Ima Buffoon

My New Alter(ed) Ego


In a moment of genius inspired activism, I just signed up for a new Yahoo E-mail account using the name "Ima Buffoon." The address is imabuffoon@yahoo.com if you want to sent me a howdy doo sometime in the future.

Ima's a pretty fun loving yet serious guy, and I'm challenging Ima to wander around the Internet on my behalf over the next few months, torturing the various scam artists that manage to piss me off on TV or via the WWW with offers of things that intelligent people should know better than to believe.

You know--things like "systems" promising unimaginable riches gained through buy low cost foreclosed real estate, E-bay marketing schemes, programs teaching you to make money by placing "little tiny" classified ads in newspapers, hair re-growth concoctions, and pills promising larger male body parts.

Don't the ads and infomercials touting these products bother anyone but me? I'm really tired of the onslaught--free speech issues aside--and I'm going to dive in with my altered ego Ima and find out what's going on from the inside if I can.

This morning Ima got things started with The Home Equity Repositioning people. These guys purport to advise you on how you can borrow your home equity and use the money to buy into some mutual funds and securities they sell.

As if you aren't already making (or losing) enough appreciation on your home investment--these morons are encouraging people to borrow money against their HOUSES and give it to them to pay their sales commissions while they put you and your house at risk in the stock market.

If you think that's a good idea, I have another scheme that you'll find attractive...

Interested?

I have a program to sell your pre-school aged kids each a 9 MM pistol and some ammunition, then I'll give them target training and send them back to your home to be in charge of you and your family's personal security.

You'll never see your little munchkins while they're running around the perimeter of your property in their new camo colored fatigue uniforms...and don't worry, you can borrow the money from your home equity, and the program only costs $10,000 per student.

Such a deal, huh?

The Equity Repositioning website has absolutely no information on it, it's just a data collecting screen that asks for your name, e-mail address, and phone number.

I gave them my real phone number and the Ima Buffoon name and e-mail address, and it will be interesting to see what happens.

I'll keep you informed as the situation develops.

Sixty Six Years Ago

How Soon Most Of Us Forget...


Just in case you aren't paying attention, let me remind you that about 66 years and 9 hours ago from right now the Japanese Navy and Air Forces attacked Pearl Harbor.

We've all seen the movies and read the history books in school, so I really don't have much to say this morning other than to pause to recognise my Aunt and three Uncles--two since deceased--that served in the military during that time in what ended up being called World War II.

None were at Pearl Harbor, but all three served with honor and survived the war unscathed to come back home and live long successful lives enjoying the freedoms they risked their lives for.

It's sad that today, when I look back, all I see is that we as a country and citizens had a Hell of a lot more patriotism and resolution then than we do now, and I regret that we've probably already squandered most of the hard earned advantages and political currency earned by a generation of true War Hero's that believed in the US Constitution, Personal Responsibility, and the original American Dream.

The way I see things, most of today's so called "Dream" is in reality much closer to a freak show or a nightmare to me...

Here's Your Christmas Card

An Oldie But Goodie...

I promised myself that I would get my Christmas shopping done early this year and get my Christmas cards out early also. Unfortunately I didn't have the energy to make my own new cards, so the store bought variety will have to do for the first time in about three years.

There will also have to be no last minute shopping rush for me this year because we're having company for the holidays and I'm going to be busy acting as Head Chef and Island Tour Guide and won't have time to be dashing to the mall to brave the wild eyed masses while dodging sniper fire.

The good news is that all of the shopping will be done as of tomorrow, the cards are laying here beside the computer on the coffee table ready to be addressed, and by scrolling down here you can have your own Christmas Card delivered immediately.













I'll feel free to check Christmas Cards to my Blog Readers off my list now...

(I apologize to any of my regular readers that remember this original PhotoShop image from last year, but it's just too good to not use again...and doing the Owl Gore Hanukkah Card reminded me of my earlier efforts...so here it is.)

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Equal Opportunity Enviro-Whackism

Spreading the Misery Responsibility...


I'm sorry to report this morning that it looks like Owl Gore's Environmental Derangement Psychosis has spread to the Jewish community now during Chanukah.

In a campaign that has spread like wildfire across the Internet, a group of Israeli environmentalists is encouraging Jews around the world to light at least one less candle this Hanukka to help the environment.

The founders of the Green Hanukkia campaign found that every candle that burns completely produces 15 grams of carbon dioxide. If an estimated one million Israeli households light for eight days, they said, it would do significant damage to the atmosphere.

"The campaign calls for Jews around the world to save the last candle and save the planet, so we won't need another miracle," said Liad Ortar, the campaign's cofounder, who runs the Arkada environmental consulting firm and the Ynet Web site's environmental forum. "Global warming is a milestone in human evolution that requires us to rethink how we live our lives, and one of the main paradigms of that is religion and how it fits into the current situation."


Do WHAT???

Leave out a candle from the ritual?

Which one would they have honorable religious people to omit?

The first one?

Don't light the eighth night's candle?

These morons are Jews, and they aught to know better.

So what about leaving dark the Shamash light usually presented in the center highest position in the Menorah?

Is any religious ritual sacred and safe from their assault and scrutiny?

While we're at it let's get the Methodists to dump their Acolytes and/or leave at least one of the two candles dark on their altars every Sunday.

Let's make all of the Christians leave a candle dark on this years Advent Wreaths --that will lower CO2 and reduce global warming by something like 0.000000000000000000000123 degrees Celsius.

And let's not leave the Catholics out--they could stop with the incense burning during Mass and possibly prevent a couple of Locust plague induced crop failures in the Sudan and Ethiopia (...oh...OH...OhhhhhhhhHHHHHH....you live in a Desert...)

Seriously, this whole story is ridiculous, and the people behind it are clearly mindless politically motivated morons asking people to jump on the Man-Made Global Warming bandwagon while making strictly ineffective "SYMBOLIC GESTURES."

The next series of wildfires in the foothills of Malibu will undo everything accomplished by leaving little wax candles unlit by ten fold. The next volcanic eruption on Montserrat or in Micronesia will spew more CO2 and volatile organic hydrocarbons than all of the cars in the US in an entire YEAR.

The ritual surrounding the lighting of the Menorah involves eight or nine little bitty candles sized to burn for about thirty minutes each night, and I think that leaving one out for a silly reason like this is beyond pale.

This is a perfect example of ever increasing politically correct crap which we can look forward to in the future if we don't manage to nip this Climate Change insanity in the bud.

Today it's candles, tomorrow it's your fireplace, your lawnmower, your electric razor, and your chain saw.

By the way, I tried to contact Owl Gores' office for comment, but all I could get was this photo:





(Yes...that's the product of me and my Photoshop skills)


So sue me...

Where's Bob Dole When You Need Him?

I'm Suffering Disenchantment With The Whole Crowd of Candidates


Will someone please call the School Principal or the Hallway Monitor and separate Obama and sHrillary for me before someone gets food thrown on their clothing? I don't know how much further below Kindergarten and First Grade we can sink in what should be an otherwise serious political adult debate.

I fully expect in the next week for someone to pull out Fred Thompson's Vacation Bible School finger paintings and interpret them like Rorschach Inkblots --using them to accuse him of sexual harassment of the volunteer teachers in church, or possibly racism for smearing out an image that vaguely looks like Jesse Jackson having sex with Madonna using a weed eater and a chicken as "marital aides."

Speaking of Bob Dole, while we can blame him for at least 4 years of Bill Clinton's tenure, I sort of miss him walking around speaking of himself in third person (or whatever it is when you address TV cameras and microphones with phrases like "Only Bob Dole speaks for Bob Dole...")

Then there was the omnipresent pen that poor old Bob always carried around in his wounded hand to keep people from noticing that he was in fact a GENUINE war hero and had been wounded in action. If I were him I would have been proud of the abilities he showed and accomplishments he made in spite of his combat injuries.

