Fall Road Trip

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Today was one of those almost perfect fall days. It started out a little cool, just enough to require a light jacket, with a turquoise blue sky, and that crisp clean snap to the air that makes your blood stir with just a hint of desire to travel to the hills.



The weather has been so dry this year that the leaves are sure to put on a show. We had a little rain the other night and wind the next day so we need to go soon before the leaves are past their peak.

I've been installing plastic totes to the gutter downspouts so we can catch what little rain we can to water the dog and some of the young grass we've planted. 350 gallons each from only 3/4 inch of rain. I have two more 250 gallon each I'll place at one end of my new shop building.



So we set our course (the spouse, the pooch and I) up Hwy 441 to I 85 to Hwy 11 in South Carolina. We motored through Seneca, S.C. towards Clemson, home of the tigers, then north towards Salem on Hwy 130. (Had I known I could have just stayed on 11 most of the way up we could have shaved probably 30 minutes off the trip.)

The absence of cars along our intended route made this a distinctly pleasant trip. Much better that following everyone else up through Clayton, GA on Hwy 441 to Franklin, N.C. I can't abide crowds and especially crowds of idiots in cars.

Shortly after entering North Carolina we turned off to the right to the park, which is a part of the Nantahala National Park.

The first thing that surprised us was the fact that even though the weather has been below freezing up there, a couple of Rhododendron bushes still had blooms on them.



Beauty endures forever, even if it is a feeble reminder of the glory of days past.

The foliage on the trees above us contrasting with the blue sky put a little spring in our steps, aided of course by the pooch wanting to pull us up the trail.



The views from the overlook were still incredible though the water going over the falls is probably less than 25% of normal.



When seen at its full flow the noise is a roar that envelopes you and holds you enthralled. Todays noise was a pleasant background to the rustling of leaves and an occasional bird call.

We clambered down the 154 wooden steps to a lower vantage point ( I know, I had to climb back up). From the picture try to imagine the Cataract that would be falling if the full width of the gorge was filled with water.



Aided by our faithful pooch (who kept encouraging us up the steps) we retraced our steps to the top.



Part way down we sat for a few minutes just enjoying the view over Lake Toxaway



and raising our eyes to the heavens to witness the beauty that nature can provide even in times of need



And so home where I snored in the big black recliner while the minute hand circled the clock a little more than once around.

Hope your weekend was all you hoped it would be.

i get all bothered

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if I don't post something on this blog every few days at least.

Sundays post was a have to, because I'd just watched "We were Soldiers once" on TV. The completion of that title is of course "and young". which we were. I've always been embarrassed that some movies touch me more than I can let on and I have to shed a few private tears. Always have but we were raised to not cry or let anyone see.

Yeah, foolish I know. Goes with the "and young".

Of course I'm still sorta young to my way of thinking. When you intend to remain in this stage of life for 192 years, almost 58 is pretty young. Sorta like a hobbit. I'll begin to feel grown up about the time I reach eleventy one.

Been sorta hard to see the computer screen since Thursday when I put my precious vision into the hand of a certain colorful doctor here abouts and his bevy of attractive blond headed assistants and had interlase lasix surgery on the baby blues.

When I was still in short pants (which I never wore, so this is a bit of literary license) I had 20/15 vision in both eyes. Came in handy for spotting flies on the inside of the cockpit bubble. Since having to wear glasses for reading was a bother I thought I'd get all modern and everything and take advantage of the Star Trek technology available today. I'm proud to say that I again have 20/15 in the right (for distance) eye and 20/20 in the left (for reading) eye.

Just not at the distance which any reasonable person would sit from a computer screen. So everything on the panel is fuzzy. They say it will improve, but, as ever, I want what I want, right now.

I was glad of the Valium they gave before the procedure. Both of them. Should have made it 3 or 4 since I still hated having them fool around with my eyes.

The ironic thing though is that as misty as I get watching movies such as the above mentioned, I seem to have something known now as Dry Eye syndrome. There has to be a problem for everything so the pharmaceutical companies can continue turning out massive quantities of heretofore unheard of remedies for brand new problems. Now if they'd only come out with better pills for the nosies in my head.

But I'm much better now doc, just keep those electrodes away from the kudzu grotto.

No Words

They're for the most part meaningless.

Just Tears.

And a remembrance that for every minute of every hour of this 24 hour period, 40 young men, and some women, of all races, creeds and colors, died in a far off distant land that was our war.
And so many others in other wars that supposedly protected or furthered the interests of this country.

