkers and bins this morning I find myself wandering around in my own basement like an Alzheimer's patient in a Nuclear Plant (or maybe a shopping mall.)
For your enjoyment, here's a photo looking at the entry wall of the 20'x12' shop area. All of the doors in these pictures are recycled Luan doors I pulled out of the main house when I replaced them with painted 6 panel slabs last year.
The bi fold doors cover a computer workstation with keyboard shelf and room for a file cabinet and my technical books. Of course there's also the obligatory TV and radio...if I could get a recliner in the room Pat and Missy the Turbo Pup would never see me again except at dinner I'm afraid.
Here's a look at the old workbench that was in that spot in the basement when we bought the house. It's build out of giant salvage lumber from the original home owner's farm and weighs about 500# I guess. Like that red door there covering my paint cans and WD-40?
Here's the wall opposite the entry, again showing our old closet doors covering a whole wall of storage shelves that came with the house...
Here's the same wall with the doors open showing where all the tools and supplies I've carefully put away and then forgotten which storage tub they reside in...
And finally, here's the new electronics workbench, made out of the old master bathroom door and covered with a sheet of 3/4" plywood. If you look closely you'll notice that the legs fold up and the whole thing is hinged to the wall (the entire wall is made of old doors except about 6" in one corner) so it can fold down out of the way if I ever decide to build a 16' sail boat or an experimental airplane in my old age...
There's still new 50 Amp 220 Volt and 20 Amp 110 Volt electrical circuits to install for future equipment like a small welding machine and larger capacity air compressor, but in the mean time I'm settling for the rewired and extended 1963 electrical circuits augmented with a new #6 grounding wire/rod circuit in an effort to reduce the chances of frying either myself or the sensitive equipment that will take form on the new bench.
Any way...back to my original point, I need to build something...and to that end I've had UPS dropping off multiple boxes almost every day this week, and I did another trip today to the Home Depot electrical isle for things like wire ties and wire labels and other wiring management stuff.
There's still a wire and tool trip to Radio Shack and Granger and possibly Northern Tool, and in the mean time I'm still waiting on the touch screen PLC (Programmable Logic Controller) to arrive from Indianapolis.
Speaking of Indianapolis, coincidentally Pat and Missy the Turbo Pup and I will be up there next week for a three day training class on the PLC company's unique programming software. It's free if you'll pay your own per diem and we couldn't pass up the opportunity.
That, and we hadn't made a road trip in about a month and I didn't want to violate my personal and now company travel policies--one adventure every thirty days of at LEAST eight hours in round trip duration.
I'm so excited about this chance to advance skills I haven't used since back in the early 1980's, and things have come so far technically since then (i.e. SIMPLER TO UNDERSTAND THAN EGYPTIAN HIEROGLYPHICS) that I hope it's true that almost anyone with programming experience can become a PLC expert in short order.
I guess that it's time to do some paper work and a little news surfing...and why don't you join me in praying for the dead and wounded and their families out at Ft. Hood--yet additional victims of another wild eyed believer in that ever peaceful religion of Islam.
(&%$#@!ing towel heads...)
Wednesday, November 04, 2009
Stinky Cheese And Web Page Printing
Things I Keep Forgetting To Admit Or Complain About...
Tonight I'm feeling lazy and distracted as seems to be usual recently, but while eating some leftovers as a snack and printing some vendor data sheets on laser measurement systems (try not to swoon) I remembered a couple of things I've thought about writing about but never can remember when I get the Blogger dashboard open and my fingers on the keyboard.
First of all, anyone but me out there like "stinky cheese??"
(Wipe the foot and genitalia images out of your mind and try to stay with me here...I'm trying to make a point.)
Seriously, today in my household we hardly ever or never buy "American Cheese" slices any more or generic orange blocks of Velveeta "cheese food products" or anything else without the word "Swiss" or "Gouda" or "Sharp" on the label.
Things get stranger and more expensive every day it seems.
Just show me the words:
Cow Feta?
Horse Feta?
Sheep Feta?
Deep Veined Blue Cheese?
Imported Organic Crumbly Goat Cheese?
(and possibly make me have to take out a loan to buy a couple of pounds of the stuff?)
NOW YOU'RE TALKING...
Let's face it...I like my stinky cheese these days, and the older I get the stronger I like it.
Maybe it's because I'm trying to have an excuse for my breath and armpits and butt smelling like they do (OK TMI), or it's just that possibly I'm hoping that the cheese covers the odors I emit after a couple of days wandering around the Turbo Pup compound in the same pair of socks.
Any way, what brought this to mind was that last night we thawed out a couple of medium sized Beef tenderloins--about an inch and a half thick each--and I sliced a big pocket into the inside of each of them and then seared everything on each side in a big skillet on the stove, then finished them to about medium doneness in the oven.
Then I danced around opening their insides up and I stuffed those suckers with a portion of nice strong crumbled blue cheese.
After adding some bacon and sauteed mushrooms on top and some smashed red potatoes containing a quarter pound of butter and more blue cheese on the side, Pat and Missy the Turbo Pup and I dined, and then I collapsed back into the bed on top of the omni-present heating pad to recover from the day's basement shop construction efforts.
Then about 1 AM I awakened and decided to work on some more paperwork and do some more work on the Internet...bringing me to my final bitching moment this morning...
Ready?
Does anyone but me think that all website designers also own stock in the office paper companies?
No?
Yes?
I think that they do.
Otherwise, why is it that almost every time you print out a web page you get one or two or three pages, followed by that infuriating LAST page that has nothing but possibly a disclaimer and a header/footer?
Understand?
I've got near an entire REAM of paper in my recycle/reuse bin with only one or two lines of text on them...all MEANINGLESS AND USELESS to the task at hand when I was printing.
Am I nuts?
Am I petty?
Am I just Paranoid?
OK
In the words of PopEye..."I am what I am and that's all that I am..."
Regards Y'all...
Tonight I'm feeling lazy and distracted as seems to be usual recently, but while eating some leftovers as a snack and printing some vendor data sheets on laser measurement systems (try not to swoon) I remembered a couple of things I've thought about writing about but never can remember when I get the Blogger dashboard open and my fingers on the keyboard.
First of all, anyone but me out there like "stinky cheese??"
(Wipe the foot and genitalia images out of your mind and try to stay with me here...I'm trying to make a point.)
Seriously, today in my household we hardly ever or never buy "American Cheese" slices any more or generic orange blocks of Velveeta "cheese food products" or anything else without the word "Swiss" or "Gouda" or "Sharp" on the label.
Things get stranger and more expensive every day it seems.
Just show me the words:
Cow Feta?
Horse Feta?
Sheep Feta?
Deep Veined Blue Cheese?
Imported Organic Crumbly Goat Cheese?
(and possibly make me have to take out a loan to buy a couple of pounds of the stuff?)
NOW YOU'RE TALKING...
Let's face it...I like my stinky cheese these days, and the older I get the stronger I like it.
Maybe it's because I'm trying to have an excuse for my breath and armpits and butt smelling like they do (OK TMI), or it's just that possibly I'm hoping that the cheese covers the odors I emit after a couple of days wandering around the Turbo Pup compound in the same pair of socks.
Any way, what brought this to mind was that last night we thawed out a couple of medium sized Beef tenderloins--about an inch and a half thick each--and I sliced a big pocket into the inside of each of them and then seared everything on each side in a big skillet on the stove, then finished them to about medium doneness in the oven.
Then I danced around opening their insides up and I stuffed those suckers with a portion of nice strong crumbled blue cheese.
After adding some bacon and sauteed mushrooms on top and some smashed red potatoes containing a quarter pound of butter and more blue cheese on the side, Pat and Missy the Turbo Pup and I dined, and then I collapsed back into the bed on top of the omni-present heating pad to recover from the day's basement shop construction efforts.
Then about 1 AM I awakened and decided to work on some more paperwork and do some more work on the Internet...bringing me to my final bitching moment this morning...
Ready?
Does anyone but me think that all website designers also own stock in the office paper companies?
No?
Yes?
I think that they do.
Otherwise, why is it that almost every time you print out a web page you get one or two or three pages, followed by that infuriating LAST page that has nothing but possibly a disclaimer and a header/footer?
Understand?
I've got near an entire REAM of paper in my recycle/reuse bin with only one or two lines of text on them...all MEANINGLESS AND USELESS to the task at hand when I was printing.
Am I nuts?
Am I petty?
Am I just Paranoid?
OK
In the words of PopEye..."I am what I am and that's all that I am..."
Regards Y'all...
Tuesday, November 03, 2009
A New Load Of Lumber
And A Sore Back...
Yet another truck showed up in my driveway yesterday afternoon.
It was my fault, because I stopped by and ordered it from a local building supply (not Lowe's or Home Depot) after making the obligatory bi-weekly trip to Staples and Home Depot.
I don't know what I'm thinking sometimes when the 75 pound slabs of 3/4 inch thick plywood show up in my carport.
How do you get a 4 foot by 8 foot sheet of wood into your basement past a kitchen and dining room table, around a corner through a door, down the stairs, around another 90 degree turn into it's future resting place?
My only solution is to cut it up into the slabs and strips in the sizes it will ultimately reside in, then make three or four trips with Pat and Missy the Turbo Pup hanging onto the other end rather than falling down the stairway on my head with the full sized slab of laminated wood on top of me.
In addition to A/B grade plywood, there was also five sheets of 1/4 pegboard intended to line the open spaces in the new wall framework and cover part of the freshly painted concrete wall.
Bad news is my back and right shoulder is giving me fits so I've been relegated to slumping at my desk and hanging out in the bed reclining on the heating pad for part of the past 48 hours.
Add to that organic pain the neurological costs of the spasms sent through my spine when I read the newspaper and watch the TV news and I hope you understand why I'm currently feeling every single minute of my past 50 years in my forehead and butt.
Time to go clean my guns and hone my blades I guess...
Yet another truck showed up in my driveway yesterday afternoon.
It was my fault, because I stopped by and ordered it from a local building supply (not Lowe's or Home Depot) after making the obligatory bi-weekly trip to Staples and Home Depot.
I don't know what I'm thinking sometimes when the 75 pound slabs of 3/4 inch thick plywood show up in my carport.
How do you get a 4 foot by 8 foot sheet of wood into your basement past a kitchen and dining room table, around a corner through a door, down the stairs, around another 90 degree turn into it's future resting place?
My only solution is to cut it up into the slabs and strips in the sizes it will ultimately reside in, then make three or four trips with Pat and Missy the Turbo Pup hanging onto the other end rather than falling down the stairway on my head with the full sized slab of laminated wood on top of me.
In addition to A/B grade plywood, there was also five sheets of 1/4 pegboard intended to line the open spaces in the new wall framework and cover part of the freshly painted concrete wall.
Bad news is my back and right shoulder is giving me fits so I've been relegated to slumping at my desk and hanging out in the bed reclining on the heating pad for part of the past 48 hours.
Add to that organic pain the neurological costs of the spasms sent through my spine when I read the newspaper and watch the TV news and I hope you understand why I'm currently feeling every single minute of my past 50 years in my forehead and butt.
Time to go clean my guns and hone my blades I guess...
Sunday, November 01, 2009
They Changed My Clock
And Winter Came Sneaking Back (and Obscure facts no one but me cares about)...
Spring forward...Fall back.
Today is possibly my least favorite day in every year because I'm forced to give up an hour of late afternoon daylight in return for early morning daylight...something those that know me also know is of little value to me personally most of the time.
Thinking about it, isn't it amazing that we allow the GOVERNMENT to control something as simple as our Clocks and the time displayed thereon?
I know that it sounds like a good idea in some ways, but seriously...
Today even the counting and progression of time has slowly been politicized over the past 140 or so years since Sir Sandford Flemming, a Canadian Railway Planner and Engineer came up with the ideal of dividing the planet into 24 "Meridian" time zones running North/South around the globe.
This National Geographic article gives even more information which I previously didn't know but had seen the results of previously...that being that the individual STATE governments have more control over the time on your VCR (you know, that thing in your living or bedroom continuously flashing 12:00 all the time) than the federal government actually has.
The Feds only control the the actual time zones, not the recognition of daylight savings time.
As I understand it, through the years the boundaries of time zones and recognition of "Daylight Savings Time" have been manipulated for personal and political reasons...generally in the name of money and/or "commerce."