It would be sort of funny if someone had stabbed John sKerry's ass a couple of times with a ball point pen so he could have, using Dole's logic, wandered around clenching an ink pen is his butt cheeks at campaign events. Imagine the scene when he signed autographs using that method. "Sorry there kid...you'll have to excuse the brown streak...did you know I served in Vietnam?"

Kerry was definitely no Bob Dole in any shape, form, or fashion, else he would have resigned his Senate seat as he started his presidential campaign like Bob did. Then we wouldn't have to have paid his useless carcass for not appearing on the senate floor for a year and a half.

Of course if he'd resigned the Senate Seat he'd be reduced to carrying Mrs. Heinz's purse and polishing the calluses and bunions on her feet these days, because I doubt that even the glorious State of Massachusetts, home for Ted "Jabba The Hut" Kennedy, would bring him back to congress once he'd given up incumbency.

Come to think of it, maybe Senator Dole was on to something back then--using a prop in an attempt to distract people from defects that they find personally embarrassing as a political candidate.

For instance, today I think Fred Thompson should consider carrying around copies of old Video Tapes of episodes of Law and Order and the movies he's appeared in looking Presidential. Let's face it, I'm afraid that's the only way many people are going to see him in that light based on the performance of his campaign thus far.

As for sHrillary Rodham-Clinton, I think that she could mount herself on Bill Clinton-Clinton's back like the pair of actors calling themselves "Master Blaster" in the Mad Max-Beyond Thunderdome movie.

Then Bill would have to walk around everywhere all day wearing her while she bitches at him and does that cackling laugh of hers at debate questions. Using the toilet and taking a shower could become a bit of a problem with that arrangement however.

Here's a look of what they'd look like in Iowa next month:





Obama...now he's a little more difficult...let's see....

I know, he could be forced to wander around from event to event holding a sign that says something like "Remember I'm Black...remember I WAS Muslim...but today I'm not a BLACK MUSLIM..."

Does anyone buy that story?

Ron Paul is a little tougher still.

No, he's actually easy. Mr. Paul could come out with a line of T-shirts with the saying "I'm With Stupid" with an arrow pointing upwards towards his own face.

I guess that I could go on and on here, but my inspiration is becoming less funny on a moment by moment basis. I think that I'll leave things at that.

Please feel free to leave a comment and tell me if you come up with anything obvious on the other candidates, and I may come back by later if I come up with something else on my own.

I'm Developing My Own Weapons of ASS Mass Destruction

Filibustering My Way To Insanity Infamy


I'm just beside myself. I don't know what to say this morning folks.

I was actually in a bit of a bind figuring out what to write about, then I stumbled onto this story...

I saw some Pinhead on TV on MSNBC interviewing some captive commentators (you know...so called experts like Pat Buchanan and some other talking head media morons) about the revised US Intelligence estimate stating that regardless of what we've heard on the news for the past two thousand years, Iran really stopped developing Nuclear weapons in 2003.

If you don't believe that story, other versions are printed here, here, and even here at the NY Times.

The MSNBC Pinhead moderator was already on the "Bush Lied" mantra, while I'm sitting here wondering why everyone is willing to ignore the bullshit uttered by Iran's own little Capuchin Monkey look-alike dictator:

...statements basically admitting that Iran has Nuclear refinement technology beyond that NEEDED TO SUPPORT A PEACEFUL ELECTRICAL POWER GENERATION PROGRAM, and saying that they (the Iranians) have the right to develop nuclear powered handbags and suitcases to lob into your living rooms and stow on airliners for your enjoyment and demise in the future.

As I recall, a stupid dead SOB named Saddam Hussain kept on pounding his hammers and rattling the swords in this same manner back a few years ago before we captured his rat bastard ass and his fellow citizens stretched his neck to the point of breaking.

My point here is this...

I you don't want the US Marine corps to tear your door off the hinges or the US Navy to fly a GPS guided Cruise missile up your butt, stop with the rhetoric, because the partisan liberal idiot professional morons down at the US State Department and the so called "Intelligence Agencies" apparently spend more time watching old "Get Smart" 1960's TV reruns than they do actually gathering any Intelligence.

If I were Bush I'd be walking around poking people with a pointy stick and kicking their butts with my size 13 boots...but instead I'm relegated to delivering commentary here on my measly little website safely sequestered in rural coastal Georgia. (if ever you piss me off enough and I manage to get close enough to grab hold of you and bite you, believe me that I'm taking something important like your nose with me...so keep that in mind in the future.)

And while you're at it, stop blaming the President and the White house for the failings of these Partisan "PROFESSIONAL INTELLIGENCE" shitheads...It's Bush's fault he let them keep their jobs when he took office after Clinton hired them in the 1990's, but it's not his fault that they lied to him and the American public or just plain missed the truth when they wandered into the sandy abyss to do their jobs.

After all, grumpy old Helen Thomas and the balance of the White house press corps would have soiled their undergarments and had public conniption fits should he have kicked them to the curb like sHrillary Rodham-Clinton would have done in the same situation.

Dammit.

Back To The Real World

Building Fantasy...


Well, I reluctantly walked out of the Ritz Theater a little after 3 PM Sunday afternoon having turned over my set and giant puppet to the actors and stage crew.

I've done all I can do with it...the rest is up to them.

I think that I just might feel like the parent of a little first grader on the first day of school....I sure hope everything performs as expected.

On projects like this there are always things that you would have liked to have done or could have done differently in retrospect, but I think that I exceeded 90% of my own expectations and the cast was pretty impressed with the results of my efforts. I got the electronics installed just in time for a couple of trial runs and the strobe light eyes really make the scene effective and scary.

Now I have to buckle down and turn my attention back to my for-profit construction efforts with the arrival of the new windows and a few thousand pounds of unmixed concrete this week.

I wish that someone would volunteer to come over and help me for a few days for free...but that's not how the world works.



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All The Math I Needed To Know

I Learned By The Ninth Grade...


From time to time in my public service career I have some interesting revelations and insights about teaching science and math to today's children.

Since I don't have any kids of my own, it is through my work with the theater and one of the local high schools which brings me into contact with the occasional rare student that asks the question: "how did you figure that out?"

In answering these little darlin's questions, of course I could as a matter of pride drag out my calculus books and differential equations textbook--all giant, dusty hardcover tomes with which my instructors tortured me while I was attempting to make my way through the first couple of years at Georgia Tech back in the late 1970's.

Instead, thus far I've resisted that urge and tried to keep things simple.

I usually just mention how I use a handheld calculator to solve simple little things like the Pythagorean Theorem and Sine/Cosine/Tangent functions that most college bound children learn in middle school.

Unfortunately, I'm not sure how far my attempts at putting a practical insight into the use of apparently mundane subjects goes when it comes to inspiring academic excellence, but I'm darn sure of how easy my ongoing mastery of those subjects makes my life on a day to day basis.

Tonight I'm working on the pre-planning for the final Ghost of Christmas Future fabrication later this morning, and in that process a working knowledge of basic geometry concepts are all that I need to lay out the shape of the "tether lanyard" that keeps Mr. Ghost Puppet from crashing down across Scrooge while "leaning down in the middle of his face with flashing red strobe light eyes." (you know what I mean here Rusty...)

I did have to cheat a little by employing some of my Sophomore year college Statics Structures class to fine tune the details, but the basic geometry was still the key to problem.

I really wish that our schools could employ more hands-on educational solutions instead of computer labs and diversity sermons--employing things like balsa wood, wooden dowels, or PVC pipe in lab sessions in order to demonstrate the usefulness of mathematics concepts. I'm building giant pyramids featured on football fields and humongous puppets seen on the theater stage using the exact same simple concepts.

At the same time, it would also be nice if they taught things like (real) economics, household budgeting, credit management, and how to balance a checkbook.

Is it just ME???

The Ghost Of Christmas Future Lives

Almost Finished...

Do You Need A Hand With That?

I've Got A Few Extra...Hands that is...


