The Prayer of Saint Francis of Assissi

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury,pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen

Habemus Papam

• Remember that rain I mentioned the other night?  It rained pretty much all day yesterday and into the night.
  • Guess who forgot to roll up the driver’s window on his truck Sunday afternoon?
  • Guess who found that on Tuesday morning when he left for work?
  • Perkele
• Note to co-worker:  “Send me a meeting notice for the planning session” does not mean “Send me a completed schedule with my tasks highlighted.”
  • No, really, it’s OK.  I didn’t have anything else planned that weekend.
• I have decided that I do not care for pear hard cider.
  • I like pears, and I like hard cider.  But pear hard cider is weak and flavorless.
• Am I going to hell for making sarcastic remarks about the people who were calling into the easy-listening call-in show on the radio tonight?
  • Caller – “Hi, I’d like to dedicate “I Will Always Love You” to my ex.  She cheated on me with a Marine scout-sniper platoon, gave me three kinds of STD, and put me desperately in debt while I was deployed, but I just can’t get her out of my mind”
  • Me – “Dude, the best thing that ever happened to you was for you to find out how big a psycho hosebeast she was.  Quit carrying the torch for her, touch it to the pile of wood she’s tied to, and quit being such a @#$!!@”
  • Maybe I should have my own  call-in advice show.  “DaddyBear tells you what you need to hear, along with the hits of the 70’s, 80’s, and 90’s, tonight on ‘Smarten Up, You Dolt!'”

#!/usr/bin/ksh

while true

do

#Remind yourself of the base rules when dealing with other people

echo “All people have the right to hold their own convictions and opinions, no matter how much I disagree or how much they piss me off.” >> /dev/brain/controlcenter

echo “Just because you disagree with someone doesn’t make them a weak-willed, ignorant, poorly educated, badly bred, and horribly raised troglodyte.” >> /dev/brain/controlcenter

#Silently let off a bit of steam

echo “You, sir, are the unholy spawn of a coupling between a Tazmanian dwarf walrus and an Armenian hairless yak.  You should be coated in rancid strawberry jam and left to be nibbled to death by pigmy koala bears in the midday sun!” >> /dev/null 2>&1

echo “play_earworm /memory/longterm/music/soothing/Eine_Kleine_Nachtmuzik.mp3” >> /dev/brain/auditory/input

sleep 30

#End the conversation and get back to work.

echo “Well, I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree.  Good day, sir!”

echo

done

exit 0

• I traded in the Caravan today, but I shall forever be the Minivandian.
• We ended up buying the car we test drove on Saturday.
  • It’s amazing how easy it is to drive a new, small car after driving my old, broken-down truck for a few months.
  • Irish Woman is getting used to driving a stick again.
  • Girlie Bear saw the car and had absolute happiness in her eye.  Apparently she believes that eventually the shiny new car will be hers to drive.
    • Of course, by then, it will have scratches, scuffs, door dings, and a worn-out engine, if it happens at all.
• Today was the least stressful experience I’ve ever had in buying a new car.
  • It’s nice to walk into the dealership with your financing taken care of, have the price for the car you want to be pretty much set in stone, and work directly with a sales manager.
• While we waited for all the paperwork to be drawn up, we window shopped in the show room.
  • Remember what I said about how expensive pickups were?  They have nothing on luxury SUV’s.
  • The dealership taunted me by having the truck I want in the configuration I want at a reasonable price.  Here’s hoping they have something like that when I come back in a few years.
• It’s kind of nice to read a book and see the names of friends doing extraordinary things.
• Taking a 4 year old to a pizza buffet and watching him try to make up his mind of which one he wanted to devour first is one of the more fun things I have done lately.
• You know, I wish I was surprised that when I tuned the TV to a network dedicated to programming for young children, the most common advertisement was a trashy, over-sexed commercial for the St. Patrick’s Day from a chain of liquor stores.
• Tomorrow, my primary task will be to drive around the airplanes and not hit the airplanes.

• I need to do a better job checking my schedule.
  • I thought I had to start work at 7 this morning, but it was really 8.
• In the bathroom update, I am batting .333 on first time success in getting lights to work.
• DaddyBear Rain Spell – Wash the minivan so that it can be traded in.
• Boo gave us a scare this afternoon when he disappeared from playing on the porch.
  • We found him in the truck, moving all the knobs on the radio and climate control.
  • Honestly, we only found him because he started honking the horn and giggling like a fiend.
  • 30 more seconds would have meant a call to the police.
• Why did I have to look at new trucks yesterday?  I’ve been haunting the local dealerships’ websites all evening, even though I know I won’t be buying a new truck for at least two years.
• I think spring has sprung.
  • At least I hope so.  The fruit trees are going to bud out in a few more days of this warmth, and a freeze would destroy the entire crop.