You may not recognize them on the street, they look much as you or I, but if you could see inside their eyes, for only a brief moment, your outlook would be changed forever.

A most heart felt thank you to all Veterans who served, some to the last drop of devotation within their hearts, and especially to those who remain.

Thank YOU.

Fall

Is beginning to really look like it around these parts.

Some of the leaves are starting to take on that dying golden tint



and will soon be all over the yard and in the gutters.



Down to almost freezing tonight, they say.

Makes one appreciate the flannel sheets on the bed.

Soon we'll be fighting to see which one of us can use the pooch to curl up next to our back.

At last.......

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........after much lifting, nailing and stretching, and once placing too much trust in a 2 x 6, which led to falling off the top and having the same (now broken) 2 x 6 knock me out on the way to the floor, I have the storage building to the point where I spent the weekend filling it half full of Stuff I hadn't seen for the most part in over a year. Which leads one to wonder what the hell I need all this for. Well, I did find a TV that I didn't remember we had, but obviously I didn't have a crying need for it. It does give me room to walk around and look at all the stuff I probably don't have a real need to possess. But It's mine, by damn and for the minor cost of renting a storage unit for 4 years I now have it right out back.

Still not quite complete,



Less than half the "stuff'



Another less than half



After I get some electricity out there I'll be prepared if I'm regulated to the dog house. Well, except for plumbing. I can always keep a roll of Charmin out back of the building on a stick.

Life, Liberty, Property

"God grants liberty only to those who love it, and are always ready to guard and defend it."
Daniel Webster

Far be it from me to try to argue with Ol’ Daniel, I'd just add that sometimes you have to love it more than TV, weekends, Nascar, or life.


I particularly like this speech

Tears of the Sun

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Just watched Tears of the Sun on DVD for the umpteenth time. We got a "new to us" JVC 55 inch TV for $150.00 Saturday. Moved the old 36 in. in to the old grumps room. The funny thing is that both of these sets came from the same guy. First he gave up the 36 in. because he was getting the bigger set. Now he's upgraded to a 62 in. plasma flat panel TV. Can hardly wait till he gets a full wall theater sized TV.

Perfect timing for the dish network to give out for a couple of days, hence the DVD.

All ways get a good feeling after watching this movie. It stars Demi Moore's ex husband, Bruce Willis. The funny thing is that I know there are really people like that serving in our armed forces. And that's a good thing and I'm really thankful that they are there.

Pray for their safety and protection. I will.

Bushed!!

No, I haven't been assaulted by the President, or anyone else for that matter.

It's just that in a 14 hour day I drove 400 miles, had 5 business meetings ranging from 10 minutes to just short of an hour.

I think I'm going to have myself a sticky bun, with a glass of milk, lick the sticky off my fingers and go to bed, where I'll put on my breathing mask and have dreams of flying a P-51 over the fatherland on the lookout for Stuka’s's or ME bf 109’s.

Thinks I hate

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Things I hate include, but are not limited to,

1. Bureaucrats who forget that they exist to serve the PEOPLE of this country.
2. Politicians who forget that they are supposed to serve.......(see above)
3. Lawyers who work to get around the guarantees and protections of the Constitution and Bill of Rights of The United States.
4. Bankers who feed us bullshit and keep us in the dark about the fact that our current money (Federal Reserve Notes) is backed by nothing and has no intrinsic value whatsoever.
5. AND ALL OTHER BOTTOM FEEDING SCUM SUCKERS WHO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF ALL THE ABOVE.

Having cleared my spleen of that, I'm of the firm opinion that if we as individuals would help one another like we are supposed to. I mean really care for one another, there would be much less want in this country.

My friend, The Lovely Livey, is in need of some new wheels. Or at least newer than falling apart around her ears old.

I propose a raising Livey a newer vehicle fund. Not many people read me, but if the idea was passed along, who knows what might happen.

Check out her blog, iffen you don't like her you don't ever have to visit again.

It'll be interesting to see where this all leads.

Or am I a Pollyanna in the Kudzu?

Does anybody know...

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.....anything about silver plate flatware?

I picked up a partial set of National Silver Co. AA Plus spoons, forks, knives plus a few other pieces from another maker today?




Have I found anything, or did I waste my money?
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Look into the light.

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That's supposedly what they'll tell you when you're having laser vision correction done.

Went to a short seminar tonight to see what the procedure consists of and how much the cost might be. I'm tired of getting a new eyeglass prescription and 2 months later my eyes have changed so that one eye is fine and the other is starting to blur or feel like it can't keep up with the other.