For instance, there are two good examples I personally know about here in the south--one involving a large textile company and the second a Paper Mill which has gone out of business and been torn down.
If you look at this map:
you'd think that the division between the central and eastern time zone runs exactly down the border between Alabama and Georgia---picking up the Chattahoochee River around West Point Georgia and continuing across the Florida Panhandle on the river basin to the Gulf of Mexico.
If that were the case, you'd be WRONG.
I can't find a detailed map but I know from driving up and down I-85 about a million times since the late 1970's that the now defunct company West Point Pepperell Mills was able to get the eastern time zone extended down US 29 (and now Interstate 85) in Eastern Alabama in order to have all of their plants between West Point, Georgia and Lanette, Alabama on the same clock each day.
Makes sense I guess that all of the employees working on both sides of the river were working on the same clock time, but it took an act of congress to pass a law saying what time was on individual citizens clocks on the nightstands and wrist watches.
Then down in Gulf County, Florida things are even more convoluted...based on the whims of the Old Saint Joe Paper Company...now called simply "St. Joe" and existing solely as a real estate development and timber company. Today they are either the first or second largest land owner in the entire state of Florida depending on whose statistics you're quoting.
Here's the map showing how the Eastern Time Zone again marches off to the west off the basin of what has become at this point the Apalachicola River (the merger of the Chattahoochee and Flint Rivers into lake Seminole.
(From 12 Mile Circle)
The neat thing was that when I spent a year living in nearby Mexico Beach, Florida on New Years we were able to go east a couple of miles to Beacon Hill, celebrate at midnight, then come back across the time zone line and do it all again an hour later.
Simple things for simple minds I guess, but I take my entertainment where I can find it these days.
Time to go work on a proposal now...y'all try to get your internal clocks adjusted and get some sleep.
Spring forward...Fall back.
Today is possibly my least favorite day in every year because I'm forced to give up an hour of late afternoon daylight in return for early morning daylight...something those that know me also know is of little value to me personally most of the time.
Thinking about it, isn't it amazing that we allow the GOVERNMENT to control something as simple as our Clocks and the time displayed thereon?
I know that it sounds like a good idea in some ways, but seriously...
Today even the counting and progression of time has slowly been politicized over the past 140 or so years since Sir Sandford Flemming, a Canadian Railway Planner and Engineer came up with the ideal of dividing the planet into 24 "Meridian" time zones running North/South around the globe.
This National Geographic article gives even more information which I previously didn't know but had seen the results of previously...that being that the individual STATE governments have more control over the time on your VCR (you know, that thing in your living or bedroom continuously flashing 12:00 all the time) than the federal government actually has.
The Feds only control the the actual time zones, not the recognition of daylight savings time.
As I understand it, through the years the boundaries of time zones and recognition of "Daylight Savings Time" have been manipulated for personal and political reasons...generally in the name of money and/or "commerce."
For instance, there are two good examples I personally know about here in the south--one involving a large textile company and the second a Paper Mill which has gone out of business and been torn down.
If you look at this map:
you'd think that the division between the central and eastern time zone runs exactly down the border between Alabama and Georgia---picking up the Chattahoochee River around West Point Georgia and continuing across the Florida Panhandle on the river basin to the Gulf of Mexico.
If that were the case, you'd be WRONG.
I can't find a detailed map but I know from driving up and down I-85 about a million times since the late 1970's that the now defunct company West Point Pepperell Mills was able to get the eastern time zone extended down US 29 (and now Interstate 85) in Eastern Alabama in order to have all of their plants between West Point, Georgia and Lanette, Alabama on the same clock each day.
Makes sense I guess that all of the employees working on both sides of the river were working on the same clock time, but it took an act of congress to pass a law saying what time was on individual citizens clocks on the nightstands and wrist watches.
Then down in Gulf County, Florida things are even more convoluted...based on the whims of the Old Saint Joe Paper Company...now called simply "St. Joe" and existing solely as a real estate development and timber company. Today they are either the first or second largest land owner in the entire state of Florida depending on whose statistics you're quoting.
Here's the map showing how the Eastern Time Zone again marches off to the west off the basin of what has become at this point the Apalachicola River (the merger of the Chattahoochee and Flint Rivers into lake Seminole.
(From 12 Mile Circle)
The neat thing was that when I spent a year living in nearby Mexico Beach, Florida on New Years we were able to go east a couple of miles to Beacon Hill, celebrate at midnight, then come back across the time zone line and do it all again an hour later.
Simple things for simple minds I guess, but I take my entertainment where I can find it these days.
Time to go work on a proposal now...y'all try to get your internal clocks adjusted and get some sleep.
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Last Vestiges of Summer
The Leaves Are Falling And It's WARM...
So I'm sitting here in the wee hours of the morning, pounding away on the computer keys getting some paperwork done in between fits of reading the news and shuffling files in my office--the newly declared International Headquarters of Plastics Engineering Technologies...situated on the lovely banks of the Mighty Tennessee River (IHPETSOLBMTR for short.)
Then I just noticed that it's Seventy Three Degrees Fahrenheit at 3:10 AM.
My front porch is beckoning...cigar and my partially read copy of Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged" in hand.
See y'all later...
So I'm sitting here in the wee hours of the morning, pounding away on the computer keys getting some paperwork done in between fits of reading the news and shuffling files in my office--the newly declared International Headquarters of Plastics Engineering Technologies...situated on the lovely banks of the Mighty Tennessee River (IHPETSOLBMTR for short.)
Then I just noticed that it's Seventy Three Degrees Fahrenheit at 3:10 AM.
My front porch is beckoning...cigar and my partially read copy of Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged" in hand.
See y'all later...
Thursday, October 29, 2009
My Life's Kicking My Butt
Who's Idea Was This Anyway???
OK
I've got two new exterior doors that still need staining and finishing. One still needs the holes and slots cut for the knobs and hinges and dead bolt.
I've got two sets of closet bi fold doors that need painting.
I've got two fluorescent lights to finish wiring and hang in the basement.
I've got a load of 1x4 and 1x2 trim lumber to install in the new and improved workshop and International World Headquarters for my new company...
(drum roll please...)
Plastics Engineering Technologies, Inc.
We got our first order for a PLC control panel last Friday and I've been pulling what little hair I have left out trying to get all the components on order.
And in the mean time I have near a half acre of yard that really needs some TLC and general fall maintenance and since today is the last 70 degree day in sight and it's supposed to rain for most of the next week...
you'll have to excuse me if the blogging continues to be sporadic at best.
Regards Y'all
OK
I've got two new exterior doors that still need staining and finishing. One still needs the holes and slots cut for the knobs and hinges and dead bolt.
I've got two sets of closet bi fold doors that need painting.
I've got two fluorescent lights to finish wiring and hang in the basement.
I've got a load of 1x4 and 1x2 trim lumber to install in the new and improved workshop and International World Headquarters for my new company...
(drum roll please...)
Plastics Engineering Technologies, Inc.
We got our first order for a PLC control panel last Friday and I've been pulling what little hair I have left out trying to get all the components on order.
And in the mean time I have near a half acre of yard that really needs some TLC and general fall maintenance and since today is the last 70 degree day in sight and it's supposed to rain for most of the next week...
you'll have to excuse me if the blogging continues to be sporadic at best.
Regards Y'all
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
First New Manned Rocket In 30 Years?
Obama Has File On Desk Under Afghanistan Troop Plans...
While the media was busy writing about "The Balloon Boy" and the President's basketball skills and FOX News obvious Right Wing bias, I've been paying attention to NASA's being busy readying the first test flight of a new generation of space vehicles designed to place men in orbit after the Space Shuttles retire...eventually evolving into having the capability to put Homo Sapiens back on the moon sometime in the year 3000 or something.
Take a look at the Ares I-X rocket on the pad in the background with the Space Shuttle in the foreground...
While the media was busy writing about "The Balloon Boy" and the President's basketball skills and FOX News obvious Right Wing bias, I've been paying attention to NASA's being busy readying the first test flight of a new generation of space vehicles designed to place men in orbit after the Space Shuttles retire...eventually evolving into having the capability to put Homo Sapiens back on the moon sometime in the year 3000 or something.
Take a look at the Ares I-X rocket on the pad in the background with the Space Shuttle in the foreground...
(From http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/091026-nasa-ares-1x-shuttle-snapshots.html)
While I'm happy that NASA has finally been allowed to address the replacement of the aging shuttle fleet, it also disgusts me that it's going to take longer to get a new spacecraft developed and get back to the Moon than it did in the 1960's.
How can it take a few rooms full of men wielding calculators with more computational power than the original Apollo Command Module's computer LONGER than it did a bunch of nerds with slide rules and pocket protectors to design a new moon rocket?
Have we fallen that far intellectually?
Or is the problem more insidious and basic?
Besides the obvious POLITICAL over/undertones, could it be that we as Americans--American Engineers--aren't cut from the same cloth as our predecessors of 40 years ago?
Do we not have the design and conceptual skills, are our colleges not teaching the fundamentals and leading us to prosper mentally and advance science at the same rate seen in the second half of the 20th century?
Or is it just that EVERYTHING is so damned %$#@ up and mucked up and glued together with the slimy funk of cultural and social decay...weighted down with the dumbing down of the American people in general...and held back by artificial demands for considerations of false self esteem...bankrupt under the burden of government mandates and funding of social "entitlement" programs which divert perfectly good money to the clamoring masses with baggy assed pants singing the lyrics of the latest rap/hip-hop song from memory while at the same time being unable to quote the pythagarean theorem.
Naaaaa...it's probably just bad luck or a result of the war on Terror/Al Quaeda and possibly the effects of global warming I guess...
That will be all...for now...
Dammit...
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Only The G O V E R N M E N T...
Would Make A Company Write Something Like This
So there I was, happily minding my own business when I found these words written in a "Green" bid solicitation this evening:
"While performing the duties of this job, the employee is frequently required to stand; walk; sit; and use hands to finger, handle, or feel. The employee is occasionally required to reach with hands and arms and talk or hear. The employee must occasionally lift and/or move up to 10 pounds. Specific vision abilities required by this job include close vision, distance vision, and ability to adjust focus."
But wait a minute...here I was thinking that "finger[ing], handling, and feeling" had pretty much been outlawed as being against the law in every state but San Francisco and Holland?
Any way, after I wiped the spit off my flat screen 22" HP monitor I ended up writing about it here on the blog tonight.
I've already wasted thirty minutes on the concept pacing around the room and pulling at what little hair I have on my head...
It's really a wonder I ever get anything done because I come across stupid crap like this all the time, but then I remember that my dear Mother told me the old "not saying anything nice...say nothing at all thing" adage but if I actually followed that...
I'd never say anyting at all.
Then I probably could get a G O V E R N M E N T J-O-B because everyone would think I wasdeaf and dumb "physically challenged" because all I would ever do is grunt and puff my cheeks up in an attempt to add extra volume to my head in order to keep it from EXPLODING.
Now where's my giant tub of ice water and my snorkel???
So there I was, happily minding my own business when I found these words written in a "Green" bid solicitation this evening:
"While performing the duties of this job, the employee is frequently required to stand; walk; sit; and use hands to finger, handle, or feel. The employee is occasionally required to reach with hands and arms and talk or hear. The employee must occasionally lift and/or move up to 10 pounds. Specific vision abilities required by this job include close vision, distance vision, and ability to adjust focus."
But wait a minute...here I was thinking that "finger[ing], handling, and feeling" had pretty much been outlawed as being against the law in every state but San Francisco and Holland?
Any way, after I wiped the spit off my flat screen 22" HP monitor I ended up writing about it here on the blog tonight.
I've already wasted thirty minutes on the concept pacing around the room and pulling at what little hair I have on my head...
It's really a wonder I ever get anything done because I come across stupid crap like this all the time, but then I remember that my dear Mother told me the old "not saying anything nice...say nothing at all thing" adage but if I actually followed that...
I'd never say anyting at all.
Then I probably could get a G O V E R N M E N T J-O-B because everyone would think I was
Now where's my giant tub of ice water and my snorkel???
My Thought For The Day
Mispelling Leads To Deep Philisophical Insight...
"The only thing between having a hose and a house is u."
(If you have to ask you probably blame the government for being homeless.)
heh...
"The only thing between having a hose and a house is u."
(If you have to ask you probably blame the government for being homeless.)
heh...
Saturday, October 24, 2009
I Feel Like A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court
Actually More Like An Alabama Redneck In A Sea Of Orange...