At the risk of appearing to be pompous, I thought that I'd give everyone a look at the new HP computer and 22" widescreen monitor presently residing back in Pat's office.

My "Ghost of Christmas Future" hands are also seen there wandering around testing out the keyboard at the moment.

Unfortunately, I'm afraid to go out into the Garage right now because this thing is lurking around in the shadows.

Is that not hideous looking, or what?

(don't worry, it's not done yet...I'm just waiting for a secondary application of foam to set up so I can do some more carving.)




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30 Days Has September, April, June, And November

Spinning Your Way Through The 2007 Hurricane Season...


Darn it all Ladies and Gentlemen, but I swear that most of the basic problems with the "professional media" today have to be centered upon their personal, professional, and corporate investment in the political interpretation of the cause and outcome of the "so called news story" at hand rather than the reporting of the DETAILS of what got the people involved into the situation to begin with and what we could learn from the final RESULTS of the event when it was all said and done.

(ANGRY WHITE MALE REDNECK BLOGGER NOTE...Yes, I realize that my last sentence, which was also presented as a single paragraph, according to MS Word, contains a total of 86 words--so sue me or go somewhere else on the Internet if you don't like it or otherwise can't keep up with writing aimed at people with greater than an 8th grade education.)

Now back to my original thesis...

I was sitting here working on the details of Mr. Ghost Puppet's Skeletal Head while The Weather Channel was droning on in the background, and they managed to get my attention with THEIR OWN VERSION OF THE LIBERAL MEDIAS' REVISIONISTIC STORY ABOUT THE PAST SIX OR SEVEN MONTHS WE'VE LIVED THROUGH HERE ON OUR LITTLE ISLAND...

Let me remind my regular readers that I CHOOSE to live within less than two miles of the Atlantic Ocean. Let me tell my driveby readers that I can walk outside right now and smell the adjacent salt marsh and hear the surf breaking when we have north east winds.

That said...Get ready...

Sit Down...I'm gonna blow...

Ready?

(Gasp)

Today is the last day of the 2007 Hurricane season.

Hurray.

I insensitively say "Hurray" because no one died here in the Continental US as a result of a landfalling Hurricane this year, but I also recognise that a whole bunch of poor people died and/or were displaced from their homes in Mexico and Central America as a result of two giant category five storms.

I also pray that the media and the liberals and the local foreign governments will rapidly move toward making the same improvements to their own infrastructures that we've enjoyed here in the Gulf Coastal areas of the United By-God States of America.

Instead of bitching and complaining and blaming people and administrations, I'd rather see progress based on using the same technology which the American taxpayer has already bought and paid for.

Regardless of the outcome, the TV faces over at the Weather Channel were blabbering on and on about how the Hurricane Season was really still a bad thing and that we shouldn't get complacent because Katrina II was coming back to jump into our bedrooms next year...the weather gods just chose to give the Republicans a break and attack somewhere else because ...just because...

What really jerks my chain is that the National Hurricane Center, a supposed bastion of science, has even resorted to going to what I call "Instant Replay" mode

They've decided that Hurricane Karen --previously only identified as a Crack Whore Tropical Storm--actually attained Hurricane strength while assaulting a bunch of crabs and jellyfish wandering around offshore of Barbados and Angullia.

So there was actually one more Hurricane this season that didn't make a damn to me or Allstate Insurance company...whoop te doo.

(Taking another big breath and collecting my thoughts...)

Bottom line is...I believe that the lamestream media can't stand this situation.

It doesn't fit their "template"

This because the slums and public housing projects haven't been rebuilt in New Orleans--so why waste a perfectly good act of GOD result of OWL Gore's much lamented human capitalist induced Global Warming?

Just change the words and results to fit your agenda and toss it out there for public constipation consumption.

When I think about it, all I have to say is that I guess that the mean old Republicans got their money's worth out of the efforts of George Bush, Dick Cheney, and Carl Rove.

New Hands Clapping

Head Stuck In A Vise...


I made a hasty visit to the theater for a couple of hours yesterday to do some work, and I took my new giant hands along with me to let them get used to the venue they'd be working in starting next Tuesday and to meet the theater staff.

In addition to putting a few finishing touches on the set, while we were there I also took the opportunity to introduce my giant hands to their new arms and spine.

Everyone got along just fabulously, although they came back home with me last night in order to help me with their giant skull head which is still in fabrication mode.

Currently this morning I'm glancing at my wristwatch every few minutes and tapping my foot on the floor (and drumming my giant wood and latex fingers on the table) while we're waiting on the second casting of Great Stuff expandable foam (four cans worth) to cure around the internal plywood support bracket so I can release my monstrosity from the 18" x 18" x 16" high cardboard box it currently resides within.

Today is a big day in the two week construction window with the fabrication of the separate copper toothed jaw in the morning and the carving and finishing of the balance of the skeletal head with a latex resin and fiber mesh material that arrived via UPS from New York City yesterday.

Then there is the final assembly of the electrical system with things like soldering of wires, heat shrink tubing, rechargable batteries, switches, strobe controller cirucits, and problems as yet to be discovered that always pop up at the last minute while trying to do good deeds.

You'll have to excuse me, because I've got to go check what's going on with my my head now (something that many readers have been saying that I should do for a few years.)

My Observations On The Clinton News Network CNN YouBOOB YouTube Republican Debate

And The Beat Goes On...


Sorry, but I managed to miss most of last night's live broadcast of the big Republican debate because I was lying on the sofa with my eyes closed while recovering from dinner, but I caught most of it early this morning on the reruns.

Just Damn...

Besides seeing Fred Thompson still asleep at the Helm, I guess I finally agree that Ron Paul is a whacko, McCain's still angry about being a POW in Vietnam, Rudy's fading a bit, and Mitt Romney and Huckabee seem to be hitting their stride going into Iowa.

CNN, as usual, filled part of the event with bullshit loaded questions while hiding behind the "YouTube" Crowd...questions that they would have never, ever, Ever, EVER thrown at sHrillary, Obama, and the Democratic Presidential wannabees.

Things like "what would Jesus do" in reference to the Death Penalty, "Do you believe EVERYTHING in this book" (showing a King James Bible), and some moron with a Confederate Flag that everyone on the panel refused to address directly.

What a totally rediculous low blow--letting some idiot toss the confederate flag into the ring in 2007. I've had my confederate flags folded up and hidden in the root cellar since about 1990--but CNN apparently still thinks that with the retirement of Trent Lott that there has to be some KKK alumni out there still running for president.

The Coup de Gras, in my opinion, was CNN letting one of sHrillary Rodham--Clinton's campaign officials ask a question on YouTube.

I knew that the question was loaded as soon as it hit the airwaves--I just didn't know that the guy was a Clinton campaign guy doing the asking.

Of course CNN claims that they didn't know that retired US Army Colonel Keith Kerr was actually a member of Senator sHrillary Clinton's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transexual Americans For Hillary Steering Committee.

He's also part of a film production crew trying overturn the US Military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy (a product of the Bill Clinton--Clinton Administration.)

All I know is that these #@%*!ing morons over at CNN obviously don't give a damn that they're going to get caught doing crap like this, and further, even if they do get called out, enough of the American voting population doesn't read my blog and don't follow the news closely enough to understand the bias and unfairness of the process.

I swear people, I'm ready to move to Costa Rica or Belize if the Republicans do another debate with CNN, and I'm going to take the Fred Thompson Ad off of this blog if the man doesn't wake up and start running a legitimate campaign.

DAMMIT...

UPDATE: 6:22 AM

I was still wincing at CNN on TV while working on the Skeleton hands when their own news broadcast reminded me that not only did they let Colonel Kerr ask the YouTube pre-recorded question, but they also had him live during the debate in the audience to follow up with his admission that he was GAY and had served in the military for forty odd years without any problems (read that getting his ass kicked by his fellow solders.)