I can remember when one of my sisters got contact lenses and the doctor couldn't fit them in his office because she became hysterical when anybody got close to her eyes, then she got one in at home and immediately it worked it's way to the top of her eyeball and mama and I had to hold her down to get it out. Sorry Sis. I know how you feel about anybody fooling with your eyes. I'm the same way. When they had to measure the pressure on our eyeballs in the army I wanted them to give me Valium or let me get drunk first. I hated that shit!

Nowadays the ophthalmologist uses machines to map your eyeballs and vision. The results are input to a computer which plots exactly what needs to be done to give you better than perfect vision. All the doctor has to do is keep you calm with drugs and eye numbing drops and talk you through the procedure which expensive machines do in less time than it takes to tell about it.

At $2500.00 per eye, each one of which is completed in less than a minute, they can afford to have a couple of half million dollar machines and a host of cute female assistants hustle you in and out like cars on an assembly line.

All that medical stuff on Star Trek in the 60's is almost here. I'm just looking forward to the day when they can transplant brains like McCoy did to Spock. About the time I'm drooling and trying to remember how to put on my pants they can just scoop mine out and replace it with some jock's that couldn't keep his foot off the accelerator and tried to make it around Dead man's Curve.

We Got Some Rain!!!!!!!

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Hooray, Hooray!!! we got some rain early this morning while I slept. About 3/4's of an inch according to the rain gauge on the oak stump.

Yesterday while we were expecting rain I cut one of the downspouts and routed it into a 350 gallon tank. When I looked out this morning it was nearly full. Over 300 gallons from just one downspout.. Had I had 3 other tanks as I plan to, I would have about 1000 gallons of free water to water the yard, flowers, even put in a small goldfish pond if I were so inclined.

Makes one think of all the abundance that we just ignore at our peril. Cities are feuding over water around here. Seems that if the government wanted to do something constructive they would build more public lakes, even smallish ones, for the times of need.

Didn't some wise ruler once save Egypt by storing up for the lean times?

I'm no greenie, in fact I find most of them sorta foolish whining about why the government doesn't do something, when if they would only do something themselves they would accomplish more good.

We were supposed to get rain

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It would be an answer to lots of prayers here abouts. I went through a couple of years drought back when dairy farming, and it was bad. I didn't think we were going to survive for a while. We had to buy hay from Wisconsin at what we thought were outrageous prices. But we made it.

This drought is much worse. Total outdoor watering bans in most of the surrounding counties.

An eternal optimist, I plowed and seeded my yard last weekend.

It looked like rain this morning. I worried that Home Depot wouldn't be able to bring out my building supplies. All we had was dust.

I started me a small storage and shop building just after lunch.

Before picture:




By supper time:





And the morning and the afternoon were the first day.

It took them long enough.

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To confirm what Carl Sagan told us 20 years ago.

The speed of light is 186,282 miles per second in a vacuum. I've never been in a vacuum, but, I was once in an altitude chamber with the air sucked out to simulate being at over 40,000 ft above sea level. Then we took our oxygen masks off to see if we could tell when we noticed anything like passing out.


I was doing real well up to about the 4 minute mark when they told me to put the mask back on. I heard the words, I knew what they meant, but I was incapable of acting on what I knew and was told. Thankfully the government doesn't like to let all that money they spent on junior birdmen go to waste, and they put my mask on for me..

If aliens ever suck all the oxygen out of our atmosphere, we'll just quietly keel over dead thinking everything is hunky-dory as our lungs keep expanding and contracting until the brain shuts down for good.

But back to this article. Apparently anytime we look up in the sky we are looking at the past. The more distant the object the further in the past we're looking. If we find Proxima Centauri in a telescope we see light beamed earthward over 4 years ago.

Some say that pictures from the Hubble Telescope show galaxies 15 billion light years ago. Are they still there? If we could travel faster than light would we arrive where they are supposed to be, to find only rubble, the results of inter-galactic warfare perhaps?

Einstein's theories supposedly tell us we'll never be able to break the light barrier. I prefer to think that anything the mind of man can conceive, man can achieve someday.

Does this contradict what bible believers think, that the earth is only 6000 years or so old? It always strikes me as a little arrogant for anyone to claim to know the mind and will of God in as much as it relates to his purpose for us. If intelligence is the glory of God, shouldn't we best be trying to obtains as much of intelligence as possible? It strikes me as a little demeaning to think that an intelligent creator would want us to sit around on clouds singing hosannas for eternity, or to never discover how to travel to the farthest reaches of space one day.

