I’ve had enough time around airplanes for a while. It’s good to have a good home-cooked meal and see Irish Woman and the kids.
Today’s Earworm
Posted by daddybear71 on August 4, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/08/04/todays-earworm-397/
Thoughts on the Day
– I have decided that the part of traveling that disagrees with me is the portion between when I leave my driveway and when I pull back in.
– There was a gaggle of small children on my flight today. They were kind enough to not cry all at once. Instead, they took turns screaming, kind of like a choral of shrieking.
– I am officially too old to go out to a ‘restaurant’ that features loud music and too many people.
– I apologize to my tidewater friends, but Maryland wins hands down in the crab cake competition.
– I got to explain what Retreat and To The Colors are for to someone tonight. Hadn’t done that for a long time.
Posted by daddybear71 on August 2, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/08/02/thoughts-on-the-day-155/
Thought for the Day
Scout Oath (or Promise)
On my honor I will do my best
To do my duty to God and my country
and to obey the Scout Law;
To help other people at all times;
To keep myself physically strong,
mentally awake, and morally straight.
Scout Law
A Scout is trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly,
courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty,
brave, clean, and reverent.
I thought these would be appropriate, considering today is the anniversary of the beginning of the Scouts.
Posted by daddybear71 on August 1, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/08/01/thought-for-the-day-199/
Rule 1 – Don’t Be Stupid
Recently, a man in Michigan was arrested after he flashed a card identifying him as a CIA employee. Apparently Mr. Flint isn’t really with the CIA, and he showed the card to allay any concerns brought on by him carrying a pistol, ammunition, and body armor at a movie theater. Now, instead of enjoying popcorn and a beverage while being entertained, he’s going to be introduced to the guys over at Club Fed for a while.
If you’re going to carry a gun, your actions need to be as pure as the driven snow, or at least as close as you can get. I understand carrying a gun to somewhere in public like a restaurant or a movie theater. I do it all the time. I also recognize that some property owners don’t want legal carriage of firearms in their establishments. I recognize it, I don’t agree with it, but it’s their property. I avoid these establishments as much as I can, and I try to scan the doors of businesses to see if they have posted a sign asking that I keep myself and my firearm out.
In this case, the movie theater may have had a posted policy against bringing weapons on the premises, and this guy thought he’d ignore it. In a lot of states, that act itself isn’t illegal. As I understand the law here in Kentucky, if a property owner notices that you’re carrying and asks you to take your gun and leave, you have to go, but so long as you comply, no harm, no foul.
But flashing phony ID and claiming to be something you’re not so that you can enjoy watching “The Chipmunks VII: Theodore’s Sacrifice” is pretty much the opposite of what you should do. It only leads to more complications, as in this case, where our subject will probably be losing a few of his God-given rights because of a moment of stupidity.
To sum up: When you’re carrying, obey the law. Doing anything less puts yourself at risk legally and makes the rest of us look bad.
And for those who need to reach for smelling salts because a man was carrying 34 bullets and had 111 more in his car, that’s called having your range bag in the trunk and having two reloads in your pocket. You might as well gasp loudly when a golfer has his clubs in the back of the minivan and a couple of extra balls in his pocket.
Posted by daddybear71 on August 1, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/08/01/rule-1-dont-be-stupid/
Shoutouts
- To whoever requisitioned October weather for July in Kentucky, bless you.
- To Irish Woman, who suggested we get two bushels of canning tomatoes at the market the other day, thank you. We shall enjoy the 19 quarts of pasta sauce we made and canned.
- To the smokers of Louisville, I hope someday they hand y’all a snow shovel and a whisk broom and make you clean up the drifts of butts that have built up on some of the streets.
- To the people being absolute drama queens, whiners, and petulant children because The Old Reader organization has decided they’re overwhelmed with what is, to them, a hobby: grow up. It’s not the end of the world, it’s an inconvenience.
- To the nitwit from North Carolina who threw his spit cup out his car window in traffic today, I hope you spill the next one in your lap so the inside of your car can smell like the outside of my truck.
Posted by daddybear71 on July 30, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/07/30/shoutouts-10/
An Open Letter to the Republican National Committee
Ladies and Gentlemen,
I am a life-long Republican who has decided that the party has left me and those like me behind in its journey toward becoming the other Democrat party. Now, the usual gang of idiots, whose support gave us Bob Dole, John McCain, and Mitt Romney, is lining up to support New Jersey governor Chris Christie in his quest to become the next Republican to lose to a Democrat half-wit.
