Since this will likely be my last time online before Thanksgiving, I'm posting early. A little over a year ago, after personal circumstances had pushed us to the brink of homelessness, we arrived via Greyhound in the Texas Panhandle. With about $1200 to our name and my weekly unemployment check to tide us over, we purchased a car, paid our deposits and set up house in the first home we could truly call our own. Our first Thanksgiving here really wasn't OURS. We spent it with new friends, a...
Link Well, I have to thank talk radio for pointing this little tidbit out for me. Apparently, several of Hollywood's elite got together last Sunday to preach at the rest of us and demand that we lobby our congresspersons to sign the Kyoto accords. From what I heard, it was a moron-a-thon of mammoth proportions. Now, to be fair, I have only heard soundbites of this claptrap. But those soundbites have been enough to make me roll my eyes until I'm deathly afraid they'll freeze that way. Wh...
The Taliban was pretty widely regarded as a bad government in Afghanistan. Though the US initially supported them in their efforts to control the country (largely because the alternative was the further expansion of the Soviet Empire and because the Taliban took a hard stand against drugs, the country's chief export), I think it's fair to say that even their one time allies were not long in understanding what a horrific mistake had been made in supporting them. Under the Taliban-led government, ...
Link Up on yahoo news' headline list is an article on a study that shows that spanked children are more likely to be aggressive. There are a whole lot of variables, of course, NOT explained in the context of the study. I have strong reservations about spanking. I believe it is sometimes appropriate for younger children, although rarely the best choice of discipline for older children (I believe the end result of any disciplinary action should be to teach the child the desired behavior, ...
In all the flap about San Francisco, everyone seems to be missing a rather key point. See, San Franciscans have pulled the "Free Speech" hot button to trot flaming gays out in clothing that belongs in the bedroom, not on Main Street, and everytime they want to denigrate anyone more Conservative than they are (which turns out to be, well, 99% of the rest of the country). Suddenly, free speech is NOT OK for military recruiters who believe in the military and want to enlist soldiers for the caus...
Well, yesterday we finally set about the task that falls next on our self reliance checklist. We woke up and organized the materials we had compiled to install the woodstove that has set in our living room as a cat perch for about three months (we bought early in the season, figuring there would be a demand this fall). The initial plan was to go up and out at a 45 degree angle, so we bought elbows that could be adjusted for that purpose. Our local handyman was initially unavailable, so it loo...
If you're going to San Francisco, Be sure to wear flowers in your hair If you're going to San Francisco You're going to find some gentle people there. Over the last two weeks I have become convinced that hairspray causes insanity. I am, of course, referring to the fact that San Francisco voters by a wide margin banned private ownership of guns within city limits and banned military recruiters on college campuses (an incredibly ironic combination, since, if private...
I read the latest tripe about Bush's alleged string pulling to get into (and out of) the National Guard during the Vietnam era. Read it, dismissed it, and walked away with a more solid resolve not to give my vote to the types of people who waste my time dragging red herrings like this out repeatedly in an order to embarass the party in power. You see, they're sending a clear message: that their PARTY, not the country, is what's truly important, and that they will abandon all ethics in ad...
I've watched some of the recent JU drama from the sidelines. I don't want to jump in the middle of it as I can see something of each side's perspective, but I DO want to offer a little bit of advice that I hope EVERYONE can take from the table. Blogs are a fairly new phenomenon for many of us. If you're in your mid thirties, as I am, chances are you haven't been involved with the internet for more than 1/3 of your lifespan, and for many of us possibly significantly less. During that time, eve...
As those of you who have read my blog with regularity know, I am a member of our local volunteer fire department. I am also one of the newer members, having served for nearly a year (I just received my jacket, which is given for a years' service). But my tenure has been thus far uneventful, as I've only been available previously for a bad bicycle-car accident and several storm chasing episodes including one that put us directly under the wall cloud (unfortunately, only AFTER rotation in that ...
Our local paper carries the high school newspaper as an insert when it is printed. And so, I was reading through the newspaper this past week, when one of the boys in our small community (who goes to school in the larger community, where the paper is located) wrote a column about a few random thoughts. He glibly discussed the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and mentioned that 95 percent of their casualties were civilian. Then, in closing, he mentioned that he would put "a fist in the face...
As I watch the mainstream news media, I'm inundated with facts and figures. The number of Iraq war casualties has become requisite for the end of every news broadcast, at least on CBS. In times past, I, as a pacifist, would have been caught up in the flow and probably would be spewing diatribes about the "neocons" strong enough to make a DU blogger blush. But, see, I'm a little more informed than most people who rely solely on the nightly news. And I owe it to the many soldiers who blog he...
Well, folks, the general public is right. We have been gouged at the gas pumps. And those responsible need to pay. But, see, the thing is, the oil companies ain't where we should be pointing the finger. Indeed, if you have mutual funds, you probably got a chunk of the oil companies' profits back in your portfolio somewhere. While the oil companies DID make money, they used the laws of supply and demand to induce a conservative mindset among consumers at a time when supply was low. Nothing ...
One of my biggest pet peeves is the MSM's insistence on calling attackers against US troops and innocent civilians in Iraq "insurgents". The reason, apparently, is they couldn't get away with the label "freedom fighters". With an assist from google, I came up with the following definitions for "insurgent": (joint) Member of a political party who rebels against established leadership. (JP 1-02) www.liberalsagainstterrorism.com/wiki/index.php/Counterinsurgency_Operations/Glossary ...
I think I'm going to get myself a bumper sticker that states "my leader is less inept than YOUR leader". Why? Well, apparently Jacques Chirac has enacted a curfew, hoping it will bring an end to rioting that has neared the two week mark and that has spread to over 300 French cities, and is apparently spreading to Germany and Belgium. From reports I have heard, however, French police will not go into the neighborhoods where the rioting is taking place. This leaves it to the French military, wh...