Or should I pull the Kudzu up over my head in an effort to hide from his wrath?

Lord........what fools .........

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........we mortals be.

We have enough food to make the majority of us, if not obese, at least with a more than healthy layer of fat stored. We spend energy like it is de-valued instead of costing more every day.. We work overtime to the ruin of our health...... and families. We have at our disposal a wealth of time and effort saving appliances, and want more.

We're like the squirrel running out every limb of the hickory tree in the yard to make sure there isn't another nut that hasn't been checked.

Makes me wish sometimes to be a hawk, floating on the updrafts and currents, dipping and rolling with the pure pleasure of being alive to witness all that can be seen.

What will we see..........when we look back???

Change in the weather

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OK, OK, I know that I complain about every thing, but this mornings cooler weather has me drawing up and thinking about maybe a long sleeved shirt.

As a true blue son of the South, it takes my patrician blood a little longer to adjust to cold snaps than I'd like. A nice 75 degrees year round would be much more to my liking. Where's Noble Peace Prize winner Al Gore's vaunted global warming now?

You just know that the Noble Prize committee lost what very little credibility they had left when they hung that medal around his neck. About as much credibility as Britteny Spears winning Mother of the Year.

Old Alfred Noble's guilt for inventing Dynamite all those years ago has carried down through the years, causing great peals of laughter to ring out from thinking individuals around the world whenever they call someone like Jimmuh Carter, Arafat, or Algore deserving of that award.

Shivering like a dog passing razor blades here in 48 degree weather. Whatta wuss.

Just a little too DAMNED close

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We've been mighty dry in these parts folks. So much so that we're under a stage four or five watering ban. Which means that we're not supposed to wash our trucks or water our lawns at all. Course there may be exceptions if you have the money to have new landscaping put in. (for a 30 day period)

So it was with a grateful heart that I saw the clouds begin to build in the sky on my way home this afternoon. Even went through a couple of showers just north of town. They seemed to be moving closer to home as I arrived. They held off long enough for me to get into the house and settle down a little then started a nice slow sprinkle while I was in the back yard, which caused me to give a little prayer of thanks and welcome.

Just before supper I was sitting here looking out the window and wishing I had had time to unload the back of the truck, when KABLOOOWY right out in the yard a huge bolt of lightning cracked across the window with instantaneous thunder.

Seconds later I saw a cloud of red oak leaves fall to the ground and my tightened throat managed to croak out, "Shit, that hit something". Never let it be said that I am at a loss for words in a crisis situation.

I've never been personally struck by lightning, but, I have seen the destructive force that it possesses, having had cattle killed, equipment ruined and a quarter mile of barbed wire fence vaporized. I know enough to get in out of the rain and especially thunderstorms.

This was a relatively light strike as these things go. But consider that the following pictures are of a tree only 75 feet or so from where I was sitting.





Glad I wasn't out walking the dog. Needless to say he was looking for places to hide in the house and none of them were suiting him, so he was trotting around in circles, panting like a race horse.

Hope the tree doesn't die. Will know by next spring I suppose.

How old

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were you, when you realized you can barely change yourself, much less the world.

Fade to black.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4aNuyNk8nro

We think that it cannot happen again.

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WARNING; NSFW OR THE SQUEAMISH


But history has always taught at least one thing.

Those who do not learn from it, make a great mistake that will inexorably lead to it's repeating.

Pamela has posted a Hitchcock Film suppressed for two generations.

Does it apply today?

It does if we allow the enemy to gain the strength and authority that the Nazi's possessed.

Evil triumphs, when good men do nothing to prevent. Thanks God for our GOOD men and women.

WARNING; NOT FOR THE FAINT OF HEART. DO NOT WATCH IF YOU DON'T WANT TO CONFRONT THE DEMONS THAT LURK WITHIN US ALL.

It's Good to Know.........

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........That there are men and women like this
With all the blather about politics and war, evil doings, foot tapping Senators, kneeling interns, and which celeb is in rehab this week, showing off their shaved pudenda, or putting their big foot in their mouth, it's nice to celebrate determination, commitment and a drive to succeed at a task one sets for themselves.

It's too easy to dwell on the inane and senseless things of the world. Far better to think about the inspiring and noble things.

When all children think about is how their going to be the next NBA, or MLB superstar, or want to emulate the latest Hip-hop rapper or winner of American Idol and obtain wealth and ease with little or no effort to increase their intellect or the size of their dreams, we lose something that might have been.

How much better to seek to enrich and en-noble and leave, for a little while, the base and mundane.