Have I mentioned that living in a "college town" pretty much sucks if you happen to not have attended the "town's college"?
Well...it does...at least until the team that's in season (as opposed to the game that's in hunting season like "wabbits" or ducks) loses three or four games.
Then things settle down and quieten up a good bit and you can stand to wander around in public without being assaulted.
Thus my situation here this morning on the banks of the mighty Tennessee River...in the middle of the 2009 College football season.
When you do go out for drinks or dinner or shopping here even with U of T's three losses to date we still see probably 50% of the people wearing orange or at least sporting a big orange T on their heads and breasts and backs and butt and feet and car bumpers.
The local newspaper--the Knoxville Sentinel--is equally difficult to stomach.
If the team is winning, the front page has a story and three quarters of the sports section is UT blaa blaaa blaaaaaa.
Likewise, if the team is losing, the front page has a story and three quarters of the sports section is UT boo hooo hooooo.
You can hardly EVER find any mention of anything except SEC sports...they'll instead print stories about the recruiting prospects of the UT Pick-up-sticks and bowling teams rather than write about anything going on in Atlanta or the ACC or in anywhere else in the country for that matter.
I guess I can understand, but still...the Oak Ridge National Lab and ranks of Tennessee Valley Authority offices are full of Auburn and Clemson and more importantly...
GEORGIA TECH ENGINEERS.
Yet God forbid they should ever mention GT's success thus far this season as UT faces being stomped by Alabama on Saturday.
And ME?
I'm faced knowing the Tech faces the University of Virginia at noon today in Charlottesville and I'm afraid that the Raycom broadcast won't be on our local moronic Comcast schedule.
So any way, I've been wandering around town in my GT shirts just for fun and last night at dinner I happened to end up sitting adjacent to an older Tech alum who was equally happy to find a fellow Rambling Wreck to talk to.
We spent a half hour swapping stories about the good old days down at the North Avenue Trade School, then I came home and went back to my new grind managing a new Website I'm developing and working on some proposals.
BTW...the company I incorporated just got it's first small order yesterday, so we're off and running and hopefully I'm no longer semi-retired/unemployed.
Of course it will take about twenty more orders like this to make some semblance of a living, but it's a start after a great deal of soul searching and planning and false starts over the past 10 months in limbo.
Time for a nap now...and wish me luck...if you will...
Have I mentioned that living in a "college town" pretty much sucks if you happen to not have attended the "town's college"?
Well...it does...at least until the team that's in season (as opposed to the game that's in hunting season like "wabbits" or ducks) loses three or four games.
Then things settle down and quieten up a good bit and you can stand to wander around in public without being assaulted.
Thus my situation here this morning on the banks of the mighty Tennessee River...in the middle of the 2009 College football season.
When you do go out for drinks or dinner or shopping here even with U of T's three losses to date we still see probably 50% of the people wearing orange or at least sporting a big orange T on their heads and breasts and backs and butt and feet and car bumpers.
The local newspaper--the Knoxville Sentinel--is equally difficult to stomach.
If the team is winning, the front page has a story and three quarters of the sports section is UT blaa blaaa blaaaaaa.
Likewise, if the team is losing, the front page has a story and three quarters of the sports section is UT boo hooo hooooo.
You can hardly EVER find any mention of anything except SEC sports...they'll instead print stories about the recruiting prospects of the UT Pick-up-sticks and bowling teams rather than write about anything going on in Atlanta or the ACC or in anywhere else in the country for that matter.
I guess I can understand, but still...the Oak Ridge National Lab and ranks of Tennessee Valley Authority offices are full of Auburn and Clemson and more importantly...
GEORGIA TECH ENGINEERS.
Yet God forbid they should ever mention GT's success thus far this season as UT faces being stomped by Alabama on Saturday.
And ME?
I'm faced knowing the Tech faces the University of Virginia at noon today in Charlottesville and I'm afraid that the Raycom broadcast won't be on our local moronic Comcast schedule.
So any way, I've been wandering around town in my GT shirts just for fun and last night at dinner I happened to end up sitting adjacent to an older Tech alum who was equally happy to find a fellow Rambling Wreck to talk to.
We spent a half hour swapping stories about the good old days down at the North Avenue Trade School, then I came home and went back to my new grind managing a new Website I'm developing and working on some proposals.
BTW...the company I incorporated just got it's first small order yesterday, so we're off and running and hopefully I'm no longer semi-retired/unemployed.
Of course it will take about twenty more orders like this to make some semblance of a living, but it's a start after a great deal of soul searching and planning and false starts over the past 10 months in limbo.
Time for a nap now...and wish me luck...if you will...
Friday, October 23, 2009
Slackard Video Blogging
I'm Still VERY Busy...
Take a look/listen at George Carlin's take on "Saving The Planet"...
(WARNING: George's usual coarse language...probably not safe for work if you work somewhere which monitors your internet usage...)
All I have to say is heh...
Take a look/listen at George Carlin's take on "Saving The Planet"...
(WARNING: George's usual coarse language...probably not safe for work if you work somewhere which monitors your internet usage...)
All I have to say is heh...
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Today's Humor
Lazy Bloggin Yields New Commedian?
Anyone but me never heard of "Mrs. Hughes"?
Here...take a listen and try not to blow your coffee out your nose...
Thanks again as always to Rodger over at Curmudgeonly & Skeptical
Anyone but me never heard of "Mrs. Hughes"?
Here...take a listen and try not to blow your coffee out your nose...
Thanks again as always to Rodger over at Curmudgeonly & Skeptical
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Haunted By "Cash For Clunkers"
I Told Everyone So...
I think some people thought I was crazy when I got heated up when I wrote More thoughts on cash for clunkers earlier.
Well...it looks like my predictions and economic analysis was was pretty darn spot-on, as reported in this News Paper story:
Berks dealers say federal clunkers program has made cheap, used vehicles harder to find
Dealers say program has made cheap, used vehicles harder to find
By Mike Urban
Reading Eagle
In her search for a cheap, used minivan for her and her husband, Krissy Dieroff has visited seven dealerships across Berks and Schuylkill counties in the last week, but to no avail.
"There's not much to pick from, and the ones we do find are overpriced," said Dieroff of Auburn, Schuylkill County, while browsing the lot of a city dealership on Monday.
Dieroff blames the shortage of inexpensive used cars on the federal cash-for-clunkers program, in which almost 700,000 used vehicles were traded in for newer, more fuel-efficient vehicles, and then scrapped.
continue reading here...
See ladies & gentlemen, the sniveling, booger eating, tree hugging, Kumbaya singing patchouli stinking, grown-up 1960's hippies currently residing in Washington DC working under job titles with the words "Economic" or "Economics" in them don't really know shit from shineola...
of if they do they just ignore the realities in pursuit of their own hidden agenda.
Either way the Voters should be PISSED OFF when things like this...so called "Government" taking 700,000 vehicles off the road in the name of helping prevent climate change...ends up hurting the very people they claim to be helping in the process.
Now just you wait for phase two of this government program to kick in...GIVING vouchers to "working families" to help offset the higher vehicle costs coming as result of phase one. Or maybe like some kind of mutant game show or Publishers Clearinghouse they'll just show up in peoples driveways with a new Prius or Corvette.
As usual, I have to go now and soak my head...
I think some people thought I was crazy when I got heated up when I wrote More thoughts on cash for clunkers earlier.
Well...it looks like my predictions and economic analysis was was pretty darn spot-on, as reported in this News Paper story:
Berks dealers say federal clunkers program has made cheap, used vehicles harder to find
Dealers say program has made cheap, used vehicles harder to find
By Mike Urban
Reading Eagle
In her search for a cheap, used minivan for her and her husband, Krissy Dieroff has visited seven dealerships across Berks and Schuylkill counties in the last week, but to no avail.
"There's not much to pick from, and the ones we do find are overpriced," said Dieroff of Auburn, Schuylkill County, while browsing the lot of a city dealership on Monday.
Dieroff blames the shortage of inexpensive used cars on the federal cash-for-clunkers program, in which almost 700,000 used vehicles were traded in for newer, more fuel-efficient vehicles, and then scrapped.
continue reading here...
See ladies & gentlemen, the sniveling, booger eating, tree hugging, Kumbaya singing patchouli stinking, grown-up 1960's hippies currently residing in Washington DC working under job titles with the words "Economic" or "Economics" in them don't really know shit from shineola...
of if they do they just ignore the realities in pursuit of their own hidden agenda.
Either way the Voters should be PISSED OFF when things like this...so called "Government" taking 700,000 vehicles off the road in the name of helping prevent climate change...ends up hurting the very people they claim to be helping in the process.
Now just you wait for phase two of this government program to kick in...GIVING vouchers to "working families" to help offset the higher vehicle costs coming as result of phase one. Or maybe like some kind of mutant game show or Publishers Clearinghouse they'll just show up in peoples driveways with a new Prius or Corvette.
As usual, I have to go now and soak my head...
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Wookin' Pa Nub In Ah Da Wong Paces
Having One Of My Buh-Weet Moments...
Sorry, but I don't have crap to say worth listening to this morning.
Imagine that?
I guess some say that's true most of the time, BUT...
In lieu of my normal original piercing political commentary and insightful wit, I suggest that you just go here and watch this silly video from the Eddie Murphy's SNL days:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nHiZ15x6Vt4
Then laugh with me at this clip:
Finally, I couldn't stop Googling and as a result I found another one of my SNL favorites of Dan Aykroyd doing a drunken Julia Child:
And thus this morning's blogging is saved with cheap Internet Videos.
heh ...
Sorry, but I don't have crap to say worth listening to this morning.
Imagine that?
I guess some say that's true most of the time, BUT...
In lieu of my normal original piercing political commentary and insightful wit, I suggest that you just go here and watch this silly video from the Eddie Murphy's SNL days:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nHiZ15x6Vt4
Then laugh with me at this clip:
Finally, I couldn't stop Googling and as a result I found another one of my SNL favorites of Dan Aykroyd doing a drunken Julia Child:
And thus this morning's blogging is saved with cheap Internet Videos.
heh ...
Monday, October 19, 2009
I have "Zero Tolerance" For "Zero Tolerance"
Dumbasses Take Control Of Our Planet and Edumacational System?
I happily, heartily, and with great hubris admit today that in my day I brought all kinds of stupid, non-essential crap to various public schools in the late 1960's and early to mid 1970's.
That said, I'm also sorry to report that if it were up to the current bunch of spineless, mindless so-called teachers and "administrators", emasculated eviscerated by and because of the pandering politicians making things represented to be "LAWS" over the past 35 years, I'd never have made it past the 11th grade because I'd have spent all of my time wearing prison pinstripes.
Then in college I proceeded to build things out of Plexiglas's tubing designed to break national and international drug laws, and spent a good deal of time carrying around a trumpet and a bottle of Jack Daniels in my boot when it was outlawed in a college football stadium.
Yet today I survived without killing anyone I'm aware of (unless they died laughing at my antics) and I sit here realizing that my punishment is watching how SUTPID many Americans have become.
That will be all...for now...
I happily, heartily, and with great hubris admit today that in my day I brought all kinds of stupid, non-essential crap to various public schools in the late 1960's and early to mid 1970's.
That said, I'm also sorry to report that if it were up to the current bunch of spineless, mindless so-called teachers and "administrators", emasculated eviscerated by and because of the pandering politicians making things represented to be "LAWS" over the past 35 years, I'd never have made it past the 11th grade because I'd have spent all of my time wearing prison pinstripes.
Then in college I proceeded to build things out of Plexiglas's tubing designed to break national and international drug laws, and spent a good deal of time carrying around a trumpet and a bottle of Jack Daniels in my boot when it was outlawed in a college football stadium.
Yet today I survived without killing anyone I'm aware of (unless they died laughing at my antics) and I sit here realizing that my punishment is watching how SUTPID many Americans have become.
That will be all...for now...
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Donna Shalala Speaks...
Think About This Government Issued Bullshit...
(paraphrasing)
"those of us that have coverage [health insurance]...can't afford to continue to pay for those of us that don't under our current system..."
I ended up spitting on my computer monitor as I watched this former Clinton era Head of the Department of Health and Human Resources bumble around talking to FOX News Mike Huckaby...
because I have to remind everyone of this.
(taking a big breath here...)
THE GOVERNMENT HAS NO MONEY TO PAY FOR ANYTHING.