• We told Boo to take it easy on Moonshine because he doesn’t feel well.
  • Boo asked if Moonshine would be molting.
  • Note to self – He’s smarter than he looks, but his information is a tad off.
• Note to bathroom fan manufacturers – You fail as a human being, and I hate you.
  • Please hire someone who speaks English as their primary language to write the English installation instructions.
    • The sentence structure and word choice is odd enough that I can’t tell if it was the French speaker or the Spanish speaker who wrote it.  Maybe it was a third-party, perhaps someone who grew up speaking Khoisan.
  • If one paragraph says to follow badly drawn figure 2, then the next says to not do what figure 2 looks like, then what exactly am I supposed to do?
  • If your instructions say to make a 11 by 9 inch hole in my ceiling for your fan, your fan should be able to fit through an 11 by 9 inch hole in some way, shape, or fashion.
  • Also, stop using whiz-bang boutique bulbs for the lights in the darn thing.
    • Seriously, lightbulbs are a problem that was solved almost a century ago.  Even if you want me to use a miniature CFL, the ones that just screw in are 1/4 the cost of the ones you designed your fan to use.
• A hand-held electric jigsaw does an excellent job cutting a hole in the ceiling of a bathroom that is clad in wallboard and a 1/2 inch thick layer of plaster.
  • However, I have been coughing up miniature ceramic teacups all afternoon.
  • What is this ‘mask’ thing you speak of?
• While I was fighting with the bathroom, Irish Woman went to a meeting with the group that is trying to organize a food co-op in our little village.
  • She swears there were no hippies in attendance, including the person who is running the thing, but I swear she smelled of patchouli when she came home.
  • First it’s a food co-op, then it’s a “Save the three-toed Bulgarian tree aardvark” committee, and before you know it, we’ve got full-blown hippie drum circles on Main Street.
• We went and test-drove cars this afternoon.
  • We’ve settled on the Ford Focus hatchback.  Now we’re down to negotiating features.
  • I would prefer a five speed manual.
  • Irish Woman wants a moon roof.
  • The only car they had with both was black with black interior.
    • Rather than bake all summer long, I’ll probably give on the manual transmission.
    • I don’t really care about the moonroof, and it’s cheaper to pay for Irish Woman’s car to have one than to hear about it not having one for the life of the vehicle.
  • The Focus has the easiest clutch I’ve ever driven. It would be great to teach Girlie Bear how to drive in that car.
  • The thing comes with Sync, Ford’s built-in computer system.  Borepatch has written about it several times.  Guess I’ll have to learn how to lock it down or shut it off, if that’s even possible.
• While we were at the dealership, I thought I’d take a look at the new trucks.
  • Apparently Ford is upholstering their pick-ups in fine Corinthian marmot leather, lubricating them with natural oils pressed between the thighs of hairy virgins, and plating their engine components with an alloy of rhodium and diamonds.
  • Who in blazes decided that a pick-up truck ought to cost $50,000?????
  • I must point out that $50k is an easy and low number to divide into the value of our house.
  • It’s also more than what my parents paid for any of the three homes they owned.
  • Looks like I’ll either be buying another brand, buying a used truck, or selling several children and a hound dog on the black market to finance a new truck when the time comes.

• There is a special place in hell for people who leave 1/8 of an inch of coffee in the bottom of the pot and then put it back on the burner.
• There is never a mop around when you knock over an entire cup of coffee with cream and sugar onto a tile floor.
  • Paper towels just didn’t cut the mustard.
• The Time of Non-Productivity has begun, as was foretold.
  • My co-workers began talking about the NCAA basketball tournament today.
• Moonshine got fixed today.
  • The vet took a look at his teeth while he was knocked out, and decided that two of his baby teeth needed to be pulled.
  • Poor guy is sore on both ends.
  • Then again, he’s much calmer a few hours after general anesthesia.
  • He came home from the vet with doggie narcotics, but no cone of shame.
• Driving a stick shift pickup with a 55 pound lab puppy who doesn’t like going for a drive is an adventure that few will experience.
• Final preparations are underway to trade in both the minivan and Irish Woman’s car on her new car.
  • Next year or the year after it will be my turn.
• You can keep your portable electronic doo-dads and candy filled to the brim with corn syrup. The best bribe I have at my disposal is a movie on the TV and popcorn.
• Tonight’s bedtime book was one I bought for Girlie Bear and Little Bear when they were toddlers – The Tortoise and the Jackrabbit.
  • Girlie Bear read it to Boo, complete with voices and sound effects.
  • I guess that’s one I’m going to hang onto for the grandkids.