Just my view from the Kudzu.

A train wreck once started

"A train wreck once started goes to completion.

And the policeman cometh. He cannot, I think, be stopped. The abolitions of the Bill of Rights, the ever increasing surveillance, the diminished recourse of citizens against the government—these are not business as usual. They have happened before, in bits and pieces, but now they become respectable. The CIA has always tortured people and the FBI has always engaged in illegal phone-tapping and political persecution. Yet in the past they didn’t want to be caught because consequences might follow. These are now federal policy, openly admitted. The government keeps records of the books you read in the airport. This is something different.

And it can’t be stopped. Actually it is wild and fun when viewed as entertainment. What a show: The United States is close to one-man rule. Congress is complicit, the Supreme Court a nursing home. No serious opposition exists. If Bush leaves office in 2008, the incoming president will continue the trends of today. The effects begin to show. People grow ever more docile, accustomed to intimidation, to searches without cause. Several writers of my acquaintance no longer question federal policy. They are afraid.

And we are going to see this show through to the end. In a dismal way it is funnier than Oprah."


I hope He doesn't go away for good, but if he does I understand. I feel much the same myself. Only I don't have the wherewithal to move to Mexico. Although if I could it would probably be Argentina.

Seems like we already tried this once.

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As a son of the South, and having read somewhat more history than most of the great unwashed out here, I find my sympathies residing with the confederacy in the War between the States. Give the times and circumstances, and the knowledge that this country was a Union of Individual States, it seems reasonable that if compromise could not be reached a separation of that union should have been possible.

Despite that I'm glad that Union was maintained. We are a better country together than we would be as individuals separated.

With the increasing encroachment of government into every part and particle of our lives today I do not agree. We lose much when we try to shoehorn every person into a homogeneous mass all thinking, acting and marching in step with the orders of folk who have forgotten they were once us.

So while I have removed myself from the dictates of government to the limited extent that I am able, I find myself almost hopeful that these groups of dreamers meet with some success. If only to cause some few to rouse themselves from their NFL, WWF, look for the weekend to Parrrr..Tay opiated dreams.

Home from War

SAFE
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Breakfast of Champions

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Damn the cholesterol, bring it on.

Hot biscuits, Country ham, sorghum syrup and apple butter. Not homemade apple butter but good nonetheless.

Oh boy.......or girl

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Watching the granddaughter this week while parents on Pronghorn hunt. Picked her up from day care yesterday.

Crabby doesn't begin to describe it. would not sleep with out someone holding her. Finally put her in bed with me around 1:00 this morning where she slept till 6:00.

Worse today. Found sores on her mouth, which pain her very much. Doctor visit this afternoon if her grandmother and I survive. We will. Right now she is finally eating some cream of mushroom soup. Seems to feel a little better with a little something in her tummy.

Meanderings

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...My God.....
It was a day to be alive.


Sunlight
bright enough to illuminate
the corners of your soul.

Air
that penetrated
to the bottom of your lungs

a breeze
... to bring
the rustle of the leaves
and the twitter of birds
and scratching of squirrels...

into focus.


you could feel
the pulse of the earth
beneath your feet
as it leads...

ever deeper...
into the euphoria
of just being

it is.........

almost


...enough

Stories.............

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..."the story of our life is,.... in the end, not our life.......it is our story".

Changes

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Today we had one of those early fall, near perfect, days where the sky is a perfect blue bowl overhead, the air is clear with no haze, you can still wear short sleeves without being either too hot or too cool.

It was just a pleasure to be outside. It would have been better of course if I had been in the mountains walking beside a stream or overlooking a valley from the mountain heights, or cruising a winding road punishing the tires and brakes on the curves and switch backs.

Here in NE GA the seasons sort of sneak up on you in subtle ways until you look around and say in surprise "hey, this is fall", or some other season. Of course our springs turn to summer before the official date, and we can have tee shirt weather up until Christmas sometimes. Nothing as definitive as my sister's weather up in the northern part of Maine, but then, we're not likely to get snow in September or June either.

It's way too easy to not pay attention to the progression of the days and nights. We just had the harvest moon this week. When I was younger running the dairy farm clear nights with a full moon would catch me gazing up in wonder at the sky. And as the moon waned gibbous I'd remember that man once strode (well, hopped and shuffled) across the barren whiteness of our nearest neighbor.

Will the country that set it's flag on the surface of that old moon be the ones to go back and really claim it for mankind? Or will we trade our inheritance for a mess of porridge, and cower lest someone accuse us of not caring about the children?