They print money, but unless SOMEONE works to pay for it in exchange, it's worth nothing.
Thus the government has to come to a house, knock on a door, point a gun, and proceed to STEAL the MONEY from SOMEONE in order to GIVE it to SOMEONE ELSE.
Food, clothing, a roof, or "HEALTHCARE", it's still paid for with someone else's money if you don't pay for it.
Are you actually willing to demand a portion of someone else's life, energy, and efforts in order to pay for something you mistakenly believe you have a RIGHT to?
(paraphrasing)
"those of us that have coverage [health insurance]...can't afford to continue to pay for those of us that don't under our current system..."
I ended up spitting on my computer monitor as I watched this former Clinton era Head of the Department of Health and Human Resources bumble around talking to FOX News Mike Huckaby...
because I have to remind everyone of this.
(taking a big breath here...)
THE GOVERNMENT HAS NO MONEY TO PAY FOR ANYTHING.
They print money, but unless SOMEONE works to pay for it in exchange, it's worth nothing.
Thus the government has to come to a house, knock on a door, point a gun, and proceed to STEAL the MONEY from SOMEONE in order to GIVE it to SOMEONE ELSE.
Food, clothing, a roof, or "HEALTHCARE", it's still paid for with someone else's money if you don't pay for it.
Are you actually willing to demand a portion of someone else's life, energy, and efforts in order to pay for something you mistakenly believe you have a RIGHT to?
Mathmatically Challenged Dumbasses Allowed To Ruin Run The Country
"Sports Writers" Only Marginally More Impaired Than "Political Pundits"...
I'm sorry Folks...but this rant has been coming on for a number of years now.
OK...having been a Georgia Tech sports fan...you can make that a little over thirty years now.
It's not anything contagious or genetic that makes my head spin when it comes to the topic of the politics of "sports rankings."
I guess it's basically just the rank odor which ALWAYS to my way of thinking seems to emanate from that little column in the newspaper and now on the Internet when you see how the minds of so-called "Sports writers" work...and then by default how the balance of college sports ranking systems work when everything is all said and done.
Unfortunately I think that the determination of political candidates on a national level (and possibly a state and local level) also suffers from a related fatal viral illness--but I'll get to that topic later if I have the time and energy.
Any hoooo, most of those of you that don't live under a rock or in a discarded packing crate under a bridge somewhere outside of Macon, Georgia probably know that the College Football rankings come out every Sunday afternoon/evening in the months of August through early January.
This year again is no exception.
I just tuned in my computer and found this evening's latest posting--looking for my GT Yellow Jackets to have launched into the top ten in the national rankings.
WRONG...
Solidly beating the number 4 team...Virginia Tech... a team which has occupied the spots of #6, #5, and then #4 in the AP "sports writers" poll for the past three weeks...only gets them the number 11 spot in the minds of these rocket scientists.
This after crashing out of their national rankings after falling from the number 14 spot because of getting beat by the AP's #20 ranked Miami team a month ago...the VERY SAME MIAMI TEAM which rose up to NUMBER NINE in the rankings that week after beating Georgia Tech at number 14?
WTF?
Let's face it people, if you are a college sports fan you have to understand the bias which exists in the "sports media" just like it exists in the national media covering everything from "the balloon boy" to political races.
Sports writers are, in my personal considered Redneck opinion, biased, narcissistic, idiotic assholes which let their personal interests and opinions threaten and influence what has grown over the past fifty years to be a MULTI-BILLION DOLLAR enterprise...
the final outcome of each season of NCAA DIVISION I COLLEGE FOOTBALL.
And that's the reason I don't run around baseing my self worth and public stature on something which is so arbitrarily determined by a bunch of idiots that couldn't make 20 on the ACT or 1200 on the SAT before going to the local community college to get their journalistic education.
And I suspect that three quarters of these "sports writers" were also relegated to the position of "bench warmer" during their limited high school or college "sports careers."
"Sports Writers" or just "Monday Morning Quarterbacks," I totally hate people that spend their lives running around like walking billboards with University of Florida or Miami or Ohio State clothing, when the only time they ever likely set foot on a given College Campus was on Saturday afternoon trying to buy scalper tickets to "THE BIG GAME."
True sports fans are exactly that...FANS
"Sports Writers" should be neutral, but that's not going to ever happen...as evidenced by teams like Boise State and Iowa and Cincinnati hanging around endlessly in the top rankings of their Fraternity poll while at the same time none of these impotent teams ever manage to actually PLAY anyone with any credentials except their own conference "straw man" dummy teams.
In closing I have this to say about THAT to all of the people running around wearing a closet load of RED or Orange or GREEN or whatever color clothes with a big W or T or U on their chest or ass...
GET A REAL LIFE!!
Dammit
I'm sorry Folks...but this rant has been coming on for a number of years now.
OK...having been a Georgia Tech sports fan...you can make that a little over thirty years now.
It's not anything contagious or genetic that makes my head spin when it comes to the topic of the politics of "sports rankings."
I guess it's basically just the rank odor which ALWAYS to my way of thinking seems to emanate from that little column in the newspaper and now on the Internet when you see how the minds of so-called "Sports writers" work...and then by default how the balance of college sports ranking systems work when everything is all said and done.
Unfortunately I think that the determination of political candidates on a national level (and possibly a state and local level) also suffers from a related fatal viral illness--but I'll get to that topic later if I have the time and energy.
Any hoooo, most of those of you that don't live under a rock or in a discarded packing crate under a bridge somewhere outside of Macon, Georgia probably know that the College Football rankings come out every Sunday afternoon/evening in the months of August through early January.
This year again is no exception.
I just tuned in my computer and found this evening's latest posting--looking for my GT Yellow Jackets to have launched into the top ten in the national rankings.
WRONG...
Solidly beating the number 4 team...Virginia Tech... a team which has occupied the spots of #6, #5, and then #4 in the AP "sports writers" poll for the past three weeks...only gets them the number 11 spot in the minds of these rocket scientists.
This after crashing out of their national rankings after falling from the number 14 spot because of getting beat by the AP's #20 ranked Miami team a month ago...the VERY SAME MIAMI TEAM which rose up to NUMBER NINE in the rankings that week after beating Georgia Tech at number 14?
WTF?
Let's face it people, if you are a college sports fan you have to understand the bias which exists in the "sports media" just like it exists in the national media covering everything from "the balloon boy" to political races.
Sports writers are, in my personal considered Redneck opinion, biased, narcissistic, idiotic assholes which let their personal interests and opinions threaten and influence what has grown over the past fifty years to be a MULTI-BILLION DOLLAR enterprise...
the final outcome of each season of NCAA DIVISION I COLLEGE FOOTBALL.
And that's the reason I don't run around baseing my self worth and public stature on something which is so arbitrarily determined by a bunch of idiots that couldn't make 20 on the ACT or 1200 on the SAT before going to the local community college to get their journalistic education.
And I suspect that three quarters of these "sports writers" were also relegated to the position of "bench warmer" during their limited high school or college "sports careers."
"Sports Writers" or just "Monday Morning Quarterbacks," I totally hate people that spend their lives running around like walking billboards with University of Florida or Miami or Ohio State clothing, when the only time they ever likely set foot on a given College Campus was on Saturday afternoon trying to buy scalper tickets to "THE BIG GAME."
True sports fans are exactly that...FANS
"Sports Writers" should be neutral, but that's not going to ever happen...as evidenced by teams like Boise State and Iowa and Cincinnati hanging around endlessly in the top rankings of their Fraternity poll while at the same time none of these impotent teams ever manage to actually PLAY anyone with any credentials except their own conference "straw man" dummy teams.
In closing I have this to say about THAT to all of the people running around wearing a closet load of RED or Orange or GREEN or whatever color clothes with a big W or T or U on their chest or ass...
GET A REAL LIFE!!
Dammit
Georgia Tech "Up-ends" Virginia Tech 28-23
Wramblings From An Old Rambling Wreck...
As my regular readers know, unlike most if not many men, I rarely spend much time watching or talking about sports.
On this blog you hardly ever see any time or words devoted to the topic.
It's not because I'm entirely unfamiliar with the subject, it's just that I've chosen such a difficult faction of sports enterprises to follow through the years.
Starting with the Atlanta Braves on Ted Turner's Channel 17 TBS Cable network during the Dale Murphy/Phil Nekro era...
and then including the NFL's Atlanta Falcons living and dieing with Steve Bartkowski in the 1970's, my understandably jaded long suffering professional sports affection/affliction has be relegated these days to yelling occasionally about Pat's beloved Pittsburgh Steelers
...else nothing at all.
On the college front, long after the tenure of Heisman, Alexander, and Dodd (and Rodgers and Curry and Ross) and having attended virtually every home football game on North Avenue at historic Grant Field in Atlanta from 1977 until the late 1990's following Georgia Tech, and having season tickets to their basketball program's games throughout the 1990's, I feel I can speak authoritatively to topics relating to young men battling their way through their academic career on the gridiron or basketball court, yet today I spend a limited amount of time and money following those sports on any basis that could be considered anything beyond casual interest.
That said, this 2009 NCAA Division I College football season has again brought my attention back to the TV screen because of Georgia Tech's potential re-emergence on the national football scene.
After losing badly while ranked #13 to a lower ranked Miami team and being dropped from the national rankings, the Yellow Jackets have scratched and clawed and stung their way back past the likes of North Carolina and survived a game with nearly 100 points combined against Florida State...
to culminate last night in pushing past number 4 ranked VIRGINIA TECH with a solid second half performance.
Georgia Tech didn't "dominate", but they (notice I say "they", not "WE" because I didn't play there in my years on campus) won in the end, and for the first time since their 1990 National Championship Season I'm a little bit excited about the possibilities for the balance of this season.
The single loss to date at Miami will most likely keep the team from vying for the national title, but a nice New Years Bowl invitation and a better outcome than last year's debacle in the Georgia Dome against LSU (I spent a couple hundred dollars attending that event) could be in the making for the "Old White and Gold" team.
I'm not making any predictions, but then again things could be pretty interesting come December.
Go Jackets...
As my regular readers know, unlike most if not many men, I rarely spend much time watching or talking about sports.
On this blog you hardly ever see any time or words devoted to the topic.
It's not because I'm entirely unfamiliar with the subject, it's just that I've chosen such a difficult faction of sports enterprises to follow through the years.
Starting with the Atlanta Braves on Ted Turner's Channel 17 TBS Cable network during the Dale Murphy/Phil Nekro era...
and then including the NFL's Atlanta Falcons living and dieing with Steve Bartkowski in the 1970's, my understandably jaded long suffering professional sports affection/affliction has be relegated these days to yelling occasionally about Pat's beloved Pittsburgh Steelers
...else nothing at all.
On the college front, long after the tenure of Heisman, Alexander, and Dodd (and Rodgers and Curry and Ross) and having attended virtually every home football game on North Avenue at historic Grant Field in Atlanta from 1977 until the late 1990's following Georgia Tech, and having season tickets to their basketball program's games throughout the 1990's, I feel I can speak authoritatively to topics relating to young men battling their way through their academic career on the gridiron or basketball court, yet today I spend a limited amount of time and money following those sports on any basis that could be considered anything beyond casual interest.
That said, this 2009 NCAA Division I College football season has again brought my attention back to the TV screen because of Georgia Tech's potential re-emergence on the national football scene.
After losing badly while ranked #13 to a lower ranked Miami team and being dropped from the national rankings, the Yellow Jackets have scratched and clawed and stung their way back past the likes of North Carolina and survived a game with nearly 100 points combined against Florida State...
to culminate last night in pushing past number 4 ranked VIRGINIA TECH with a solid second half performance.
Georgia Tech didn't "dominate", but they (notice I say "they", not "WE" because I didn't play there in my years on campus) won in the end, and for the first time since their 1990 National Championship Season I'm a little bit excited about the possibilities for the balance of this season.
The single loss to date at Miami will most likely keep the team from vying for the national title, but a nice New Years Bowl invitation and a better outcome than last year's debacle in the Georgia Dome against LSU (I spent a couple hundred dollars attending that event) could be in the making for the "Old White and Gold" team.
I'm not making any predictions, but then again things could be pretty interesting come December.
Go Jackets...
Saturday, October 17, 2009
Today's 1980's Audio Flashback
The Church..."Under The Milky Way Tonight"
UPDATE: 10/19/09
I did this song at the local Karaoke Bar Saturday night...easy for my vocal range and it got a good crowd response because no one ever does it but everyone remembers it when you sing it.