• I hate it when I wake up a few minutes before the alarm, lay back down, then dream I got up and got ready for work.
  • Waking up from that is always a let down.
• I shouldn’t use the term “poking the pooch” to describe someone’s professional conduct and performance.
• The utility of writing plans months in advance is that when someone gives you clearance to do something, you can pounce before they have a chance to change their mind.
• No, really, I feel bad that you have to work a weekend.  This is my empathy face.
• I am forever thankful that I made it home alive tonight.
  • Apparently the correct method for getting out of the way for an ambulance is to try to park your semi-tractor in my engine compartment.  Luckily, there was no-one behind me when I locked  up my brakes instead of coming to a nice safe stop.
  • I’m glad I got new tires when I did.  The roads were slick on the drive home.
• It changed over from rain to snow in the space of about 5 minutes.  Haven’t seen that in a while.
• Boo demanded to know what I had done when we had a power blip tonight.
  • I was unaware of this super power, but I promise to only use it for good.
• Several of Girlie Bear’s classmates in JROTC learned they have been accepted to the service academies today.  It’s got her thinking.
  • Does West Point or Annapolis offer a pre-med program?

• Maybe I was raised differently than most, but it infuriates me to listen to someone berate the staff at a doctor’s office for things that they don’t control, but which displease the berator.
  • Here’s a hint – People in the office should not be able to hear your voice outside of your exam room with the door closed.  They especially shouldn’t be able to understand every word that comes out of your mouth.
• Poke and prod tally for the day – One hole in each arm to draw two tubes of blood. One hole in the right arm to get a shot of steroids.  Three chest X-ray’s (different aspects).
  • I feel well tenderized and ionized.
• The doctor gave me some medical advice that had me running off to the Internet to research it.  If you’re looking to live a calm, unfrightened life, don’t go looking up side effects for your medications.
  • I’m either dyeing or just a ninny.  I’ll let you guess which.
• Girlie Bear seems to be doing well at JROTC.  She was invited to join in the weekly staff meeting (S-1, S-3, S-4) that the Colonel holds with the student leaders.
• She also had her introduction to college level homework tonight.  Writing up a study outline of about 40 pages of the textbook by the end of the week, which will be graded and then used as her basis for the next test is giving her something to chew on.
• Irish Woman must really love me.  After dealing with my too-grumpy-for-words self all weekend, she made h0memade lasagna for dinner.
• It looks like some people are coming into town for the Knob Creek machine gun shoot in April.  Anyone want to have a blog meet that weekend?
  • I suggest meeting for breakfast.  You don’t want to miss the afternoon shooting and gun show, and the night shoot is supposed to be very cool.
• We got an evaluation from Boo’s preschool today.  He apparently has trouble with sharing, playing with others, and coloring in the lines.
  • Guess I’m going to have to claim this one.  That could have been written about me.
  • Heck, I’ve had personnel reviews that used similar phrases.
• No matter how hard he tries, Moonshine just can’t make friends with Annya and Koshka.
  • He doesn’t seem discouraged, and looks at the swatting upside the head as just playful pats.

• Girl Scout Cookies – They’re not just for breakfast anymore.
• I was wondering where all the dirt that came up in the mop bucket came from, and then the dogs came in from the yard.
  • Ever see those pictures from no-man’s land in World War I?  Yeah, my backyard looks something like that.
• Irish Woman threatened to paint the walls Navy Blue if I didn’t give her input on what colors I want.
  • I countered with Khaki Green.
  • I’m sure we’ll compromise.
  • Of course, this could be the Great Paint Sequester of 2013.
    • Navy Blue below the chair rail, Khaki Green above.
    • It’ll make her twitch spasmodically, and my lack of appreciation for proper color placement will protect me.
    • It’s a no-lose situation.
• There may be a good reason I’m not an electrician.
  • I know to throw my own breakers and then check the wires to make sure I hit the right circuit.  Most everything after that I have to consult books and the Internet.
  • Of course, if the wiring in this house wasn’t older than my mother, this might be a little easier.
• The bathroom remodel is in its end stages.  I had a rather firm discussion with my loving wife about scope creep in any other projects and how it would impact our friendship.
• I’m not grumpy. I’ve just been in a bad mood since the Clinton administration.