Don't get me wrong here because a) I'm not really anti-Gay, b) I haven't been in the military since the late 1970's and c) I really don't give a damn what kind of rules the government (read that Congress) issues as long as the bullets and bombs we use hit their intended targets every single time someone pulls a trigger or pushes a button.

If you have a hairy chest and want to wear a bra while sitting in a Foxhole or have your Mr. Pee Pee cut off and replaced with God knows what other body part (perhaps another knee or elbow?) just keep your clothes on and keep your hands off my butt and the butts of your fellow soldiers who or whom are not of like mind and everything will be just hunky dory.

But... (or maybe I should say BUTT in this instance...sorry..I couldn't resist the inuendo)

CNN had to know who the heck Keith Kerr was because The New Republic has this link to the transcript of his appearance on a CNN broadcast entitled "Gays In The Military: 10 Years Of Unfair Policies" aired on December 11, 2003.

When it's all said and done, all I want to know is how much longer are YOU going to put up with crap like this from your so called independent professional media?

I Almost Forgot

Here's What Dinner Looked Like Here Tuesday Night...

That would be my version of this Paella Recipe. In addition to a cup of rice and a pinch of
Saffron, mine had Sausage, Chicken, and Shrimp; but I left out the Clams because Pat is still afraid of a lot of seafood.

It was simple to make, and good to eat--You should try cooking it sometime.

Time to go fool with my skeleton hands again...

Hands Take Shape

Larger Than Life...And Capable of Changing Channels


Here's a look at the goings on on my kitchen table recently (the remote control laying there is over 8" long):

(click on the photo for a bigger view)


The hand in the foreground has a couple of coats of gauze and liquid latex already in place, and the one in the background gives you a glimpse of the 20 pieces of wooden dowel ranging in diameter from 3/8" to 7/8" that makes up the wired together "skeleton."

I've already got the head half cast out of expandable urethane foam and the electrical components (red strobe eyes and blue lighting for the inside of the mouth) are mocked up and working.

This thing is going to cause some kids to pee their pants if we're not careful.

I guess that I'm just a baaaaaaaaaddddddDDDDDD man.

I believe that I'll wear that description with honor.

The Dumbass Of The Day

Just In Case You Missed The Story...


Some guy from Georgia tried to open a bank account in South Carolina using a $1,000,000.00 bill as his deposit.

The employee refused to open the account and called police while the man started to curse at bank workers, Frank said.

And you wonder why many of us here in the south can't keep the rest of the planet from thinking we're STUPID?

And another thing...If you're gonna break the law, at least listen to your mother and be polite while you're doing the crime.

The Religion's Name Which Shall Not Be Spoken

Don't Anyone Start Calling a Muslim Youth a Muslim Youth


I just learned this morning that some people described by the ASSociated Press only as "Minority Youth" are running around burning buildings and cars and shooting at French police officers again over the past few days in the suburbs of Paris France.

VILLIERS-LE-BEL, France - Youths rampaged for a third night in the tough suburbs north of Paris and violence spread to a southern city late Tuesday as police struggled to contain rioters who have burned cars and buildings and — in an ominous turn — shot at officers.

A senior police union official warned that "urban guerrillas" had joined the unrest, saying the violence was worse than during three weeks of rioting that raged around French cities in 2005, when firearms were rarely used.

Bands of young people set more cars on fire in and around Villiers-le-Bel, the Paris suburb where the latest trouble first erupted, and 22 youths were taken into custody, the regional government said. In the southern city of Toulouse, 20 cars were set ablaze, and fires at two libraries were quickly brought under control, police said.

Despite the renewed violence, France's prime minister said the situation was calmer than the two previous nights. About 1,000 officers patrolled trouble spots in and around Villiers-le-Bel on Tuesday, he said.

The government was striving to keep violence from spreading in what was shaping up as a stern test for new President Nicolas Sarkozy. The unrest showed anger still smolders in France's poor neighborhoods, where many Arabs, blacks and other minorities [emphasis mine-vrr] live largely isolated from the rest of society.

The trigger was the deaths Sunday of two minority teens when their motorscooter collided with a police car in Villiers-le-Bel, a blue-collar town on Paris' northern edge.

Residents claimed the officers left without helping the teens. Prosecutor Marie-Therese de Givry denied that, saying police stayed on the scene until firefighters arrived.

But wait a minute...I thought that Europe was a model of tolerance, and I thought that France specifically had solved most of societies' problems with 30 hour work weeks and other liberal government supplied benefits?

Further...where's New York Al "torch the place and kill your White Oppressor" Sharpton when the disenfranchised Parisian suburbanites need him for Public Relations?

Sorry folks, but this is all simply a replay or continuation of the rioting and disorder that happened in 2005 when primarily young immigrant citizens of France--primarily of Black Muslim descent from Northern Africa--staged mass protests and burned thousands of cars and did millions of dollars of damage to private property of innocent bystanders and the public buildings in and around the cities of France.

I did a little further checking around on the News websites and English. Aljazeera, The LA Times, and the BBC Website all elect to mention the nationality of the criminals only in passing.

How long before we see the same kind of "unrest" here at home in North America on a daily basis, and how soon are we going to be forbidden from pointing out the true source--the radical segment of the religion of Islam--as the problem?

Yeah...I thought so...

Dickens Set Complete

Ghost Puppet Still In Skeletal Form...


Well, the good news is that I'm basically done with the sawdust phase of my Christmas set construction effort this year.

That is, of course, because the current project represents the simplest version of the three productions of Dicken's "A Christmas Carol" that I've supported at Brunswick's Ritz Theater thus far.

Heather wanted a really simple backdrop this year because there are 29 kids and 1 adult in the cast and complex sets and gaggles of children generally don't mix in the theater business--particularly when the kids are all under the age of 12 years old.

My air compressor, pneumatic brad gun, and stapler made quick work of the thin plywood panels and wooden trim installation, and now I'm down to finish casting and detailing the foam Ghost Puppet of Christmas Future's head and wiring together it's giant dowel segmented hands.

Of course there is the little detail of installing the electrical wiring for the red strobe light eyes and green strobes in the mouth, but those are just last minute details that I have until the weekend to work out.

Tomorrow will see the foam casting process completed, followed by some shopping for final supplies as we begin the mad rush toward opening night on December 4th.

Then there has to be some Christmas shopping thrown in for good measure, but I've pretty well got the list figured out and it's just a matter of getting it into boxes and out on a UPS truck.

Hope y'all are all having as much fun as I'm having these days...

Media Mental Malaise?

Or Just Plain Indifference?


I don't know about you, but right now it would be very easy for me to just turn off the TV, stop buying the newspaper, and disconnect my Internet connection from news sources and just smile my way through the balance of 2007.

I feel like I have it coming this holiday season.

I don't give a crap what the retailers think of the money I didn't spend at the Mall last Friday because I stayed home.

I don't give a crap what Fred Thompson thinks about FOX News' potential bias against his lackluster campaign.

And I definitely don't care that some liberal bleeding heart moron thinks that natural disasters have increased four fold in the past twenty years.

I'm so lazy this morning, I don't even care to give you the links to those stories--so I guess that you'll have to do your own Google search if you want to read about what I don't care about.

I've got a giant head and two skeletal hands to build, and with any luck I have a couple thousand dollars of windows showing up in town from Virginia for my construction effort-- so I hope you understand if I'm a bit short of words here on the blog this week.

Other than that...everything's just Peachy down here in paradise.

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I'm A Theater Scab

Crossing The Picket Lines


It hadn't even occurred to me until reading the Internet News this morning that I might be accidentally breaking some kind of "Union Rules" via my involvement with the set construction over at the Ritz Theater this past week.

Should I be looking over my shoulder in downtown Brunswick for some of the "Stage Hands Union Thugs" skulking around in the shadows?

After all, I'm not a Union Member.

I'm not much of a fan of Unions either.

I understand why Unions have existed through history, but I also think that today most unions and most fervent union members eat used kitty litter are dope smoking inbred morons are the equivalent of gangsters because they choose to hold a gun to the heads of their employers rather than work for a living and let market forces determine their pay scale and benefits.