UPDATE: 10/19/09
I did this song at the local Karaoke Bar Saturday night...easy for my vocal range and it got a good crowd response because no one ever does it but everyone remembers it when you sing it.
This Weekend's Audio Flashback
Mushy Mid 1970's Music...
Can anyone believe I used to have hair sorta like that?
Can anyone believe I used to have hair sorta like that?
Friday, October 16, 2009
One Bad Apple Spoils Every Barrel
Being Your Own Worse Enemy...
I just had an interesting experience this noontime today.
I called the US office of a company based in France which builds a machine that I have the opportunity to support on an O&M basis, and much to my surprise...
THEY WON'T SELL ME PARTS FOR THEIR MACHINE.
Without "Permission."
Paraphrasing the conversation with the polite lady with the title of "Spare Parts Manager":
"We have to have a letter from the company that owns our machine telling us that you are authorized to work on on their machines else we can't even QUOTE YOU PRICES for spare parts."
[silence...heavy breathing]
(Taking a big breath here boss)
WTF?
I guess that now I have to remind everyone of the story of Apple Computer Corporation, the company that owned the "Personal Computer" market until 1982/1983 when IBM came on the scene.
You see, Apple's downfall and relegation to second tier status in the computer business...living a life as the machine favored by the "arty/farty, dope smoking, patchouli stinking hippy and sniveling, booger eating, tree hugger crowd"...was their insistence on clinging to a "closed" hardware/software system architecture where the only innovations and advancements came from within APPLE and their tightly controlled community of software developers.
IBM, on the other hand, virtually gave away their drawings of their computer and begged smart people to write programs and build expansion cards for their "open architecture."
Anyone but me ever buy a "QuadRAM board with extra serial I/O ports" to get a PC with a system clock with a battery back up?
And the end result?
There's a ZILLION IBM PC clones out there today built by companies with names from Acer to Zenith, and computer store isles are filled with software to support the machines based on the ancestry of the old Intel 8080 CPU chip.
Meanwhile Apple languishes in a small back corner area of those same stores, having recently resorted to building their own machines that can act like a "normal" APPLE Computer while at the same time imitating a "REAL" IBM PC clone machine in order to try to draw in a larger user base. (A business associate of mine bought one for about $4000 and absolutely hates it and nevers uses it in "APPLE" mode.)
Needless to say that these French Assholes haven't heard the last from me, because I already have pricing from regular industrial supply houses for a box full of o-rings and gaskets and for the time being I'll just make do without them...probably giving my customer a LOWER price in the process.
Free trade isn't FREE, but my money is as green as the next guy's/gal's and I have a LONG memory and little allegiance to anything without red/white/blue on the label.
Dammit...
I just had an interesting experience this noontime today.
I called the US office of a company based in France which builds a machine that I have the opportunity to support on an O&M basis, and much to my surprise...
THEY WON'T SELL ME PARTS FOR THEIR MACHINE.
Without "Permission."
Paraphrasing the conversation with the polite lady with the title of "Spare Parts Manager":
"We have to have a letter from the company that owns our machine telling us that you are authorized to work on on their machines else we can't even QUOTE YOU PRICES for spare parts."
[silence...heavy breathing]
(Taking a big breath here boss)
WTF?
I guess that now I have to remind everyone of the story of Apple Computer Corporation, the company that owned the "Personal Computer" market until 1982/1983 when IBM came on the scene.
You see, Apple's downfall and relegation to second tier status in the computer business...living a life as the machine favored by the "arty/farty, dope smoking, patchouli stinking hippy and sniveling, booger eating, tree hugger crowd"...was their insistence on clinging to a "closed" hardware/software system architecture where the only innovations and advancements came from within APPLE and their tightly controlled community of software developers.
IBM, on the other hand, virtually gave away their drawings of their computer and begged smart people to write programs and build expansion cards for their "open architecture."
Anyone but me ever buy a "QuadRAM board with extra serial I/O ports" to get a PC with a system clock with a battery back up?
And the end result?
There's a ZILLION IBM PC clones out there today built by companies with names from Acer to Zenith, and computer store isles are filled with software to support the machines based on the ancestry of the old Intel 8080 CPU chip.
Meanwhile Apple languishes in a small back corner area of those same stores, having recently resorted to building their own machines that can act like a "normal" APPLE Computer while at the same time imitating a "REAL" IBM PC clone machine in order to try to draw in a larger user base. (A business associate of mine bought one for about $4000 and absolutely hates it and nevers uses it in "APPLE" mode.)
Needless to say that these French Assholes haven't heard the last from me, because I already have pricing from regular industrial supply houses for a box full of o-rings and gaskets and for the time being I'll just make do without them...probably giving my customer a LOWER price in the process.
Free trade isn't FREE, but my money is as green as the next guy's/gal's and I have a LONG memory and little allegiance to anything without red/white/blue on the label.
Dammit...
Stupid Crap Keeps Happening And The News People Swallow It...
Hook Line And Stinker Sinker
OK Everybody...I'm taking up a collection and building a really big balloon, and then I'm going to spend the afternoon hiding in my attic after I launch it.
Here's my design, modeled after the locally famous "peach" water tower up off I-85 in Gaffney, SC. (Just in case you're wondering, my next balloon design will be modeled after a giant tube of "Preparation H.")
If you see me coming you better watch out and AVOID anything falling out that you see heading your way...
after all...
If the US Congress can Crap all over everyone...
I don't see why I can't take the opportunity to fly past and dump a little well intended feces in your life just to show you that I care.
Heh...
OK Everybody...I'm taking up a collection and building a really big balloon, and then I'm going to spend the afternoon hiding in my attic after I launch it.
Here's my design, modeled after the locally famous "peach" water tower up off I-85 in Gaffney, SC. (Just in case you're wondering, my next balloon design will be modeled after a giant tube of "Preparation H.")
If you see me coming you better watch out and AVOID anything falling out that you see heading your way...
after all...
If the US Congress can Crap all over everyone...
I don't see why I can't take the opportunity to fly past and dump a little well intended feces in your life just to show you that I care.
Heh...
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Replacement Terminology For My "Sniveling, Booger Eating, Bed Wetting, Eco-Friendly, Communist, Global Warming Believing Socialist Liberals..."
I Need A New "Anachronism..."
All Liberals are democrats, and all democrats are twig eatin', tofu fartin', lily livered, Prius driving, America-hating, bleeding heart liberal, blinkered, Starbucks drinking, elitist, can't-we-all-just-get-along, granola eating, namby-pamby, Birkenstock wearing, tree hugging, long haired, pansy-assed, kumbaya-singing, Earth First, bed-wetting, patchouli wearing, dirty, smelly, dope smoking, bongo playing, arm pit haired women and feminized, armpit shaved men crying "Mother Earth is Gaia," tortured "artiste" types, Kennedy DNA bearing slugs
Thanks Again Rodge
All Liberals are democrats, and all democrats are twig eatin', tofu fartin', lily livered, Prius driving, America-hating, bleeding heart liberal, blinkered, Starbucks drinking, elitist, can't-we-all-just-get-along, granola eating, namby-pamby, Birkenstock wearing, tree hugging, long haired, pansy-assed, kumbaya-singing, Earth First, bed-wetting, patchouli wearing, dirty, smelly, dope smoking, bongo playing, arm pit haired women and feminized, armpit shaved men crying "Mother Earth is Gaia," tortured "artiste" types, Kennedy DNA bearing slugs
Thanks Again Rodge
Slackard Blogging
I Wish I'd Thought Of This Stuff First...
If a conservative doesn't like guns, he doesn't buy one.
If a liberal doesn't like guns, he wants all guns outlawed.
If a conservative is a vegetarian, he doesn't eat meat.
If a liberal is a vegetarian, he wants all meat products banned for everyone.
If a conservative is homosexual, he quietly leads his life.
If a liberal is homosexual, he demands legislated respect.
If a conservative is down-and-out, he thinks about how to better his situation.
If A liberal is facing living on the street, he demands to know who is going to take care of him.
If a conservative doesn’t like a talk show host, he switches channels.
Liberals demand that those they don’t like be shut down.
If a conservative is a non-believer, he doesn’t go to church.
A liberal non-believer wants any mention of God and religion silenced. (Unless it’s a foreign religion, of course!)
If a conservative decides he needs health care, he goes about shopping for it, or may choose a job that provides it.
A liberal with a festering foot or ear lobe...demands that the rest of us pay for his.
If a conservative slips and falls in a store, he gets up, laughs and is embarrassed.
If a liberal slips and falls in his own apartment, he grabs his neck, moans like he's in labor and then sues the apartment management.
If a conservative reads this, he'll forward it so his friends can have a good laugh.
A liberal, moving his lips as he scans these lines, will delete it because he's "offended"
(or comment anonymously calling me a racist and bigot.)
Slightly edited from my Blog Idol Rodger over at Curmudgeonly & Skeptical
If a conservative doesn't like guns, he doesn't buy one.
If a liberal doesn't like guns, he wants all guns outlawed.
If a conservative is a vegetarian, he doesn't eat meat.
If a liberal is a vegetarian, he wants all meat products banned for everyone.
If a conservative is homosexual, he quietly leads his life.
If a liberal is homosexual, he demands legislated respect.
If a conservative is down-and-out, he thinks about how to better his situation.
If A liberal is facing living on the street, he demands to know who is going to take care of him.
If a conservative doesn’t like a talk show host, he switches channels.
Liberals demand that those they don’t like be shut down.
If a conservative is a non-believer, he doesn’t go to church.
A liberal non-believer wants any mention of God and religion silenced. (Unless it’s a foreign religion, of course!)
If a conservative decides he needs health care, he goes about shopping for it, or may choose a job that provides it.
A liberal with a festering foot or ear lobe...demands that the rest of us pay for his.
If a conservative slips and falls in a store, he gets up, laughs and is embarrassed.
If a liberal slips and falls in his own apartment, he grabs his neck, moans like he's in labor and then sues the apartment management.
If a conservative reads this, he'll forward it so his friends can have a good laugh.
A liberal, moving his lips as he scans these lines, will delete it because he's "offended"
(or comment anonymously calling me a racist and bigot.)
Slightly edited from my Blog Idol Rodger over at Curmudgeonly & Skeptical
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Will Somebody Call Someone...Will Somebody Do SOMETHING???
Here...Read These Words...
From my Blog Idols over at Powerline blog:
...What is meant by a "weak mandate" is that, in the current version of the Baucus bill, there is no requirement to buy health insurance at all until after 2013, and by 2017 the penalty for failing to buy health insurance still amounts to only about 15% of the cost of the insurance. Now, think about it: if you know that you don't have to buy health insurance when you are young and healthy, but if you should get sick, or just get older, you can apply for health insurance at any time and it will be illegal for the insurance company to turn you down, what would you do? Obviously, you would defer buying insurance unless and until you get sick. This means that the pool of those who are insured will be lower quality, and the cost therefore higher for everyone who buys insurance. It is as though you could wait until you die, and then your heirs can buy life insurance on you.
This isn't reform, it is stupidity.
It actually would be very easy to make health insurance cheaper. All we have to do is allow insurance companies to compete nationally instead of state-by-state and eliminate all mandates that limit consumer choice. It has been estimated that these simple reforms--which are not part of any of the Democrats' "reform" bills, for obvious reasons--would reduce health care costs by one-quarter to one-third. Instead of such common-sense reforms, the Dems are proposing Rube Goldberg measures that will make health care more expensive. Instead of eliminating mandates, their measures, including the Baucus bill, increase them--in effect making cheaper health insurance illegal.
Once more: this isn't reform, it is stupidity.
I have to go now and fill the kitchen sink with ice and soak my head...If you're interested in this topic , Go here and read the whole blog article.
From my Blog Idols over at Powerline blog:
...What is meant by a "weak mandate" is that, in the current version of the Baucus bill, there is no requirement to buy health insurance at all until after 2013, and by 2017 the penalty for failing to buy health insurance still amounts to only about 15% of the cost of the insurance. Now, think about it: if you know that you don't have to buy health insurance when you are young and healthy, but if you should get sick, or just get older, you can apply for health insurance at any time and it will be illegal for the insurance company to turn you down, what would you do? Obviously, you would defer buying insurance unless and until you get sick. This means that the pool of those who are insured will be lower quality, and the cost therefore higher for everyone who buys insurance. It is as though you could wait until you die, and then your heirs can buy life insurance on you.