I’ve walked away from the Republican party rank and file, and put myself into the “Independent” column, but I still tend to lean toward your side of the argument on most elected officials. That being said, let me make myself perfectly clear:
If you nominate Chris Christie or any of his ilk for the presidency in 2016, you will lose, and I will do everything in my power to help that along.
Now, let me be brutally honest:
I will vote for Hillary Rodham Clinton before I will vote for Chris Christie. I will vote for Nancy Pelosi before I will vote for Chris Christie. I will vote for Deval Patrick before I will vote for Chris Christie. I will vote for just about anyone else on the face of the planet before I will vote for Chris Christie.
And I will shout from the rooftops to anyone who will listen as to why and I will take as many Republican voters with me as I can.
Chris Christie is political kryptonite to me and those like me. He has cozied up to Barack Obama as often as he can. He opposes gun rights at every turn, and supported anti-rights legislation in New Jersey at the same time that a groundswell of support for pro-gun legislators in Congress was at its peak. His ilk should not be the future of the party, and if he is, you will throw away the support of that all-important “None of the above” political demographic.
Am I getting through to you?
The best case scenario for you if Governor Christie is on the Republican ticket in 2016 is that we stay home on election day. The worst case is that we decide to vote for someone other than the person y’all decided deserved a turn at losing an election.
If you want my support and the support of those like me, you need to break your habit of putting up a milquetoast, get-along-to-get-along candidate. You need to support people who want to roll back the abuses of the last two presidencies, both in the area of individual rights and in the overreach and intrusion of the federal government. Anything less will reinforce your status as the also-ran, permanent loyal opposition.
Sincerely yours,
Daddy J. Bear
Louisville, KY
(Yes, I did put this in an envelope and mailed it. No, I don’t expect they’ll respond)
Posted by daddybear71 on July 28, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/07/28/an-open-letter-to-the-republican-national-committee/
Happy Birthday!
Today is the birthday of an Original Gangster American Badass, Samuel Whittemore. This fine gentleman, at the ripe age of 80, proceeded to take on the British army armed only with the weapons he had in his home, gave better than he got, and survived to tell the tale.
Whittemore was in his fields when he spotted an approaching British relief brigade under Earl Percy, sent to assist the retreat. Whittemore loaded his musket and ambushed the British from behind a nearby stone wall, killing one soldier. He then drew his dueling pistols and killed a grenadier and mortally wounded a second. By the time Whittemore had fired his third shot, a British detachment reached his position; Whittemore drew his sword and attacked. He was shot in the face, bayoneted thirteen times, and left for dead in a pool of blood. He was found alive, trying to load his musket to fight again. He was taken to Dr. Cotton Tufts of Medford, who perceived no hope for his survival. However, Whittemore lived another 18 years until dying of natural causes at the age of 98.
Today, please raise a toast to the man who typifies my beliefs about Americans: We’re a peaceful people, but raise a hand to harm us, and we’ll take your whole gorram arm off.
Posted by daddybear71 on July 27, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/07/27/happy-birthday/
Thoughts on the Day
- It is exceedingly difficult to convince some people that it is better to write down how to do something, especially if it’s an odd happenstance that does occasionally happen, than to be called on vacation because you’re the only person who knows how to do something and can’t be bothered to write it down.
- I spent 8 hours over two days working on two tasks that others have done but failed to document their procedures.
- The Thai chili garlic dill pickles turned out quite well. They go very well with a cold beer and grilled meat.
- Little Bear and I had dinner last night with a good friend’s family for a wedding rehearsal dinner.
- When you eat dinner with a Chinese family and they compliment the Chinese food at the restaurant, it must be good.
- I don’t speak Chinese, but I recognized a couple of phrases from Firefly.
- I ate until I was stuffed, but they kept pushing food at me. Apparently I don’t eat enough.
- I’m enjoying this 75 degree July weather. I could get used to having the climate of San Diego, but the culture and people of Kentucky.
Posted by daddybear71 on July 26, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/07/26/thoughts-on-the-day-154/
Thought for the Day
If “In Vino Veritas” is true, what do you get from bourbon?
To paraphrase George Carlin, it’s questions like these that kept me out of the good universities.