Gone are the days when unions fought child labor abuses and deadly workplace conditions--now they want two months of paid "family leave" and six figure income for stock boys working at Wal Mart.

I've never been in a union and to me union mentality is the equivalent of college Fraternity mentality--mindless group think--with the emphasis being on "mental" and the underlying concept being the support of a bunch of otherwise useless and weak morons that can't hold a job and justify their pay without the threat from some outside force or "workplace action."

These latest strikes by the Screen Writers Guild and the Stage Hands crowd is a perfect example. What a bunch of useless overpaid losers. I guess that the Patchouli Vendors Association and the Cannabis Clothing and Furniture Covering Vendors of America Local #666 can't be far behind on the walk out list--then we're in real trouble

Way back in the early 1980's I had the pleasure of working as a the lead non-union employee for my manufacturing company doing the start up of a custom compressed air dryer installed in a paper mill in New Bern North Carolina.

New Bern was a beautiful idyllic town on the river tributary Atlantic coast region near the southern end of North Carolina's outer banks and Ocracoke island. I ended up spending several weeks there and the location was awesome to behold.

BUT...

the Weyerhauser Paper mill was staffed with inbred, slack jawed, mouth breathing UNION MEMBERS that couldn't get over the bad feelings that still lingered there from an extended strike which was finally broken by management in the mid 1970's.

They had separate bathrooms and break rooms for union and non-union employees.

They had pay phones and coke machines that you couldn't use unless you had a Union Card in you wallet.

All of this Bullshit from LIBERALS...DEMOCRATS by and large...the one in the same people that today criticise conservatives for being divisive and closed minded.

So any way, these highly paid UNION ASSHOLES couldn't understand why myself and my co-worker should be allowed to enter what they considered to be "Their Paper Mill" (although it was actually owned by the stockholders of Weyerhauser corporation) and be allowed to do electrical work and millwright work in support of our non-union Georgia employer.

Warranty work included in the base price of the equipment. Something like one hundred thousand dollars at the time.

I'm lucky to be here today writing this blog posting, because if it were up to at least one of the lovely UNION EMPLOYEES at that Weyerhauser Mill, I would be dead today because the individual thought it would be funny to reactivate the dedicated 480 volt three phase high amperage circuit breaker powering our equipment while we were away from the plant and if I hadn't elected to check the breaker before beginning work I would be dead Dead DEAD right now.

Of course this coincided with the Union writing a formal complaint stating that we were't electrical union members and therefore presented a hazard and were unsafe to work in the plant.

All I have to say is..."Screw those UNION ASSHOLES", because this home boy had enough sense to buy a couple of padlocks and change the circuit breaker at my company's expense in order to lock and tag off the power supply in order to prevent their predicted accident premeditated Murder.

All of that crap over "employment issues"

Imagine that?


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New Computer and A Football Game

I'm All lathered Up.....


I guess that you could compare my situation yesterday to that of having to spend the evening at Disney world while risking missing Santa Clause coming on Christmas Eve.

I love going to theater to do my set construction work, but at the exact same time that I was stomping around making sawdust over in Brunswick I knew that FedEX was hauling our new HP computer around in a truck somewhere for delivery.

I was right...and when I got home it was sitting in a box in the Foyer.

Dang it's fast.

And pretty.

And it has external speakers.

And it can display two full size pages of text on Microsoft Word on it's big flat 22" flat screen monitor.

I want to lay down in the floor beside it and take a nap, but I have to go back to the theater this morning to finish the panels for the set and screw around with Mister Ghost Puppet's framework before coming home to watch unranked Georgia Tech pound #7 Georgia in Football.

Then I have to put about a million lights on our friend Ski's Christmas tree (I'm in the Christmas tree decorating business also--haven't I mentioned that in the past?)

Y'all have a good post-Thanksgiving Saturday!

(Cheer for the Jackets if you will.)

Burp

Kitchen Clean...Coma Over With


I was awakened this morning from my lethargic daze about eleven by Heather at the Theater calling me on the telephone. It seems that I'm needed on the stage today with power tools in hand, so me and the PVC framework of the Ghost Puppet are heading over for a few hours of sawdust and hammering/nailing.

Actually, there's very little hammering because everything that isn't secured with a portable screw gun is connected with staples or brads using my new Craftsman air compressor and the appropriate pneumatic gun. I love moving my construction efforts from the dark ages into the 21st century in a single 12 month period of time. All it takes is money...

I'm proud to report that my epic cooking saga yielded a Thanksgiving dinner which was deemed a success, and surprisingly the Oysters Rockefeller and Prosciutto wrapped Sea Scallop appetizers were the biggest hit. I couldn't believe that I was able to get a dozen decent oysters at Harris Teeter for $2.99, especially since our local oysters are inedible because of industrial pollution and everything has to be shipped over here from the Florida Gulf coast.

So I'm off to Ace Hardware for a couple of items, then I stumble around and sweat over the final backdrop panel assembly before mounting Mr. Ghost Puppet's framework and fine tuning it's shape a little.

Watch your toes if you are going to the mall.


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Gobble Gobble

Anyone Wanna Try Some Of My Spicy Nuts?


Well, me and Missy the Turbo Pup are sitting around on the sofa at this early morning hour basking in the glow of having pretty well gotten Thanksgiving Dinner under control.

The turkey has finally allowed itself to thaw so I could toss it into a giant pot of water, vinegar, and spices iced down in a big Coleman cooler, and since then I've been jumping around on and off all evening working on the stove top and throwing things into the oven in the preliminary phases of my dinner preparations.

In addition to not one but TWO giant pones of cornbread, I also have home made turkey stock in one big boiler, my Red Cabbage with Apricots and Balsamic Vinegar in another, and a big cookie sheet covered with something called "Spicy Nuts" that I made in a big stainless skillet using canned Planter's Mixed Nuts and seasonings like Cayenne pepper, cumin, salt, and brown sugar.

Can you say S P I C Y?

Time for a little nap with the Turbo Pup before cranking up the oven and finishing everything off for my guests.

I hope everyone has a really nice Turkey day.

I think that we all deserve it, even if it is going to rain here on our little island.

Standing Room Only

Don't You Wish YOU Were Going To Be At Our House On Thursday?


I've just now gotten through putting together my final shopping list and menu for my concoctions to be served to our crowd for Thanksgiving Dinner.

Since Mr. Turkey spent last night in the Fridge not thawing out, he/she's been relocated to the giant brinning pot situated inside a big Coleman cooler in the kitchen in order to raise it's internal thermodynamic energy while at the same time preventing the growth of anything intent on causing me to kill myself or my holiday guests in the process of cooking and serving the ornery bird.

After spending tonight exposed indirectly to the ambient conditions of the kitchen, tomorrow I'll dump a nice mixture of water, apple cider vinegar, white vinegar, kosher salt, black peppercorns, and some Kristal hot sauce into the pot and then surround everything in between with an ice water mixture contained in the cooler--all the while praying that it all finishes thawing by Thursday about noon.

In addition to the Brined and Roasted Turkey stuffed with Sage Sausage & apple dressing, our guests can look forward to the following menu:

Appetizers

Home made Spiced Mixed Nuts
Oysters Rockefeller
Prosciutto wrapped Sea Scallops

Main Course

Red Cabbage with Apricots and Balsamic Vinegar
Creamed Red Potatoes
Porcine Mushroom Gravy
Cornbread Dressing

Being the contrarian that I am, you might notice that I've omitted the obsequious "Green Bean Casserole" from my menu.

Also, our guests have demanded to be responsible for the dessert course.

As a warning, I have to report that if you bring Green Beans into my house this week in any form except raw and offered as a gift for future consumption, I'm going to have some kind of a cosmic conniption fit and hurt myself or someone else in the process; because I'm VERY TIRED of eating and even smelling green beans with French Onions on top (even if I only eat them once or twice a year for nearly a half century.)

