The baby is eating a piece of toast, I have a nice cup of decaf, some non-stale Christmas cookies, and the Cartoon Network is having an all day Looney Tunes marathon.

It doesn’t get any better than this.

Well, welcome to 2009.

We welcomed in the New Year trying to get some sleep with a teething baby. He’s currently snoozing away his evening of frivolity.

Since we and our hoped-for New Year’s Eve companions are all overcoming colds of some sort, we decided to put off partying until this weekend.

Since I took a look back yesterday, I’ll make a couple of predictions for the new year now.

1. The price of oil will rise significantly this summer, but will not reach record levels again. OPEC will continue to fuss about how the loss of revenue is ruining their chances of building yet another golden castle in the desert, but selling a commodity that isn’t in as much demand as you’d like it to be will do that to you time and again.
2. The economy will continue in its tailspin for at least the first two quarters of the year, but things will start to look better before the end of the year. During the continued downturn, the Federal and State governments will continue to try to stem the flow of blood so that there isn’t a general uprising of us, the unwashed masses. Unfortunately, their pouring of money into the open financial wound will start inflation ticking up quite sharply. I don’t think we’ll see the inflation of the 70’s again, but it won’t be good. Sometime in the 4th quarter, the Fed will start hinting about raising interest rates, which will cause the new, slow recovery to slow even more.
3. The housing market will finally reach bottom. Consequently, those who have good jobs and good credit but don’t make 6 figures will finally be able to find both a decent house in their price range and a loan that doesn’t put the whole national economy in danger.
4. At least one of the Big 3 automobile manufacturers will either be absorbed by another company, or go out of business altogether. President Obama will have to explain to his UAW constituency why he was unable to protect their employment-for-life rights.
5. A major natural disaster will occur in the United States, and President Obama will be quick to point out how his ineffectual reaction to it was better than President Bush’s ineffectual reaction to Hurricane Katrina. Citizens will again be reminded that if they wait for the government to help them in an emergency, they’re going to be waiting a long time. Those who choose to be prepared for said emergency and have the means to take of their own will be castigated in the national news for not waiting for the government handout that will take too long to come. Remember, when seconds count, the police are only minutes away. And FEMA is a couple of days inland.
6. Iran will get the bomb. They will demonstrate it with great fanfare, and will immediately start production of atomic weapons for export to the highest bidder in either money or ideology.
7. US casualties in Iraq will continue to decline, but casualties in Afghanistan will continue to rise. The anti-war groups will have to decide if they want to attack the president they helped put in the White House. Kind of like trying to decide if you want to tell the “virgin” you met at the club she gave you the clap.
8. President Obama will start off with very good approval ratings, but these will steadily decline until his is almost as unpopular as Congress. Yes, it will get that bad.
9. The Republican party will go through much soul searching, and will decide that it’s better to be electable than right. The race for the center will continue, and we will all lose.
10. The Republican minority in Congress will have a hard time defending their right-of-center stands, and will not stand in the way of most of President Obama’s agenda for his first 100 days. Remind me again why I vote Republican?
11. In local news, UK will finally get its act together and beat UL in both football and basketball. The religious war in the Bluegrass over these two teams will continue as it has since time immemorial.

Well, we’re into the playoffs.

I’ve been able to watch quite a few games this year (yeah DVR!) and this has been a really enjoyable season. Lots of good close defensive games, and a minimum of drama.

Detroit sucked the zub kabir this year, but they did it in a historical way. No-one will ever forget this season in Michigan.

The Cowboys didn’t make the playoffs. Heeheeheeheehee

The Bronco’s also didn’t make the playoffs, and reacted by firing Mike Shanahan. This came as quite a surprise to me. He’s a good coach, and 8 and 8 isn’t that bad a record. Hopefully Mr. Shanahan will find another team and show up Denver.

Brett Favre and the Great Mangini didn’t make it to post season this year. My guess as to why Mangini was fired is that he told management that he could go all the way if he got Favre. Favre of course signed a contract that gave him his weight in gold and jewels, so not making it to the playoffs doesn’t look so good for him and everyone in the Jets leadership that wanted to bring him on board. I predict that Favre will finally retire and mean it this year.

Of course, my Raiders didn’t make it. If you watch the Raiders to watch victories, you need to stop hitting the pipe. People will start to think you’re slow.

Here are my predictions for Wildcard Weekend:

Indianapolis Colts and San Diego Chargers – Indianapolis will pull this one out, but it’s going to be close. I think that these teams are almost evenly matched.

Baltimore Ravens and Miami Dolphins – Miami will stumble here. Baltimore will win this one running away.

Philadelphia Eagles and Minnesota Vikings – It pains me to say this, but I see the Eagles taking this one. They’re on a roll.

Atlanta Falcons and Arizona Cardinals – I see Atlanta taking this one. No real reason. It would be interesting for the Falcons to do well without Vick and then when he gets out tell him to go somewhere else.

So there you are. We’ll see how I do on Monday morning.

Well, 2008 is in its last hours.

It’s been an eventful year.

First of all, we have a new baby. Baby Bear is fast becoming a participating part of the family, and having a new member of the group keeps us on our toes.

Next, Girlie Bear started living with us full time. That alone would have made this a great year.

On a non-personal note, the country went through the most contentious election I’ve ever seen. Even though I don’t agree with the result, I hope we can remember how to get along and work together. We’re going to need it. The Zombiepocalypse is just around the corner in 2012, and we haven’t even begun to dig trenches around the neighborhood and fill them with oil.