Is this really radical??

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"Levees shouldn’t break. Bridges shouldn’t fall. The Detroit school system should not cheat three out of every four entering freshmen."

Stolen with h/t from Here.

Can we blame these things on politicians and bureaucrats?

Why should it take Sparrow’s company 10 to 12 months to get a new permit for something that was already permitted.

I rant and rave because, like most people, I don't believe we have to behave stupidly, and against our own best self interest. Either our own interests or our society's interests.

But WTH do I know. Pill time will be in an hour and shortly after that I'm sure I'll feel much better. Not as good as a fine Cognac, but I don't fall down as much either.

Very Easy

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It is very easy to rant and rave about all the things one thinks is wrong with the world today. At least for the part of the world that I've lived in all my life. Of course I have many years to look back and count the changes from then to now. Nearly 58 of them which I consider not too many, and my kids and grandkids can't imagine reaching.

Lord knows that I have done more than my share over the last 33 years. Once I left the army I entered a world that I didn't recognize when I returned. Some part of us always wants to live in the past, although that is never possible. All we have is today and a hope for tomorrow.

My hope for tomorrow has always been to see it be better than either today or yesterday. In order to do that we have to remember the past mistakes and successes and build tomorrow on the desire to make it better.

I have for a number of years been disgusted by the direction the political world is heading. It's kinda like coming in from the yard and smelling dog shit on your shoe.

Of course it could be said of me that my political stance is somewhere to the far right of Attila the Hun, or Timur-a-ling. So none of the announced candidates of either party have yet to do anything about the smell in my opinion. (And I stress that this is only my opinion, you can have yours, simply allow me the same privilege).

I watched this evening a recording of a speech made in Michigan recently. I link it HERE for you to watch, or not, at your preference.

Seems like we could use a few new Solutions in America. What we got don't seem to work all that well in a political sense.

You see..........

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.......you just tug gently here and the whole human DNA unravels into one long strand.





She's going to be a Scientist or Astronaut. I just know it!

We get to keep her next week while mom and dad are on a hunting trip to Wyoming for mule deer.
I taught her mom to shoot starting around age 3. She's taken more deer than me. Which wasn't hard considering I never squeezed the trigger on one.

My kids all just amaze the heck out of me.

Oh My

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What a day!

Up at 7pm because I forgot to put the cell phone on charge and it was still in the pants pocket at the foot of the bed when Don calls to ask what's going on.

People who get up and started before 5am should have some kind of a restrictor plate put on their phone until at least 8am. It wakes us (or at least me since the wife gets up around 5 but is generally quite about it) up and forces us to start the day, which I like to put off as much as possible since I don't have to open my eyes, or think for that matter.

But I was looking forward to getting a check, which was overnighted????, from Dallas on Friday. Called post office. Nothing. Probably coming via Fed Ex or something. Called Dallas. Yes, Fed Ex. Got tracking #. In Gainesville probably arrive in afternoon, thinks I. So I can make the 100 mile round trip for the 2 hour meeting in Hartwell. Surely be here when I get back, again, thinks I.

Needless to say, it's not. Use tracking # online........not delivered due to incorrect address......WTH. Call Fed Ex. Attempted delivery to address from a year ago. Dallas used my old address............not like they don't know where I live since I communicate via mail with them nearly every week.

To make a long story short, while talking to Fed Ex I climb back into the truck and head out, balls to the wall for Gainesville only to decide about 15 miles up the road that it would make far more sense to have them send it to Athens so I can pick it up at 9am rather than make the 200 mile round trip tonight when I wouldn't be able to do anything with it anyway.

Ya see, even I can have moments of cognitive thinking. I just have to be faced with the prospect of a 4 hour round trip.

So my butt hurts from all the driving and sitting today. I'll hopefully never have to put up with drooping ass cheeks since I wear them off constantly.

Haig or Sun Tzu

If'n yo ain't reedin Kim yo r miss-n da boat. Here why I likes hem.

Him's a thanker!

Waxing Nostalgic

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Between my new kudzu header, courtesy of Lil Toni, and her new blog featuring an old antebellum home, I started noodling over some of the old houses of memory.

The first old plantation home I remember seeing and having a sad feeling about was about 5 or 6 miles SW of Braselton, Georgia. We used to go quail hunting in the overgrown fields surrounding it.

My dad loved to quail hunt. Well, I guess he probably loved hunting of all kinds. I can remember the second house I ever lived in. It was the house my paternal grand parents moved out of about the time I was a year old. We had been living in another house on the original Dunagan's Dairy Farm behind Alcovy Baptist church. We moved after my grandparents moved into the house they built up on the hill.