This isn't reform, it is stupidity.
It actually would be very easy to make health insurance cheaper. All we have to do is allow insurance companies to compete nationally instead of state-by-state and eliminate all mandates that limit consumer choice. It has been estimated that these simple reforms--which are not part of any of the Democrats' "reform" bills, for obvious reasons--would reduce health care costs by one-quarter to one-third. Instead of such common-sense reforms, the Dems are proposing Rube Goldberg measures that will make health care more expensive. Instead of eliminating mandates, their measures, including the Baucus bill, increase them--in effect making cheaper health insurance illegal.
Once more: this isn't reform, it is stupidity.
I have to go now and fill the kitchen sink with ice and soak my head...If you're interested in this topic , Go here and read the whole blog article.
Monday, October 12, 2009
Nobel Committee Slights Obama
Prize In Economics Goes To Michael Vick
Coming up for air after working in my basement shop all morning, I was cruising Drudge Report trying to find out what was happening in the world when I saw this Wall Street Journal Story lamenting President Obama NOT receiving the Nobel Prize in Economics this year.
With a little more Googling I found this secret photo of the Nobel Committee deliberating their internationally significant earth-shattering decisions:
Coming up for air after working in my basement shop all morning, I was cruising Drudge Report trying to find out what was happening in the world when I saw this Wall Street Journal Story lamenting President Obama NOT receiving the Nobel Prize in Economics this year.
With a little more Googling I found this secret photo of the Nobel Committee deliberating their internationally significant earth-shattering decisions:
Obama has as much business winning the Nobel Prize in ANYTHING...Economics, Physics, Peace, or Bungee Jumping...as I have showing up at the Super Bowl in a Helmet, pads, and a Football Uniform.
Speaking of Football, here's a photo of this years Nobel Economics winner prior to declaring bankruptcy after going to jail and forfeiting his Zillion dollar a year contract with the Atlanta Falcons...
You got to love a Brother with spirit...
Heh.
Saturday, October 10, 2009
New Dairy Queen Blizzard Flavor
"Chunky Nobel Peace Prize"
Here...take a look at the new DQ menu item celebrating our President receiving his latest round of international recognition...
I guess it's good that you get to keep the cup, but then again... I suspect that the aftertaste will never fade...
(yes...it's me and my Photoshop at it again...)
Here...take a look at the new DQ menu item celebrating our President receiving his latest round of international recognition...
I guess it's good that you get to keep the cup, but then again... I suspect that the aftertaste will never fade...
(yes...it's me and my Photoshop at it again...)
Friday, October 09, 2009
Foreign Socialists Continue To Meddle
Nobel Prizes Made Of Silly Putty and Dog Poop...
So there I was this morning, pounding away on a proposal with one hand and wiggling my mouse doing an AutoCAD drawing with the other, when I decided to break the silence in my office by tuning in to Neal Boortz's streaming broadcast on the Web this morning.
Then the first thing I heard was President Obama giving some kind of speech.
Then my face fell off as my head exploded as I realized that this wasn't a "hope and change" speech or a "government health care reform" speech....
this empty suit was delivering his "ACCEPTING THE NOBEL PEACE PRIZE" speech.
As I picked my face up off the floor and stuffed my Cerebellum and Medulla Oblongata back into my fractured cranium I felt a little better because I remembered that this same bunch of foreign sniveling booger eating eco friendly climate change disciples had also previously handed the same prize to the likes of Yasser Arafat and Jimmuh Carter.
Still, it pisses me off that they hand the thing to Obamarama after being in office for less than ten months and having accomplished WHAT?
Nothing
Nada
Buttkiss
I seem to remember in spite of his January pledges that Gitmo's still full of abused naked peaceful Muslim "detainees" being forced to watch Koran's being flushed down the toilet.
And aren't Americans are still dropping on the under staffed battlefields of Afghanistan and Pakistan?
The only thing Obamamrama has done to date is run around the planet apologizing for imagined mistakes and wrongs committed over the past 233 years...
and telling the Israelis to stop building houses and play nice with the Palestinians and Hammas.
Some %$#@ Peacemaker.
I say if SURRENDER and APPEASEMENT is the only thing necessary to win a Nobe Peace Prize, they aught to just print them up and sell them in flea markets and at yard sales.
Dammit...
So there I was this morning, pounding away on a proposal with one hand and wiggling my mouse doing an AutoCAD drawing with the other, when I decided to break the silence in my office by tuning in to Neal Boortz's streaming broadcast on the Web this morning.
Then the first thing I heard was President Obama giving some kind of speech.
Then my face fell off as my head exploded as I realized that this wasn't a "hope and change" speech or a "government health care reform" speech....
this empty suit was delivering his "ACCEPTING THE NOBEL PEACE PRIZE" speech.
As I picked my face up off the floor and stuffed my Cerebellum and Medulla Oblongata back into my fractured cranium I felt a little better because I remembered that this same bunch of foreign sniveling booger eating eco friendly climate change disciples had also previously handed the same prize to the likes of Yasser Arafat and Jimmuh Carter.
Still, it pisses me off that they hand the thing to Obamarama after being in office for less than ten months and having accomplished WHAT?
Nothing
Nada
Buttkiss
I seem to remember in spite of his January pledges that Gitmo's still full of abused naked peaceful Muslim "detainees" being forced to watch Koran's being flushed down the toilet.
And aren't Americans are still dropping on the under staffed battlefields of Afghanistan and Pakistan?
The only thing Obamamrama has done to date is run around the planet apologizing for imagined mistakes and wrongs committed over the past 233 years...
and telling the Israelis to stop building houses and play nice with the Palestinians and Hammas.
Some %$#@ Peacemaker.
I say if SURRENDER and APPEASEMENT is the only thing necessary to win a Nobe Peace Prize, they aught to just print them up and sell them in flea markets and at yard sales.
Dammit...
Thursday, October 08, 2009
Paducah Manusha
Road Rumblings--Day Two
After an uneventful trip of reasonable length yesterday, we managed to rumble into Western Kentucky in time for happy hour and dinner at "The Texas Roadhouse" adjacent to our hotel parking lot.
As usual when recovering from a multi day bout of "Internet Deprivation Syndrome," I was up half the night to all hours doing some work and catching up on the news on Drudge and the Blogs.
Now it's time to jump in the shower, reload the Turbo pups lockers and sea chests in the car, and blast on across Kentucky/Tennessee in time for a mid afternoon arrival at the Turbo Pup compound.
Regards Y'all
After an uneventful trip of reasonable length yesterday, we managed to rumble into Western Kentucky in time for happy hour and dinner at "The Texas Roadhouse" adjacent to our hotel parking lot.
As usual when recovering from a multi day bout of "Internet Deprivation Syndrome," I was up half the night to all hours doing some work and catching up on the news on Drudge and the Blogs.
Now it's time to jump in the shower, reload the Turbo pups lockers and sea chests in the car, and blast on across Kentucky/Tennessee in time for a mid afternoon arrival at the Turbo Pup compound.
Regards Y'all
Wednesday, October 07, 2009
Eastward Bound
Ready To Sleep In My Own Bed...
We woke up to a light frost on the roofs here this morning in Western Missouri.
There's a busy day ahead for everyone packing the Turbo Pup's lockers and sea chests into the Chrysler 300 in preparation of making the first leg of our journey over to Paducah, Kentucky by mid afternoon, then on back to the banks of the Mighty Tennessee River on Thursday morning.
Pat's been able to spend a week with a daughter and two soon-to-be grown granddaughters and I've made some substantial headway on the professional front and all and all I'd have to declare this to have been a successful trip...assuming that we have a safe return journey over the upcoming 725 miles of interstate highway insanity.
I still haven't had time to come up with anything creative to say regarding the stuffed shirts up in Washington DC or the other world insanities going on which hasn't already been said on FOX News or talk radio, but it's been sort of nice to act like most "regular" Americans and be so distracted I don't have a clue what's going on.
I'm sure that by Friday or Saturday I'll have developed another full "head" of steam and be spouting off about something that's making my head spin at "orbital rotational velocity."
In the mean time wish us a safe trip and continue to feel free to entertain yourselves...
if you will...
Regards Y'all
We woke up to a light frost on the roofs here this morning in Western Missouri.
There's a busy day ahead for everyone packing the Turbo Pup's lockers and sea chests into the Chrysler 300 in preparation of making the first leg of our journey over to Paducah, Kentucky by mid afternoon, then on back to the banks of the Mighty Tennessee River on Thursday morning.
Pat's been able to spend a week with a daughter and two soon-to-be grown granddaughters and I've made some substantial headway on the professional front and all and all I'd have to declare this to have been a successful trip...assuming that we have a safe return journey over the upcoming 725 miles of interstate highway insanity.
I still haven't had time to come up with anything creative to say regarding the stuffed shirts up in Washington DC or the other world insanities going on which hasn't already been said on FOX News or talk radio, but it's been sort of nice to act like most "regular" Americans and be so distracted I don't have a clue what's going on.
I'm sure that by Friday or Saturday I'll have developed another full "head" of steam and be spouting off about something that's making my head spin at "orbital rotational velocity."
In the mean time wish us a safe trip and continue to feel free to entertain yourselves...
if you will...
Regards Y'all
Tuesday, October 06, 2009
A Basement Without Internet
Is a Dungeon...
You can probably tell that I've not had much time or energy to write anything here on the blog the past few days during the daylight hours.
Thus since I only have sporatic wireless capability that makes the signal come and go with the phases of the moon and some sort of other mystical phenomena, night time blogging is virtually impossible.
I've had to just learn to live with only two or three hours of Internet...it's been a rather cathartic, soul cleansing experience.
I have a sales meeting with the local production facility for a international plastics products company later this afternoon regarding an enterprise which I still don't feel at liberty to discuss here on the blog, then we head back toward the banks of the Mighty Tennessee River tomorrow stopping overnight in the metropolis of Paducah, Kentucky overnight.
Time to go now and finish my sales outline I guess.
Will someone find me something in the news to be mad about in the mean time?
You can probably tell that I've not had much time or energy to write anything here on the blog the past few days during the daylight hours.
Thus since I only have sporatic wireless capability that makes the signal come and go with the phases of the moon and some sort of other mystical phenomena, night time blogging is virtually impossible.
I've had to just learn to live with only two or three hours of Internet...it's been a rather cathartic, soul cleansing experience.
I have a sales meeting with the local production facility for a international plastics products company later this afternoon regarding an enterprise which I still don't feel at liberty to discuss here on the blog, then we head back toward the banks of the Mighty Tennessee River tomorrow stopping overnight in the metropolis of Paducah, Kentucky overnight.
Time to go now and finish my sales outline I guess.
Will someone find me something in the news to be mad about in the mean time?
Monday, October 05, 2009
Weekend Overload
Kansas City Rockin'
If you didn't have to work or spend time mowing the lawn...Man you should have been out here in Kansas City this weekend.
This place was rocking.
Besides the American Royal BBQ event, the city also hosted the NASCAR race and the NFL home football game on Sunday.
Giant crowds everywhere but where we were because other than the Royal BBQ the members of our extended household managed to stay safely away in the KC suburb of Liberty, MO.
On the college football front I was happy to see Georgia Tech beat Mississippi State and Auburn stomped on Tennessee (thus keeping things a little quieter when we return to the Turbo Pup Compound.)
So now there's a little professional business to take care of over the next couple of days as we continue to enjoy fall in the Midwest, then back toward the east on Wednesday.
I'll try to catch up on the news this morning and see if I can find something to complain about here on the Internet.
In the mean time, feel free to entertain yourselves...
If you didn't have to work or spend time mowing the lawn...Man you should have been out here in Kansas City this weekend.
This place was rocking.
Besides the American Royal BBQ event, the city also hosted the NASCAR race and the NFL home football game on Sunday.
Giant crowds everywhere but where we were because other than the Royal BBQ the members of our extended household managed to stay safely away in the KC suburb of Liberty, MO.
On the college football front I was happy to see Georgia Tech beat Mississippi State and Auburn stomped on Tennessee (thus keeping things a little quieter when we return to the Turbo Pup Compound.)
So now there's a little professional business to take care of over the next couple of days as we continue to enjoy fall in the Midwest, then back toward the east on Wednesday.