Posted by daddybear71 on July 26, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/07/26/thought-for-the-day-198/
News Roundup
- From the “And The Band Played On” Department – The House of Representatives narrowly defeated an amendment to defense appropriation legislation that would have stripped funding from the NSA’s program of domestic surveillance. You’ll recall that the NSA has worked with technology and telecommunications companies to vacuum up data on all communications in the United States, and some, including me, call that an eggregious violation of the public’s trust. Now that we know which of our representatives are not with us, I look forward to someone in the Senate introducing a similar amendment to the legislation so we can know who in that august body stands on the side of the people and who stands on the side of an over-arching government surveillance state.
- From the “Tuning Up the Fiddle” Department – The city council of Detroit, which recently became the largest city in U.S. history to declare bankruptcy, took a good chunk of its time in what most people would consider a crisis to draft, debate, and pass a resolution about the Martin-Zimmerman case in Florida. Apparently fiddling while Detroit burns is considered a civic virtue in the Motor City. In related news, the city council is putting off discussion of how they’re going to keep the city from imploding under the pressure of decades of mismanagement in favor of debating great taste versus less filling, Helvetica versus Comic Sans, and kerosene versus gasoline as an accelerant in burning down abandoned homes at Halloweentime.
- From the “Only Ones” Department – A panel in Illinois, which is looking into allegations that members of the Chicago police department coerced and tortured confessions out of suspects in murder cases, has announced that several more people have been found to be convicted and imprisoned based on evidence gained through beatings and intimidation. Most troubling to me is the propensity of these ‘peace officers’ to attack and exploit the mentally ill. It is my sincere hope that the bottom of this particular cesspool is successfully plumbed, and that the people involved get justice, either by being released from prison due to police misconduct, or being thrown into prison for that misconduct.
- From the “Never Let A Crisis Go To Waste” Department – Ohio governor Kasich is blaming the murders of women, whose bodies were recently found in Cleveland, on ‘poverty’. You see, apparently when you have poor people, people get murdered and buried in a shallow grave wrapped in a plastic sheet. It can’t be the fault of the piece of crap that killed these poor women, can it? This wretched urchin couldn’t control himself, being poor himself. So of course he stalked, killed, defiled, and discarded these people to work out his issues brought about by the abject ‘poverty’ of the American inner city. I would remind the good governor that what we call poverty is considered unthinkable luxury by a huge portion of the human population, and that there have been poor people since there have been people, and I haven’t heard of epidemics of serial killers in the slums of Rome. Then again, they had better ways of dealing with mad dogs who slaughtered young women in Rome, so maybe they were just better at this than we are.
- From the “Shrinkage” Department – Former congressman Anthony Weiner has lost his impressive lead in the campaign to become the next mayor of New York City after revealing that he continued the scurilous behavior of sending nude pictures to women other than his wife even after being driven from office. It’s not often that I agree with Nancy Pelosi on anything, but she hit it on the head when she said “The conduct of some of these people that we’re talking about here is reprehensible”. I’m wondering what excuse Weiner will trot out this time to explain his behavior and abject stupidity. Apparently “The Internet is forever” means nothing to this twit.
- From the “Four Rules” Department – A man in England was killed recently when the zipper pull of his boot caught the trigger of his rifle and caused it to fire. Remember, ladies and gentlemen, all it takes is a moment of inattention to cause tragedy. Keep stuff, including fingers, away from the trigger, and be careful to not let the muzzle of a weapon go across anything you don’t want shot.
- From the “Sauce for the Gander” Department – A man in California has pled guilty to manslaughter in the death of an elderly man in a traffic accident. What makes this a novel situation is that the death was not caused by a motorist, but rather by a cyclist. The cyclist admits that he struck the man, but maintains that the light was yellow when he entered the intersection. Having, at several points in my life, used a bicycle as a primary means of transport, it makes me cringe when I see cyclists blow through lights or stop signs, fail to signal, or cut between cars in traffic or through a crowd of pedestrians. If you want to be respected in the same manner as those who use powered vehicles, you have to follow the laws of the road and accept responsibility when called out for not doing so.
- From the “What Caliber?” Department – A CNN reporter misspoke the other day and avowed that people had hunted dildos to extinction as an example of our impact on the environment. He quickly corrected himself, and changed his assertion that we had hunted the contraceptive sponge out of existence.
Posted by daddybear71 on July 26, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/07/26/news-roundup-198/
DaddyBear
