This morning, after feeding Baby Bear his morning cereal, I gave him a handful of Cheerios to gum/chew while I got my breakfast. My coat was across the back of the kitchen chair next to the high chair.

Apparently, Baby Bear decided to stash away a few Cheerios while Dad had his back turned.

When I got to work this morning, my coat pocket had about 10 cheerios in it. For Baby Bear, that’s a pretty good snack. For me, it was a sticky handful of oat flour.

He’s learning to stash away supplies against lean times already. I’m so proud.

When an old soldier meets a young soldier in the Army, occasionally he will ask the young trooper his age. A wise ass old NCO may say “Heck, I’ve got boots older than you!”. It’s a light hearted ribbing to show just how ancient the NCO is in comparison to the young pup.

This man (H/T to The Best Defense) most certainly has boots that are older than me.

CSM Mellinger went through basic training and jump school while I was still learning to walk and talk. He’s jumped out of a military aircraft more times than I’ve been on a commercial airliner.

After 37 years on active duty, he’s got to be close to retirement. If he truly is the last draftee, a whole generation that remembers compulsory service will be gone.

The other day, I made a prediction that President Bush would come out with a raft of pardons for people in his administration in an attempt to protect them from investigations by either the Congress or the new administration.

Unless something comes out in the next few days, I was wrong. President Bush issued no pardons at all, and only issued commutations for two Border Patrol agents who were convicted of shooting a suspected smuggler and then covering up their actions.

Here’s another prediction: In the next 6 to 12 months, Speaker Pelosi or Senate Leader Reid will open wide ranging investigations of just about everything the Bush administration did that they find objectionable. Subjects that come to mind will be the intelligence used in the run-up to the Iraq War, Guantanamo Bay and the other prisoner/interrogation issues, use of non-competed military contracts (Halliburton), the firing of U.S. attorneys, and the intelligence gathering programs that tapped into the communications of terrorists.

What President Bush and his assistants will have going for them, at least in a couple of things, are that the courts have already ruled on a couple of things, and they have cleaned up things that have gone wrong.

The FISA court recently ruled that the NSA surveillance program was legal.

The perpetrators, at least those on ground, who mistreated prisoners have been disciplined.

The bad intelligence from the pre-war period will be hard to explain, but intelligence is not a game of certainties, and the administration tried to act like it was. They will now take their lumps for that.

The U.S. attornies scandal will go away quickly. These government prosecutors serve at the discretion of the president, so it would be hard for Congress to argue that President Bush was wrong to let them go. I expect that President Obama will let some or all of the currently serving U.S. attornies go.

All of this won’t stop congressional investigations from happening, but at least it’ll give some cover from the political fallout.

I hope I’m wrong. The country doesn’t need all of this when we’re still fighting a war and trying to bring the economy out of a downturn.

Dude!

All you had to do was administer the Oath of Office, and you messed up!

What, didn’t you practice? Did the teleprompter mess up? Were you so cold you choked?

Classy, dude, real classy. A moment in history that’s being watched by billions and will be studied for the rest of our history will be marked by you making the new president prompt you to correct your prompting him.

Well, Obama is president now. For the next few years, for good or ill, he will be the head of our government. He will set the agenda for our country, and will ultimately be held responsible for the direction our country goes under his watch.

Even though I don’t agree with him politically, I wish him well. I have no wish for the country to suffer so that someone I don’t agree with can fail. You will rarely, if ever see personal attacks against President Obama from me, although the occasional bit of snark will seep through. It won’t be personal, it’ll be a joke.

However, when he or his minions mess up, and they will, I will comment on it. When they do well, I will also comment on it.

Hopefully, President Obama will be smart enough to not mess with success in those parts of the government that are working well. And when he chooses to change things, he won’t through the baby out with the bath water, and will be smart enough to recognize when his changes either don’t work, or do more harm than good due to unforeseen consequences.

So good luck, Mr. President. While I’m sure there will be plenty for me to joke and complain about during your administration, please don’t bother yourself to create opportunities for me on purpose.

According to Forbes, Fiat is buying a 35% stake in Chrysler.

For me, this is yet another nail in the coffin of my purchases of Chrysler products.

I have driven precisely two Fiat cars, both of them Puntos. The Fiat Punto is basically a scaled down 1970’s VW Rabbit. To call those cars crackerboxes would have been an insult to Keebler.

And remember, Fiat stands for “Fix It Again Tony!”. Those two cheeseboxes couldn’t go across town without me worrying that I’d have to call a tow truck. Driving them on the Autobahn was a religious experience. Not a good religious experience. More like the “I wish I’d given my heart to Jesus and told my wife I loved her before I left this morning” experience.

So, while Chrysler has gotten a shot of adrenalyne to the heart and will survive to suck another day, this will do nothing for the quality and dependability of their vehicles.

I’m looking forward to seeing Dodge cars lined up on the side of the road with their hoods up in the near future. It’ll be nice, kind of like modern art statues to beautify the freeway.

This morning, the Today Show was doing a quick discussion of the myriad of things that are coming out for the inauguration. Plates, posters, teeshirts, cupcakes, and candy. One of the items was a chocolate lollipop in the shape of Obama.

Irish Woman: Would you want a sucker in the shape of Barack Obama?
Me: I’m not sucking on anything shaped like Barack Obama!

The peanut butter recall has gone down to the bone!

Little Debbies are being recalled. Other major suppliers of food that is tasty and bad for you are also recalling their products. This will cause artificial shortages in other snack cakes, and before you know it, it’ll be pandemonium in the aisles at the local Quicky Mart! Truck drivers will be beating up housewives over Twinkies, and a black market in certified healthy peanut butter crackers will spring up across this great land of ours.

True Story:

When I first moved to Germany, it was right after the end of the first Gulf War. Most of the military shipping for the months prior to this had understandably been used for the war effort, so only those things that were absolutely necessary were brought over for the PX and Commissary for several months. Needless to say, shortages of such things as snack foods and American beer, wine and liquor rapidly set in.

About two weeks after I got to Bavaria, I went to our local commissary to pick up a few things. As I was in line to pay for my eggs, milk, bread, and some fruit, I noticed that a shipment of Hostess snack cakes had come in and was being put on the shelves. Everything went higglety-pigglety there for a while. I did not participate in the small riot that ensued, but it was entertaining to watch the military wives scramble over each other to get a box of Twinkies or something. Quoth the commisary queen: “Hey Bitch! Get your hands off of my Ho-Ho’s!”.

I’m hoping that this current situation doesn’t come to that.

is right twice a day.

Today, I was that broken clock. Both Pittsburgh and Arizona played very good, close defensive games, and are headed to the Super Bowl.

My thoughts and prayers go out to McGahee of the Ravens, who was knocked out of his sneakers by an open field tackle that would have totaled the Irish Woman’s car.

If methane is a sign of life, then why do the people in my office keep asking me if something has crawled up inside me and died?

Just wondering….