I'll try to catch up on the news this morning and see if I can find something to complain about here on the Internet.
In the mean time, feel free to entertain yourselves...
Friday, October 02, 2009
Oh By The Way...
In Other News...Remember This promise???
Yes?
Well...take a look at the reality:
Yes?
Well...take a look at the reality:
and I guess that it's OK that they just keep on keeping on?
Hittin' The "Reset Button"
Maybe He Pushed It Too Hard...
After hacking into a neighbor's unsecured wireless network (the home we're staying in has wired Internet) I've been spazing most of mid-day today watching some training DVD's and not living on the Internet as I usually do.
Regardless, I had to chuckle when I skipped over to Drudge Report and learned that Rio de Janeiro beat out Japan, Madrid, and Chicago to host the 2016 Olympics.
You see, I'm not just happy (or maybe just not unhappy) about the defeat because Obama and his fellow ChicagoPolitical Democratic Thugs Obamamaniacs had spent a zillion dollars of taxpayer money on their bid...seeing the President make a personal appearance in support of the effort.
No, I'm happy to see a City/County in South America get the Olympics on the Continent for the VERY FIRST TIME and further...
if you read the fine print it's going to SAVE all of us American TAXPAYERS tens of zillions of dollars because in reality the City of Chicago is NEARLY BROKE and was counting on Obama to toss "stimulus funds" in their direction to pay for new stadiums and parks and bridges.
I personally lived through the Atlanta Olympic bid process in the late 1980's and saw the results of the infighting, political double dealing, and outright theft that occurred in my City by the time the actual Games arrived in the summer of 1996. I was so enthused I LEFT TOWN and didn't manage to make or spend a single dime on the Olympics or Olympics paraphernalia.
And then there were all of the rumors of insider dealings already underway giving away political favors and government funding to people inside the White House to do things like renovate dilapidated housing or even build new housing for Olympic athletes which would be turned over to private citizens or companies when the games were over (see Napolitano, Janet.)
When it's all said and done, I believe in all seriousness that it's a GOOD THING Chicago's Olympics Bid ended up "going south", as I resist wanting to drop onto the ground laughing hysterically at yet another event showing our dictator/terrorist butt kissing President/Savior what "TALKING" and "ENGAGING" and "APOLOGIZING" for things we as a country haven't done to the world over the past 223 years gets him and more importantly...
gets US...
YOU and ME as American citizens and taxpayers.
That would be N O T H I N G...
N A D A
Z E R O
Z I L C H.
All of his smiling and romancing and proclaiming he's a different kind of president in charge of a country that has learned our lesson couldn't save an Olympic bid any more than it's going to stop the Koreans or Iranians from building warheads and loaning them to the next wild eyed virgin seeker with a few million of al Queda's cash in their backpack.
Got my point?
Now it's time to watch some more videos I guess
After hacking into a neighbor's unsecured wireless network (the home we're staying in has wired Internet) I've been spazing most of mid-day today watching some training DVD's and not living on the Internet as I usually do.
Regardless, I had to chuckle when I skipped over to Drudge Report and learned that Rio de Janeiro beat out Japan, Madrid, and Chicago to host the 2016 Olympics.
You see, I'm not just happy (or maybe just not unhappy) about the defeat because Obama and his fellow Chicago
No, I'm happy to see a City/County in South America get the Olympics on the Continent for the VERY FIRST TIME and further...
if you read the fine print it's going to SAVE all of us American TAXPAYERS tens of zillions of dollars because in reality the City of Chicago is NEARLY BROKE and was counting on Obama to toss "stimulus funds" in their direction to pay for new stadiums and parks and bridges.
I personally lived through the Atlanta Olympic bid process in the late 1980's and saw the results of the infighting, political double dealing, and outright theft that occurred in my City by the time the actual Games arrived in the summer of 1996. I was so enthused I LEFT TOWN and didn't manage to make or spend a single dime on the Olympics or Olympics paraphernalia.
And then there were all of the rumors of insider dealings already underway giving away political favors and government funding to people inside the White House to do things like renovate dilapidated housing or even build new housing for Olympic athletes which would be turned over to private citizens or companies when the games were over (see Napolitano, Janet.)
When it's all said and done, I believe in all seriousness that it's a GOOD THING Chicago's Olympics Bid ended up "going south", as I resist wanting to drop onto the ground laughing hysterically at yet another event showing our dictator/terrorist butt kissing President/Savior what "TALKING" and "ENGAGING" and "APOLOGIZING" for things we as a country haven't done to the world over the past 223 years gets him and more importantly...
gets US...
YOU and ME as American citizens and taxpayers.
That would be N O T H I N G...
N A D A
Z E R O
Z I L C H.
All of his smiling and romancing and proclaiming he's a different kind of president in charge of a country that has learned our lesson couldn't save an Olympic bid any more than it's going to stop the Koreans or Iranians from building warheads and loaning them to the next wild eyed virgin seeker with a few million of al Queda's cash in their backpack.
Got my point?
Now it's time to watch some more videos I guess
Thursday, October 01, 2009
On The Road Again
Low Battery Limits Blogging...
Disagreeable weather today will delay our departure on the second leg of our cross country trip.
An then my ignoring an ongoing power adapter plug problem on the old HP laptop has me sitting here typing with one hand while I hold the power cable with the other.
Feel free to read a few stories of ratbastard Democratic insanity on Drudgereport and then raise heck in the manner you would expect me to in the mean time
Disagreeable weather today will delay our departure on the second leg of our cross country trip.
An then my ignoring an ongoing power adapter plug problem on the old HP laptop has me sitting here typing with one hand while I hold the power cable with the other.
Feel free to read a few stories of ratbastard Democratic insanity on Drudgereport and then raise heck in the manner you would expect me to in the mean time
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
They Already Have The Christmas Stuff Out???
And I haven't Even Carved My Pumpkin And Made My Scarecrow...
So there I was, back in Home Depot this morning...making my bi-weekly visit to the "return counter" (this time with receipt in hand...got a cash refund...Woo Hoooo...)
While wandering away into the sea of "home improvement" products counting my change I momentarily noticed something I had failed to comment on EARLIER and which I was JUST again reminded of by a TV commercial on FOX News advertising something defined as "seasonal music."
What I'm talking about is that here it is...the thirtieth day of September...and Home Depot and the late night TV advertisers are already talking about trying to get me to spend money on of all things...
C H R I S T M A S ?
Further...
Christmas Decorations?
Let me ask everyone...IF I bought lights and a boat load of shiny tinsel, where am I supposed to put these trapping to store them between now and the time I can legitimately hang them out on my front door and along the eaves of my house?
Am I supposed to have a pumpkin with colored lights and fake snow and a herd of Reindeer grazing on the lawn nearby?
Or could I erect a display on my lawn of Pilgrims eating the first Thanksgiving Feast with a "weird beard" Santa and a flock of mutant radio active turkeys from the TV series South Park looking on?
Not to worry...being the ultimate "non-consumer" I'll easily pass the animated cackling witches and the smiling and nodding Santa mannequins and keep myself focused on the Tapcon Concrete fasteners and the products on the electrical isles.
In other news, later this morning I'm loading Pat and Missy the Turbo Pup and all of their luggage and lockers and sea chests up in the newly washed and serviced Chrysler 300 and we're heading off toward Kansas City, Missouri for a week or so, stopping over night in St. Louis to break the west bound trip into two smaller segments.
In addition to visiting with Pat's family and celebrating a Grand Daughter's 18th birthday, we also have the privilege of attending a private party at the American Royal BBQ Event on Friday night and then there's a bunch of other business stuff going on which I'm not at liberty to talk about publicly yet.
Once again the Internet availability will be somewhat questionable along the way, but I ask that if you don't hear from me within three or four days that somebody please send up a flare and organize a search party.
Regards Y'all...
So there I was, back in Home Depot this morning...making my bi-weekly visit to the "return counter" (this time with receipt in hand...got a cash refund...Woo Hoooo...)
While wandering away into the sea of "home improvement" products counting my change I momentarily noticed something I had failed to comment on EARLIER and which I was JUST again reminded of by a TV commercial on FOX News advertising something defined as "seasonal music."
What I'm talking about is that here it is...the thirtieth day of September...and Home Depot and the late night TV advertisers are already talking about trying to get me to spend money on of all things...
C H R I S T M A S ?
Further...
Christmas Decorations?
Let me ask everyone...IF I bought lights and a boat load of shiny tinsel, where am I supposed to put these trapping to store them between now and the time I can legitimately hang them out on my front door and along the eaves of my house?
Am I supposed to have a pumpkin with colored lights and fake snow and a herd of Reindeer grazing on the lawn nearby?
Or could I erect a display on my lawn of Pilgrims eating the first Thanksgiving Feast with a "weird beard" Santa and a flock of mutant radio active turkeys from the TV series South Park looking on?
Not to worry...being the ultimate "non-consumer" I'll easily pass the animated cackling witches and the smiling and nodding Santa mannequins and keep myself focused on the Tapcon Concrete fasteners and the products on the electrical isles.
In other news, later this morning I'm loading Pat and Missy the Turbo Pup and all of their luggage and lockers and sea chests up in the newly washed and serviced Chrysler 300 and we're heading off toward Kansas City, Missouri for a week or so, stopping over night in St. Louis to break the west bound trip into two smaller segments.
In addition to visiting with Pat's family and celebrating a Grand Daughter's 18th birthday, we also have the privilege of attending a private party at the American Royal BBQ Event on Friday night and then there's a bunch of other business stuff going on which I'm not at liberty to talk about publicly yet.
Once again the Internet availability will be somewhat questionable along the way, but I ask that if you don't hear from me within three or four days that somebody please send up a flare and organize a search party.
Regards Y'all...
Monday, September 28, 2009
This Is The Level We've All Sunk To
Ninnys versus Nannys
So I hear that out at LAX this afternoon some poor unfortunate guy with a rumbling stomach was guilty of ignoring thestewardess...wait I mean waitress in a crappy restaurant in the sky ...no...rather today they're called "flight attendants' " FAA approved mandate that everyone stay in their seats while the airplane was taxi-ing out to the runway for takeoff.
You probably know the rest...things escallate out of control because of new government laws and mandates, then the Police were called and they boarded the plane once it returned to the gate and took the offender (UPDATE 2 AM: and his "companion" ) off the flight...poopy pants and all.
FOX news reports as of 3 PM that the plane had been emptied while "officials" searched the nooks and crannys and all of the passengers were re screened.
They're lucky it wasn't me on board trying to struggle to thephonebooth restroom or I'd probably have left them a loaf posessing an aroma and stain so mighty that Ajax won't get the smell out of the plane for months, and if they hadn't let me into the closet they call a bathroom I guess I'd have had to drop it under the seat cushion (which normally can be utilized as a flotation device.)
I'm fairly certain some socialist democrat "Nervous Nelly" type preppy soccer mom probably was responsible for the origination and reporting of the so-called "INCIDENT."
Oh Crap...now I've done it...
Now I guess that I'll be called a chauvinistic pig for denigrating women...
Ask me if I care?
(and NO..."Denigrating" does not mean a situation where the "authorities" make all of the Rappers and Professional Basketball players leave the room...)
So I hear that out at LAX this afternoon some poor unfortunate guy with a rumbling stomach was guilty of ignoring the
You probably know the rest...things escallate out of control because of new government laws and mandates, then the Police were called and they boarded the plane once it returned to the gate and took the offender (UPDATE 2 AM: and his "companion" ) off the flight...poopy pants and all.
FOX news reports as of 3 PM that the plane had been emptied while "officials" searched the nooks and crannys and all of the passengers were re screened.
They're lucky it wasn't me on board trying to struggle to the
I'm fairly certain some socialist democrat "Nervous Nelly" type preppy soccer mom probably was responsible for the origination and reporting of the so-called "INCIDENT."
Oh Crap...now I've done it...
Now I guess that I'll be called a chauvinistic pig for denigrating women...
Ask me if I care?
(and NO..."Denigrating" does not mean a situation where the "authorities" make all of the Rappers and Professional Basketball players leave the room...)
Anyone Want To Join My "Racist" Club?
"Here...Have a White Sheet And Some Scissors"
I love the way most people like to"hit and run" "comment and run" when they find something on a blog which appears to go against their government educated beliefs and/or offends their delicate multi-cultural racial/sexual sensibilities.