With my cooking skills, does that little quirk make me a bad guy?

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I'm Busting My Skull

Designing Theater Set Parts...That Is


As of Monday morning at 10:30 AM I was in full construction mode building this year's rendition of my idea for the Set of Charles Dicken's "A Christmas Carol" opening down at Brunswick's Ritz Theater begining December 4th.

The stage decking is in place and I'm now working on the plywood backdrop panels, along with my first theatrical puppet.

Here's my inspiration for what "The Ghost of Christmas Future's" head is going to look like:

I found it over here at this site.

My version of this skull will be about 18" high, 15" wide, and 16" deep with an articulated jaw and it will sit on top of a 12' high body with a 10' arm span.

The current plan is for it to appear on stage from behind Scrooge's bed, do it's scene with sound effects (including glowing LED eyes) but no spoken lines, then disappear the same way it came in.

Needless to say I'm...

B U S Y ! ! !

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Do You Know The Difference Between Planting And Share Cropping?

A Larger Scale Harvesting Of BS...I Guess.


I guess that by now anyone with a TV or a Newspaper has heard about the Clinton campaign admitting that they planted a question on global Warming with a college student at a "Town Hall" forum in Iowa a couple of weeks ago.

Clinton campaign spokesman Mo Elliethee admitted that the campaign had planted the question and said it would not happen again.

"On this occasion a member of our staff did discuss a possible question about Senator Clinton's energy plan at a forum,” Elliethee said.

“However, Senator Clinton did not know which questioners she was calling on during the event. This is not standard policy and will not be repeated again.”

Yeah...R I G H T T T T T.

After tossing, turning, and spinning the story every way possible they finally just had to admit what they did for a change and take their embarrassing lumps in public.

I bet there were a few industrial strength butt chewings handed out by the former First-Lady-in-Chief since then (for getting caught--not for planting the question), and ironically it was the lamestream media that jumped on the little "plant" and clipped it off at the roots for a change.

Unfortunately, it took about a week for Mrs. sHrillary's people to come up with another idea to get around the literal intent of their half hearted promises.

The plan was obvious and brilliant at the same time.

Instead of stopping with the question planting in Las Vegas, they'd just get someone else to do their planting--this time not just one "plant" but instead a whole "crop" of questions--for FREE.

The Clinton campaign sharecropper was not a person, but this time was in fact the cable network airing the debate, CNN, and the plants they planted were the following people identified on the air to the viewers simply as "undecided Democratic voters:"

The first was an antiwar activist, Catharine Jackson, who's son is home now from doing three tours in Iraq and likes to attend an anti war rally or two when she isn't appearing on national TV.

Then there was a (former) Democratic Party bigwig from Arkansas, LaShannon Spencer, who was only identified as a member of the First African Methodist Church. See, religious people were at the Debate also.

An active Union official, Judy Bagley, who identified herself only as "a booth cashier [whom] moved here over 30 years ago. And I have three children, and as of yesterday, 8 grandchildren." Senator Obama addressed her by saying "Well, first of all, Judy, thank you for the question, and thanks for the great work you do on behalf of the culinary workers, a great union here."

An Islamic Leader named Khalid Khan--President of the Islamic Society of Nevada, and also a big donor to Nevada senator Harry Reid.

A "Hispanic Activist" named George Ambriz, Secretary Treasurer of a group called ¡Sí Se Puede! Foundation of Nevada. George was introduced by CNN as "a graduate student here, and ...also a mentor to children." George's group is actually demanding that everyone, regardless of immigration status, be allowed to attend college here in the United States.

Finally, the event ended with a softball thrown by a future Harry Reid Intern, Maria Luisa, the UNLV student that CNN asked to present the "diamonds or pearls" question to sHrillary.

I don't know about you, but this all looks sorta fishy to me, and the deeper I dig the worse things get. I did watch the entire debate without falling asleep, but I'm still reading the official CNN transcript and could come up with some more things before the dust finally settles.

I guess that my basic question here is this...

After the Clinton campaign machine already had their knuckles rapped for planting the question in Iowa, isn't it very telling that at the VERY NEXT event, this time on TV in front of three or four million viewers, that the Clinton News Network is afraid to leave to complete chance what sHrillary might have to answer to and/or for?

It seems like, in an effort to ensure fairness to ALL of the Democratic Candidates, that they would have done the exact opposite of what they ended up doing, but noooooooOOOOOO....can't do that.

And of course since it was CNN that was the apparent guilty party, this story will get very little media play outside the Blogosphere.

I swear people, we're all going to go down a bumpy road to hell if people don't start paying attention to things like this.

Aren't you happy that I'm around to point things out for you?


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Is The News Story Actually About The Deaths...

Or Just Covering The Political Agenda Of The Dumbasses Reporting Them?


I was languishing around the Internet this evening trying to find something to bitch about write about when I saw a headline about the recent Cyclone in Bangladesh that has killed at least 2000 people.

Bangladesh said on Sunday that the death toll from a massive cyclone hit 2,000, with that grim tally certain to rise as they struggled to get aid to millions of people left homeless.

The death toll has been jumping by hundreds at a time as rescue workers fight their way to remote areas where entire villages were flattened by the fury of Cyclone Sidr, which tore through south Bangladesh on Thursday night.

''I have never seen such a catastrophe in my 20 years as a government administrator,'' said Harisprasad Pal, a local official in the hard-hit southern district of Jhalokati.

''Village after village has been shattered,'' he said. ''Millions of people are living out in the open and relief is reaching less than one percent of the people.''

This story of death and loss is certainly yet the most recent "natural disaster" to hit the news wires, and I'm sure that the United Nations will be happy to rattle their tin cups demanding financial aid and the use of the US's military resources (something we're already doing) to assist in the relief effort; while at the same time lamenting that America should and could do more, ignoring the Europeans while they make yet another of their typical stingy offers:

The European Commission said it was sending US$ 2.2 million dollars in emergency relief aid to the country.

I hope that somehow that figure is wrong or a typo, because otherwise the socialists over in Europe will be guilty of offering only the equivalent of $1,000.00 per corpse, or $1.00 per displaced Bangladeshi?

That can't be right, nor is it morally conscionable.

That said, what really pisses me off is the amount of news coverage that stories about the poor citizens of Bangladesh get in the US and world media.

FOR INSTANCE, I did a Google News search using the words "Bangladesh Typhoon" and only came up with a total of 49 hits.

Next I did a Google News search looking for "Hurricane Katrina" and was astonished by finding
22,453 stories printed in the PAST HOUR ( at 1:54 AM in the morning)!!!

What the heck?

Then I realized that tropical storms occurring in the Indian Ocean were called Cyclones, not Typhoons, so I did another Google News search for stories in the past hour using the words "Bangladesh Cyclone" and came up with again only 4,024 hits.

My point here is this, Hurricane Katrina, a storm which by varying accounts killed as many as 1836 people in its initial assault and the resulting floods occurred over TWO YEARS ago, in a country with modern infrastructure, where virtually every household in the affected area had cable TV, was warned to evacuate, and had a private automobile or other public transportation available to assist potential victims in their Exodus.

With the exception of the elderly and hospital patients, most of the people who died or were injured were just plain stupid by not leaving when told to do so, and I'm not making this statement based on political affiliation or lack of human compassion.

Yet today the lamestream media is still publishing stories about the Katrina aftermath two years later bashing FEMA and the administration of George Bush at a rate 300% (4,024 stories versus 22, 453 articles) above their use of newsprint and ink on a disaster of possibly ten times Katrina's magnitude, in a country full of tan skinned citizens that live in poverty in houses on bamboo stilts with tin roofs, and without the benefit of getting a warning from the Weather Channel or their government.

Doesn't something seem a little strange about that statistic--4 to 1?

And another thing, where the %$#@ is the UN before this debacle happened?

After all, Bangladesh historically gets inundated every TEN or FIFTEEN years with this exact same kind of natural disaster. Poor illiterate people are killed and stacked like cordwood every decade, and all Kofi Annan, his successor, and his predecessors could and can do is bitch about the US's failure to recognize global warming.