The price of oil has been the highest anyone has ever seen, and now it’s at almost historical lows. I’m not sure I like that large a swing. Extreme changes in markets result in extreme reactions and consequences. If OPEC and the other oil producing 3rd world crapholes cut production too much, it’s Road Warrior in Kentucky, and how is that going to help us get ready for the zombies?

The war in Iraq is finally looking better, not that anyone is giving the troops and President Bush much credit. I expect that the new administration will start drawing down our presence in Mesopotamia quickly after they take power. My hope is that I won’t be seeing a withdrawal ala Vietnam 1975. A lot of blood and treasure will be wasted if we withdraw too quickly and the government we’ve propped up in Iraq collapses.

The war in Afghanistan, well that’s another matter. My guess is that any forces that are taken out of Iraq will be re-directed to Afghanistan. Hopefully, we will be able to stabilize that area a bit more. Western powers have been able to bring peace and order to this area since Alexander, so I’ll probably be talking about this next New Years Eve.

The economy this year has taken the biggest gut punch I’ve seen in my lifetime. A lot of the trouble seems to be that no-one in the past few years seems to remember that it’s not a good idea to make loans that the recipients have no way to repay. Funny, I seem to remember that one from finance classes in high school almost 20 years ago.

Anyhoo, hope y’all had a good year. Thanks for stopping by and have a great New Years Eve.

A young man in New York has earned each and every one of the merit badges offered by the Boy Scouts of America.

He earned his first 62 in five years. To put it in perspective, I only earned 5 merit badges in the 3 years that I was a Scout.

Congratulations for a lot of hard work!

H/T to Phil over at Random Nuclear Strikes.

My home state of North Dakota has had a significant drop in the number of murders statewide this year. 2 murders in a state, even one as sparsely populated as North Dakota is pretty darned good.

And I need to do some reading on the gun laws back home. Got to know what I’m getting into when I convince my employer to put the next datacenter in Minot.

OK, you’re driving your 11 and 12 year old children to their mother’s house so they can spend Christmas with her.

It’s snowy, the wind is blowing, and it’s below freezing out.

Your truck somehow gets stuck in the snow. You are 10 miles of highway away from your destination.

Do you

A) Tell the kids to stay in the truck while you work to get it out and continue on getting your truck unstuck?

B) Call the children’s mother to come get them while you try to get your truck out of the snow?

or

C) Tell the kids to bundle up and walk the 10 miles to their mom’s house while you get your truck out of a snowbank and go on your merry way?

Guess what some trogladyte in Idaho did?

This idiot caused the cold, lonely death of his daughter, and almost killed his son to boot. I feel very sorry for the mother, who is innocent in this, and I really pity the son. He’s going to question himself over whether or not he should have gone with his sister or forced her to come with him for the rest of his life. And that’s not to mention the little girl that died cold and alone when the parent who should have died for her was warm in a nice heated truck.

But for the moron who put those two children on the highway and sent them on their merry way? I hope he gets life without parole and is forced to have pictures of his daughter taped to every flat surface in his cell.

This isn’t a momentary mistake that went wrong. This was an overt act of stupidity that he could have either not done or stopped at any time. It took those kids a long time to get too far away from their father for him to get them and bring them back. He could have stopped them and prevented a stupid mistake from turning into a tragedy.

I hope he rots, and I hope he lives a very very long time with what he’s done.

but it definitely got my attention.

Scientists are reporting that clusters of small earthquakes are happening with surprising regularity in Yellowstone Park.

So why, as a somewhat willing resident of Kentucky, should I worry?

Because Yellowstone Park is actually an active volcano, that’s why. If you believe the Discovery Channel, then if Yellowstone blows big, it’s the end of most of North America as we know it, at least for a generation or two. That’s a worst case scenario, but they make a good case that it has happened before and it will happen again.

I’m not running to Kroger to buy milk, bread, and eggs yet. But I do keep emergency supplies at the house in case of some kind of disaster. This is just one of those doomsday scenarios that never seem to end well when you think about them.

What do all of y’all think? If it’s just a series of small earthquakes that go nowhere, no problem. If it’s a major natural disaster, what do you think the consequences would be for the US and the world?

To noone’s surprise, as soon as the “cease-fire” between Israel and Hamas sunsetted, Hamas started rocketing and mortaring the area of Israel that butts up against Gaza. After a few days of this, Israel called in the fighters and helicopters and started making bad things happen to bad people. Unfortunately, because said bad people had intentionally mixed themselves in with civilians, a lot of civilians are being hurt and killed. And the media are howling about Israeli tactics that kill civilians. And of course, there are the more than slightly more than unfriendly demonstrations in front of Israeli embassies worldwide.

The Israelis have a lot to answer for in their history of relations with the Palestinians and the US, but they can at least say that they don’t park their military (read “valid targets”) next to their civilians (read “non-valid targets”) in order to either deter their enemy from firing on them or to give CNN something to crow about when civilians get hurt or killed.

Israel has, for the most part, been an ally to us in a sea of Mid-East opponents. They have counted to ten more times than I can count when Hamas shells their neighborhoods. So now, I say have at it when they decide to whack Hamas upside the head. They should, and I expect that they will, do what they can to minimize non-necessary casualties, but enough is enough. You don’t answer artillery barrages with diplomacy, you answer them with airstrikes and artillery.

how much marriage is like the Act of Contrition?

What have I done?
What have I failed to do?
In thought, word, and/or deed?

I am wholly sorry, and I humbly repent.

Please stop crying. Please?