It doesn't matter what you say or how you say it, it never fails that if you address certain topics or use certain words at least SOMEONE is going tospeak up and object. cry and snivel and complain.
I'm surprised it took as long as it did to get someone's ears smoking with this posting from last Wednesday which I titled "OneDumb Stupid Mulatto Negro Black Man African American."
As I posted earlier, the commenter said "How nice of you to inject race into your blog, President Jimmy Carter Got it right. And you Sir, live in the wrong time."
Then they added "Don't bother replying to my comment, I won't be back to read it."
OK...(taking a big breath)...let's get a few thing straight.
NUMBER 1. It's my Blog and I'll say anything I want to here (except things that would make Google shut down my free site or specifically threaten the lives of the President and other high ranking officials.)
NUMBER 2. In writing the words "Mulatto" or "Negro" or "Black Man" in front of the words "African American," I knew that I was going to make some people wince and piss a few others off completely, BUT...
I'd like to point out that each and every one of those words have legitimately been used in my lifetime i.e. the past 50 years in this county by polite "non-colored" citizenry when referring to people of dark skin color descending genetically from the continent of Africa.
When I was a kid in rural Alabama in the 1960's, being polite white people of anglo European descent, I was taught that the word "Nigger" was offensive and instead refered to our maid and other "black" persons as "Negro" or "Niggra" or simply "colored."
I guess that "niggra" was too close to "Nigger" and "colored" left open the answer to the question "what color?", so then sometime in the 1970's, in an effort to keep all the White folks off balance and inject the latest distillations of the current cultural movements from NY and Detroit and LA into everyone's lives, all of us "crackers" were told that "Negro" and Niggra" and "colored" was inaccurate and offensive, we should just call a proud black man a "black man" or a dark skinned woman a "black woman."
By the way...anyone but me ever wondered why the people living here from Southeast Asia and the Caribbean/South America didn't get on the same bandwagon or start up their own movement coining, defining, qualifying, endorsing "official" politically correct self identifying terminology while at the same time expressing outrage at their supposed political and cultural insufficiency?
Fortunately they didn't, and instead elected to melt into the "melting pot" and enjoy the benefits of living in the United By God States of 'Merica and have been rewarded with the kinds of social and educational and financial success which still escape the followers of the likes of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.
Bless all of their multi-national, multi-racial, mult-cultural, multi-colored hearts for shutting the %$#@ up and getting on with life rather than making a career and thinly veiled political movement out of their "victimhood."
Further, remembering that we're still stuck here under my point NUMBER 2, my reference using the word "mulatto" to address someone of mixed racial descent is not directly an insult....it's simply descriptive (look it up on Wikipedia) :
"Mulatto denotes a person with one white parent and one black parent or a person who has both black ancestry and white ancestry. The term may be perceived as pejorative in some cultures and situations. Its current usage varies greatly."
Unfortunately, currently it is considered an outrage to make any reference to any part of a person's appearance or persona which is in fact "different" from yourself and/or your peers.
And finally, apparently not being satisfied with phraseology using something like skin color as an identification, forward looking self appointed black leaders like Jackson and Sharpton settled on the self identification terminology "African American" as the descriptor of choice continuing until today...
although most of these same people using the "African American" identification were at least SEVEN generations from ever having set foot on the continent of Africa ( and I suppose that 3/4 of those same people couldn't find Africa on a Map or Globe with a flashlight and a magnifying glass...)
NUMBER 3. I really don't give a darn what most people think when I write here on this blog.
I do not write specifically to GAIN readership or attract any specific group of readers. If I did I would resort to sticking key words like "Patrick Swayze Death" in my titles and enjoy having nearly a THOUSAND HITS like I did over the past few days when the people in Europe finally found out the guy had died.
Then if I was getting that kind of traffic, instead of the normal measly 50 hits a day I get, I'd have the sidebar and header of this blog covered up with blog ads for Viagra and Hair replacement and "conservative tee shirts and mugs" and God knows what else.
But I DO NOT WRITE TO PLEASE ANYONE BUT MYSELF, thus I do not give a RATS ASS if my lovely, talented, well intended yet culturally/racially sensitive commenter ever comes back.
I offer my sincere, heartfelt approval to anyone who reads and is offended by a single word I write to NOT EVER COME BACK.
EVER....
NUMBER 4. This is the most important point that Jimmuh Carter and my commenter and most of the lamestream/dead tree media don't understand or refuse to recognise...
I would just as vehemently object to Obama's policies and inane utterings and apologizings regardless of the skin color or hair color or shoe size of any other person forcing them upon me and speaking supposedly on behalf of me and my country.
Understand?
Now, let me see if I can find where I put my scissors...I have some eyeholes to cut...
I love the way most people like to
It doesn't matter what you say or how you say it, it never fails that if you address certain topics or use certain words at least SOMEONE is going to
I'm surprised it took as long as it did to get someone's ears smoking with this posting from last Wednesday which I titled "One
As I posted earlier, the commenter said "How nice of you to inject race into your blog, President Jimmy Carter Got it right. And you Sir, live in the wrong time."
Then they added "Don't bother replying to my comment, I won't be back to read it."
OK...(taking a big breath)...let's get a few thing straight.
NUMBER 1. It's my Blog and I'll say anything I want to here (except things that would make Google shut down my free site or specifically threaten the lives of the President and other high ranking officials.)
NUMBER 2. In writing the words "Mulatto" or "Negro" or "Black Man" in front of the words "African American," I knew that I was going to make some people wince and piss a few others off completely, BUT...
I'd like to point out that each and every one of those words have legitimately been used in my lifetime i.e. the past 50 years in this county by polite "non-colored" citizenry when referring to people of dark skin color descending genetically from the continent of Africa.
When I was a kid in rural Alabama in the 1960's, being polite white people of anglo European descent, I was taught that the word "Nigger" was offensive and instead refered to our maid and other "black" persons as "Negro" or "Niggra" or simply "colored."
I guess that "niggra" was too close to "Nigger" and "colored" left open the answer to the question "what color?", so then sometime in the 1970's, in an effort to keep all the White folks off balance and inject the latest distillations of the current cultural movements from NY and Detroit and LA into everyone's lives, all of us "crackers" were told that "Negro" and Niggra" and "colored" was inaccurate and offensive, we should just call a proud black man a "black man" or a dark skinned woman a "black woman."
By the way...anyone but me ever wondered why the people living here from Southeast Asia and the Caribbean/South America didn't get on the same bandwagon or start up their own movement coining, defining, qualifying, endorsing "official" politically correct self identifying terminology while at the same time expressing outrage at their supposed political and cultural insufficiency?
Fortunately they didn't, and instead elected to melt into the "melting pot" and enjoy the benefits of living in the United By God States of 'Merica and have been rewarded with the kinds of social and educational and financial success which still escape the followers of the likes of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.
Bless all of their multi-national, multi-racial, mult-cultural, multi-colored hearts for shutting the %$#@ up and getting on with life rather than making a career and thinly veiled political movement out of their "victimhood."
Further, remembering that we're still stuck here under my point NUMBER 2, my reference using the word "mulatto" to address someone of mixed racial descent is not directly an insult....it's simply descriptive (look it up on Wikipedia) :
"Mulatto denotes a person with one white parent and one black parent or a person who has both black ancestry and white ancestry. The term may be perceived as pejorative in some cultures and situations. Its current usage varies greatly."
Unfortunately, currently it is considered an outrage to make any reference to any part of a person's appearance or persona which is in fact "different" from yourself and/or your peers.
And finally, apparently not being satisfied with phraseology using something like skin color as an identification, forward looking self appointed black leaders like Jackson and Sharpton settled on the self identification terminology "African American" as the descriptor of choice continuing until today...
although most of these same people using the "African American" identification were at least SEVEN generations from ever having set foot on the continent of Africa ( and I suppose that 3/4 of those same people couldn't find Africa on a Map or Globe with a flashlight and a magnifying glass...)
NUMBER 3. I really don't give a darn what most people think when I write here on this blog.
I do not write specifically to GAIN readership or attract any specific group of readers. If I did I would resort to sticking key words like "Patrick Swayze Death" in my titles and enjoy having nearly a THOUSAND HITS like I did over the past few days when the people in Europe finally found out the guy had died.
Then if I was getting that kind of traffic, instead of the normal measly 50 hits a day I get, I'd have the sidebar and header of this blog covered up with blog ads for Viagra and Hair replacement and "conservative tee shirts and mugs" and God knows what else.
But I DO NOT WRITE TO PLEASE ANYONE BUT MYSELF, thus I do not give a RATS ASS if my lovely, talented, well intended yet culturally/racially sensitive commenter ever comes back.
I offer my sincere, heartfelt approval to anyone who reads and is offended by a single word I write to NOT EVER COME BACK.
EVER....
NUMBER 4. This is the most important point that Jimmuh Carter and my commenter and most of the lamestream/dead tree media don't understand or refuse to recognise...
I would just as vehemently object to Obama's policies and inane utterings and apologizings regardless of the skin color or hair color or shoe size of any other person forcing them upon me and speaking supposedly on behalf of me and my country.
Understand?
Now, let me see if I can find where I put my scissors...I have some eyeholes to cut...
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Ahhhhhhhhh the Smell Of Napalm In the Morning..."
The Sound Of Angry Leftists Disguised As "Republicans"...
"How nice of you to inject race into your blog, President Jimmy Carter Got it right. And you Sir, live in the wrong time. I'm a Republican, a gun owner, but not a racist. While your cleaning you gun, and polishing your brass you might spend a little time doing critical thinking, and a little less time watching Glen Beck, and listening to Rush Limbaugh. Don't bother replying to my comment, I won't be back to read it."
O' Tay...
(new comment received tonight about this posting last week...)
"How nice of you to inject race into your blog, President Jimmy Carter Got it right. And you Sir, live in the wrong time. I'm a Republican, a gun owner, but not a racist. While your cleaning you gun, and polishing your brass you might spend a little time doing critical thinking, and a little less time watching Glen Beck, and listening to Rush Limbaugh. Don't bother replying to my comment, I won't be back to read it."
O' Tay...
(new comment received tonight about this posting last week...)
Today's Tip for Old "Middle Aged" Homeowners
Quality...Not Tonnage Quantity
As many of y0u already know if you've ever owned your own house, for years now the lovely Men and Women working over at the company called Sakrete have saved the average homeowner the agony of having to wait until they needforty million pounds more than a couple yards of concrete delivered to pour a slab for an AC unit or a pool filter pump or a footing for steps or whatever else said homeowner can dream up to want to make out of "concrete."
They make bags of things like Portland cement and mortar mix and fast set concrete and in my recent endeavor...pouring my own 16"x16"x2-1/2" thick concrete mini concrete slabs...HIGH STRENGTH 5000 PSI FAST SETTING CEMENT.
Be advised, however, that they make most of their products in 40 pound, 60, pound, and 80 pound bags.
The bigger the bag, the cheaper the product on a weight or volume basis, BUT...
I can personally testify, holding my shriveled concrete encrusted hand on a stack of bibles, that saving $3.95 on a $31 purchase isn't worth the pain and agony and potential visit to the emergency room to have your intestines and testicles re-inserted and sutured back into their correct positions in your abominable abdominal cavity.
If you're over the age of45 40 35 30, please do yourself a favor and buy the forty or sixty pound packages--the label means WEIGHT...not the age you can live to and still pick things up and sling them around while adding water and stirring... and leave the 80 pound bags to the younger guys that still have biceps and abs.
I have to go now and see if I can find my truss...
As many of y0u already know if you've ever owned your own house, for years now the lovely Men and Women working over at the company called Sakrete have saved the average homeowner the agony of having to wait until they need
They make bags of things like Portland cement and mortar mix and fast set concrete and in my recent endeavor...pouring my own 16"x16"x2-1/2" thick concrete mini concrete slabs...HIGH STRENGTH 5000 PSI FAST SETTING CEMENT.
Be advised, however, that they make most of their products in 40 pound, 60, pound, and 80 pound bags.
The bigger the bag, the cheaper the product on a weight or volume basis, BUT...
I can personally testify, holding my shriveled concrete encrusted hand on a stack of bibles, that saving $3.95 on a $31 purchase isn't worth the pain and agony and potential visit to the emergency room to have your intestines and testicles re-inserted and sutured back into their correct positions in your
If you're over the age of
I have to go now and see if I can find my truss...