Mom and Dad had a fenced lot beside the house where the garden was tended. The hunting dogs pen was there as well as a chicken coop. I can remember that dad would fatten up and clean out the digestive system of the opossums he'd catch. There was a place to keep the snapping turtles, feeding them on milk soaked cornbread, he'd trap on the creeks and rivers close by. We might have been poor as far as money went but we feasted on the bounty of nature. I can't imagine what it must be like to know hunger. We live and lived in a nation of plenty........it's just that sometimes you had to go out and hunt it down.

Back to the old plantation house. As I said it was not far from Braselton, Ga, the town that later Kim Bassinger bought at the urging of her realtor brother-in-law, and later had to bankrupt on. (I doubt that he had to give back any of the commission.)

This old place was about a half mile off the paved road, and had been abandoned for long enough for it to start falling down around it's self. What had once been a large rambling two story wooden structure with a huge balcony across the whole of the front, had the porch collapsed and holes in the roof, the windows were all broken and the doors were ajar, looking like an old bleached skull, wondering where the rest of itself was. The grounds were all overgrown with kudzu which had begun to creep over the roof line, determined to hide the ugliness like a once great beauty drawing her shawl close about so you can only see glimpses of what used to be.

Many, many are the ruins of what once were dreams of young, strong builders of this country. Farmers whose children went to where the paychecks were regular and sure. Who had a fondness for the old home but neither the money or desire, or ability to keep something tax collectors were determined should not be passed down to future generations.

I've seen buildings in Germany which have been pretty much continuously lived in for a thousand years or more. Lived in, loved in, repaired, updated, housing generations of people from birth to death, they are sanctuaries for their occupants, except for the occasional war here or there.

We have many two, three, a few even four hundred year old year old structures, many of them designated historical landmarks. But for the most part, whats old gets discarded, bulldozed into oblivion, then paved or concreted over.

The natural order you may say. Perhaps? But I wonder if we're leaving a part of our soul behind in order to have the latest and newest?

Go give her some love

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Lil Toni has a new blog to showcase some of her pictures. She sho knows how to take a picture and tell a story. Go pay her a visit here.

Obama Floats Social Security Tax Hike

Isn't it amazing how many times in the past 40 years we've heard a politician, indeed most politicians, talk about how we need to fix, or improve our marvelous Social Security system in this country.

All talk, all want to raise taxes and none of them ever mention that what is paid in today is paid out tomorrow. If no SS taxes were paid into the system at all they'd probably not be able to pay benefits in a couple of months. This in spite of the so called trust fund, which in reality is a filing cabinet full of IOU's in Virginia somewhere.

Oh, I guess they'd still pay the benefits. All they have to do is print more Federal Reserve Notes. Do a little google search about the hyperinflation of the German Reichmark in the early 1920's. Or the Hungarian catastrophe of the 40's after wwII.

This while the congress critters all get a full pension after just a few terms, at their full rate of pay plus yearly increases for life and their spouses life, although I'm not sure who would get Barney Franks.

If you're old enough they send you a projected SS payment form each year showing how much you would get at age 62 or 65. Take a close look at it and then go read about the retirement plan Galveston, TX has in place. Then ask your congress critter why a county has a better plan than the whole country.

I really should know better that check on the news after 6pm each evening.

Government outrage

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We certainly ought not to just allow anyone to abuse the right to die and be reincarnated without proper government approval, no doubt in triplicate.

The government of China, which claims control of Tibet despite the region's vigorous culture of independence, announced in August that it would henceforth require Tibet's "living Buddhas" (special clergy believed to be continuously reincarnated) to get permission from China's religious affairs officials before submitting their souls to be embodied in the future. The government acted, it said, because the reincarnation process needed to be managed better. [Agence France-Presse, 8-3-07]

Maybe this would be better titled: Stupid Chinks

At long last

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I have taken a little time to update some of the sites I check. Some each day and others occasionally, but all have good things to say from time to time.

I've been a little lax lately although no more than at other times. I can only rant and rave for so long before I realize that you don't care and it doesn't make me feel any better. Just relives the monotony some what.

But tomorrow is another day. Ihop in the morning until the bank opens then garner some mammon and head out to buy a few herringbones. Boy did they go out of fashion or what? People thought you could wear them like any other necklace. Sleep in them, work in them, mess around in them, whatever, it took only a small kink to ruin them. Most jewelers and pawnshop owners held on to them way too long.