I'm sure the stories will be popping up soon saying that me, my Chevy Suburban, and all of my fellow gas guzzling citizens here in the US bear at least half the responsibility for the size and severity of the storm, and Bush and Cheney used secret Air Force technology to steer the storm into the country in order to deflect attention from their illegal War in Iraq and their failed domestic policies.

And another thing--where the heck is the outrage of the bleeding hearts in the Democratic Party and Paul Krugman at the NY Times over this loss of life and destruction of people's homes and lives?

I suspect that in reality Krugman doesn't give a tinker's damn about poor tan skinned people in some far off foreign land, because there is virtually no political capital in them--they're useless compared to Louisiana and New Orleans' vocal "victims", many of which haven't gotten off of their asses since the storm and are still living in free government housing over two years after the fact.

Maybe it's just me, but something seems wrong here when you carefully think about the details...anyone agree?

I think I'll walk outside now and let my head explode...

Technical Details

More Stuff For You To Think About...


Take a look at this story about Mexico's policy on giving non-residents drivers licenses:

MEXICO CITY - The question of whether to give driver's licenses to illegal immigrants ignited a national debate in the United States. But in Mexico, the largest source of U.S. immigrants, there's no question: Here, you must be a legal resident to get a driver's license. All of Mexico's 31 states, along with Mexico City, require foreigners to present a valid visa if they want a driver's license, according to a survey of states by The Arizona Republic. "

When it comes to foreigners, we're a little more strict here," said Alejandro Ruíz, director of education at the Mexican Automobile Association.

...

Proponents said the plan would have made the roads safer by ensuring that drivers are trained and insured, but the ensuing public outcry forced Gov. Eliot Spitzer to abandon the effort Wednesday.

...

Yet, licensing offices in all of Mexico's 31 states, along with the Federal District, where Mexico City is located, said they require applicants to prove their citizenship, preferably by showing a federal voter-registration card issued by the Federal Elections Institute.

Of those, 28 states and the Federal District said they would issue licenses to foreigners only if they present valid FM-2 or FM-3 residency visas.

The central Mexican states of Morelos, Puebla and Guerrero are more lenient. Foreigners there can get a driver's license with a valid tourist visa, or FMT.

How about them apples?

The Mexican Government wants proof of who you are and that you've gone through the proper channels to get there, yet the same officials and the flood of refugees illegal immigrants "undocumented workers" coming north across our southern border expect us to hand them A LICENSE TO OPERATE A MOTOR VEHICLE just because.

Because...it will make "the roads safer by ensuring that drivers are trained and insured."

Bullshit.

There is no driver training these days here in Georgia, and they don't even make you take a road test unless you are 15 or 16 years old and getting your first license.

Getting a driver's license involves standing in line for two hours, going into a building, paying your fee, then picking up a rule book written in English or Spanish on one side of the room and wandering into a booth with a computer on the other side of the room to take a simple test.

When you walk out of the building, you have not only a license to drive an automobile, but you also have THE KEY TO OUR ENTIRE SOCIETY in your hot little hands.

You can't get a bank account without a government issued picture ID.

You can't get on a commercial airliner without a government issued picture ID.

You can't rent a jet ski at the beach or a chain saw at the local equipment rental store without a Picture ID...

and most of all YOU CAN'T REGISTER TO VOTE WITHOUT A GOVERNMENT ISSUED PICTURE ID.

What IS NOT guaranteed by handing Miguel or Pedro a NY drivers license is that they will actually BUY auto insurance or that they actually know how to drive safely.

Heck, in my opinion three quarters of the legal population that have legitimate drivers licenses aren't safe drivers 99% of the time.

My point is that handing out ID's guarantees NOTHING, except that it will be easier for the people that have already broken the law by coming here and working to exist in our society.

There won't be less crashes with illegal and uninsured Mexicans, there will actually be more.

Just watch and see for yourself...

Dammit

Eyes Glazed Over

Lethargy Setting In...


I hate to admit it, but I'm just too damn comfortable these days.

Imagine that?

I think that I would actually lapse into a self induced coma or stupor if it wasn't for the inane idiots and morons that I encounter in the process of trying to spend money doing the things I love to do.

First, I finally managed to get my butt up out of the bed and off of the sofa after lunch to open the box that FedEX delivered around 11 AM containing our new 22" HP Flat Screen monitor. (The new computer is still on the production line I guess.)

Next, I hooked it up to my notebook computer on the coffee table and found that everything worked seamlessly.

Then I lumbered back to Pat's office and lugged her giant thousand pound 19" CRT monitor and docking station out of the way into the guest bedroom, then hooked our new marvel up to her little Dell laptop.

After a half hour fooling around with the driver CD she was cooking with gas...in a computer sort of fashion. So far so good.

While rummaging through the festering pile of mail adjacent to my computer I realized that my property tax bills were due down at city hall in Brunswick on the 15th (that would be today--at the time), so I jumped online and reluctantly agreed to pay a 2.5% "convenience fee" in order to avoid making the 15 mile round trip over to the mainland.

Of course Capital One still has my primary credit card screwed up, even after giving them a couple of thousand dollars late last week to pay off the balance that had inched upward over the past month of tool and material purchases, so I had to resort to using a Debit Card for the online payment...something that's just asking for disaster in my opinion.

I'm ready to climb over the phone lines and strangle the next customer "non-service" idiot that tries to act like I shouldn't be angry when my purchases are declined and I have to spend a half hour talking to some dang foreigner about my intimate personal financial data when the problem apparently lies with THEIR COMPUTER SOFTWARE, not my shortcomings.

I ended up a basically useless day by defrosting some of my patented chicken and black bean chili that I cooked up and froze last month, serving it with a little pone of my Killer Cornbread for Two, then vegetated on the sofa watching the CNN Democratic Presidential Candidate Debate out in Las Vegas.

I actually managed to stay awake through the entire two plus hours of mindless pandering and droning on about raising the cap on social security, pulling the troops out of Iraq, and not attacking Iran.

I think that they actually managed to not talk about Global Warming, but they did a good deal of stammering and yammering about "energy independence" and "universal healthcare" and, to me, after the first ten minutes, it looked like a pre-planned Hillary/Obama/Edwards kiss and make up lovefest.

I sincerely hope a good deal of the population is paying attention to details beyond the kind of crap delivered in these debates for both the Democrats and the Republicans over the next few months.

If not, we're all in big trouble for the next four if not eight years here in the good old US of A.

Recollections Of The Son Of A Military Pilot--Part II

Smoking Luggage


After having spent yet another late evening doing material takeoffs and lists of things to do in my construction efforts, this morning I happened upon this story about "a smoking backpack" found at the Phoenix airport.

PHOENIX - A backpack caught fire Tuesday in the cargo area at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport, leading to an evacuation, but authorities said the flames were likely caused by heat from a conveyor belt. The bag contained no explosives or other banned items, just leaking toiletries.

Phoenix police Lt. Rick Gehlbach said the backpack likely began to smoke after it got jammed between two larger pieces of luggage on a conveyor belt.

The impact probably caused toiletries containing alcohol to leak, and a combination of heat from the conveyor belt and its track rubbing against the backpack caused it to catch fire, Gehlbach said.

The fire was extinguished quickly, Gehlbach said.

About 10 a.m., a baggage handler loading bags on the US Airways plane noticed that the backpack was hot and set it aside. The fire department was called when the bag began to smoke, and they in turn called in a hazardous materials team as a precaution.

"When the bomb squad arrived, everything was melted in the bag," said Victor Rangel, a spokesman for the Phoenix Fire Department.

Rangel said the backpack contained hairspray and other toiletries.


Yadda yadda yadda...Whoop te doo... give me a break here and find something to really worry about.

I've actually had to jump up on the conveyor belt myself at Atlanta's Hartsfield "Interjacksonville" Airport more than once to save my suitcase from the ravages of the giant conveyors and the crap other idiots shipping baby strollers and coolers full of rotting fish home from the Philippines offer as "checked luggage."

Any way...

The story reminded me of an event that happened back about 40 years ago when my father was still flying airplanes and helicopters on a weekly basis.

As a test pilot and engineer, my dad was rated at least to ride in the co-pilot seat in virtually every airframe the US Army had in their inventory back then, and perhaps one of the most dangerous airplanes they had going was the Grumman OV-1 "Mohawk".

Here's a picture of the fastest, coolest looking fixed wing aircraft the Army ever had:

It's creation was a study in government stupidity and politics, but once the Air Force and Navy pulled out of the program it ended up being the only airplane the Army ever operated which included ejection seats for each of the cockpit crew.

Here's a look from the Pilot's seat:

Talk about bells and whistles...

In it's thirty year career with active duty and reserve forces, the plane also earned the nickname of "The Widowmaker."

It was unstable as hell, and was prone to going into an unrecoverable flat spin that killed several friends and acquaintances of my father, not to mention ending the life of one of my best friend's father from my grade school days in Vietnam in the late 1960's.

My father's flying career was essentially ended from a spinal injury he received in the ejection seat qualification training that the Army put the pilots through in order to qualify to fly it.

Now back to the smoking luggage story...

Dad was doing some test work with a Mohawk airframe out at his home airfield at Ft. Rucker, Alabama, and he and another pilot were required to shuttle the craft out to Texas for some additional work.

As I recall, the trip was long enough to be an overnight run with a return flight in another airplane, so dad loaded a small hardside briefcase with clean socks, underwear, and minimal toiletries (stick deodorant, toothpaste, etc.).

Not being a commercial airliner, the "luggage" was loaded into an empty equipment bay in the fuselage, and the mechanics were instructed to turn off the turbine engine operated heating system since the ferry flight would be a low altitude and the bays were empty.

That's where the problem came into the story.

Instead of turning the heat OFF, they apparently turned it WIDE OPEN.

I never will forget, as a little kid, seeing the warped body of that Samsonite hardside briefcase, the crispy socks (you could stick your finger through them), and the exploded tube of toothpaste and melted stick deodorant that came home after that little overnight sortie.

I'm quite proud to report that my Dad never bent or broke an airplane, even though things like this happened every now and then and he spent a couple of thousand hours in the air in his almost 20 year flying career.

YOU should be so capable or lucky next time you climb on a Delta airliner..

I'm On A Spending Spree

Somebody Stop Me...


Hurray, after months of delay and procrastination, I'm gearing up to get the residential construction project back on track over in Brunswick.

I've spent the past few months distracted with the new house and Pat's pending change in employment status, plus some design and renovation scope changes had me paralysed with indecision, but I've broken out of my funk and today placed the order for the nine new custom built windows.

I hate having to spend the money to buy custom windows on a lower end residential project like this, but the option would be to burn up another saw cutting concrete block openings to size to fit the stuff they sell at Lowes and Home Depot and I just don't have the energy to hang onto the saw for that long.

I can't imagine why in the world they don't make windows that fit standard increments of 8" and 16" that cinder blocks produce when building a wall, but they apparently don't--at least that I can find locally or on the Internet.

Next on the punch list is a new 200 Amp electrical service entrance and breaker panel and about a million dollars a thousand dollars worth of copper wiring
and accessories to power the new heat pump, outlets, and lighting fixtures. Back in 1959 when this place was first constructed they got away with putting one duplex outlet per room, but today you have to have them every twelve feet along the walls so I've got some creative wiring to do in the process.

Then there's the new 4" sanitary sewer connection (yuck)and 1" plastic water supply line that has to be dug into the tree root filled dirt in the front yard. I get tired thinking about that process.

Time to head back over to Brunswick to pay for my windows and get some other material moving now. All in all the process will be more fun than buying a computer I hope.

Would Somebody Please Kill Me

Hello...Doctor Kevorkian?


Dammit, it's that time in my life again.

Time to buy a new computer...this one for Pat.

One would think that, for a long time computer nerd, buying a new machine with lots of bells and whistles and a 22" flat screen monitor would be something akin to a psychic or sexual experience.

You'd be wrong however, because of the idiots you encounter in retail computer establishments and the processes you're forced to endure if you make your purchase online.

After several days of research online, we staggered over to Office Depot, Staples, and Circuit City on Sunday afternoon armed with model numbers of hardware that, according to the respective websites, was supposed to be in stock.

Nope.

Just like when I bought my HP widescreen notebook a year ago, the store employees had no idea what they had in inventory, and the computers displayed were a subset/superset of the things advertised in the newspaper and online. Nothing would allow you to compare apples with apples, or apples with HP's (excuse the pun.)

I walked out of the store after twenty minutes of tripping over a gaggle of customers worrying about video game capability and wild eyed pimple faced kids who weren't born when I first laid my hands on an IBM PC.

Meanwhile, back online, after massive additional research, and with credit card in hand, I discovered that Capitol One's new computer system upgrade had scrambled my personal information and, in spite of having paid the card balance off in the past week, their fraud department was blocking my charge because I didn't have a history of charging four digit amounts in one lump sum.

Dammit.

After three tries and an hour on hold on the telephone with the credit card company, I just got the order processed. What a total pain in the butt.

Since I'm having the machine custom built, now I have to wait until the week after Thanksgiving to lay my hands on the new wireless keyboard.

I think that I'll go smoke a nice cigar now in celebration.

NEWS FLASH: THERE IS NO SOCIAL SECURITY "TRUST FUND"

Who ARE These Idiots That Believe There Is?


Look at this story.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Democrat Barack Obama said Sunday he will push for higher Social Security taxes if elected, viewing it as the best option for improving the retirement program's
finances.

Obama and several other Democratic presidential candidates previously have signaled support for lifting the cap on the amount of income that is taxed to provide monthly Social Security checks.

But during an interview on NBC's "Meet the Press," Obama said taxing more of a person's income was the option he would push for if elected president. He objected to benefit cuts or a higher retirement age.

"I think the best way to approach this is to adjust the cap on the payroll tax so that people like myself are paying a little bit more and people who are in need are protected," the Illinois senator said.

"That is the option that I will be pushing forward." Currently, only the first $97,500 of a person's annual income is taxed. That cap is scheduled to rise to $102,000 next year. Obama's proposal could include a gap or "doughnut hole" to shield middle-income earners from higher payroll taxes, he said.

Dammit, anyone that has any sense knows that the Imperial Federal Government of the United By God States Of America stole the proceeds of the so-called Social Security "Trust Fund" under Nixon back in the 1970's when they started commingling the revenue stream with the general budget.

If you managed to find a key and wandered up to Washington DC to open up the lamestream media glorified "lock box", instead of cash or gold bullion, all you will find inside are a bunch of IOU's written by the same lieing stealing bastards that we've all managed to (re)elect to office over the past 40 years.

And now Obama and 97% of congress--both Republican and Democrat--want to steal yet more money from higher wage earners to hand to all the withering masses of citizens that will be retiring over the next twenty years (myself included.)

Here's how the ASSociated Press reporter puts it:

Social Security is projected to start spending more than it collects beginning in 2017, with its trust fund depleted in 2041.

How can people that have spent four years of their life attending college, and a big chunk of their parent's money in the process, still sit in front of a computer keyboard and write the words "trust fund" and the other BS that is still written about Social Security with a straight face.

In the real world, based on things like reality and little details like FACTS, this shouldn't even be a news story. If there is a news story here, it's that the little shiny black presidential candidate is a class warfare pandering moron just like the balance of the other stupid, lieing Caucasian white pandering morons with testicles or ovaries dangling between their legs during this political campaign season.

They're all either STUPID, or they're LIARS, or possibly BOTH, and they must think that the public is all STUPID also, in my considered Redneck opinion.

Are you that STUPID?

I'm not...