With the recent surge in gold prices people are starting to reevaluate their worth.
I don't care, they refine easily.

Of course the price is also a reflection of the perceived worth of the US pictures of dead presidents. Right now we're losing out to the euro, which makes them happy as a pig in a mud wallow. Wait until they force us to pay for oil in euros. Don't think the Fed lowered rates to help the housing market. No, it's all about them making money in the currency markets.

Funny how we spend our lives, or a great portion of it, to gain what few pieces of paper that we can, and if we do amass a large number in our bank account call ourselves rich.

At least you can eat Kudzu and make paper out of it.

Beer and Rednecks

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On second thought, this guy isn't a redneck, he's an Idot.

I don't care how many beers you have in you, if you put a poisonous snake in your mouth, no matter how large or small, it's just a damn pity that he didn't garner a Darwin Award.

Word up

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Having been the proud possessor of a cast iron stomach most all my life, I rarely hesitate to eat what ever gets in front of me, although I have for the most part hidden from common knowledge that holiday meals don't see me return for seconds as often as once I did.

Today the first thing to get in front of me was a nice sausage biscuit eaten on the go along with a quart of water between then and lunch. Lunch time saw a new Mexican restaurant opened up. Remember these clues: 1. it's in an old Arby's in a small town, 2. the Arby's sign is still up and the now open sign is printed on half an old bed sheet. Not quite up to hopeful expectations. I'm all about equal opportunity but they've used theirs up. Remember those clues and violate your good judgment at your own risk.

This evening saw the piling on of a Supreme Pan Pizza, picked up and consumed with the addition of crushed red peppers to taste. I'm reasonably sure the ol' pipes will be alright in the morning, but the ears are ringing even more than usual, and I've a slight throbbing in my temples.

Checked the blood pressure before taking the daily BP pill this evening and it was a nice 106 over 62. Seemed reasonable considering I hadn't seen pictures of either Angelina Jolie or Lil Toni today.

Looking around to make sure there are enough Kudzu leaves within reach here in the kudzu grotto.

All Hail.................

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..........The two blogging Goddesses LL and Lil Toni. Both of these wonderful ladies contributed to my new Header. A thing of beauty excelled only by they celestial glory.

Thank you both.

Financial News????

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Allen Greenspan husband of Andrea Mitchell claims in his new book that the Iraq War is all about OIL.

Well Duhhhh. He makes it sound like he and his masters had nothing at all to do with it.

If you still believe that Bush and Congress run this part of the world, I've got news for you. They're as much cattle as you and I.

You can call me a conspiracy nut if you want, I don't care. Read "Proofs of a Conspiracy" written in 1798 if you would seek understanding. Any number of other books. Look at a history of Henry Kissinger. The writings of former National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski.

They consider us the unwashed, unintelligent masses who have to be molded and led around with blinders on for our own good and their power and profit.

Financial Vampires they are. Feeding on the spoils whether there are wars or the illusion of peace. So for Greenspan to come out all self-rightous over this is just more of the same old, same old to keep the kettle boiling, just like they always have.

I could really get worked up over this, and I have over the last 30 or so years, but, most people don't want to hear it and it doesn't make me feel any better.

Thanks Umberto

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Nice bit of rain falling this evening. Gracie the dalmatian hiding outside in her hidey hole and Toby the yorkie curled up on the couch burying his head against the thunder like the wuss he is.

Used to be we'd call this snuggling weather. Now it's known as sleeping weather.. Which is what I did after arriving home from the trip to Clayton and back. Flopped down in the rocking recliner and never felt the second rock backwards. Woke just in time to eat a bowl of veggie beef soup and cornbread.

I know, it's a hard life, but, someone has to do it.

While in Clayton I stopped at the Ranger Station and picked up a few topo maps of the northeast part of Georgia. I want to get one of the hand held GPS systems and do a little trekking before the year turns too far toward winter. Of course the term winter doesn't really apply here like it does in the more northerly parts of the country.

Snow measured in more than inches just makes me cold, although back when younger I liked to go sliding over it. Now.........just want it to go the heck away.

Lil' Toni over at Random bits of Pomposity has posted a couple picture of some kudzu from down in Miss-a-sloppy. Hopefully I can get LL of Chromed Curses to tell me how to use it as the header for this poor excuse of a blog. That would be really , like, cool, you know?.

A little something for the ladies.............*UPDATED*

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.............to consider when you think about our men in Iraq.

Here are pictures of two of my nephews.

Lt. Zack ( he's the one not trying to look crazy)



And his younger brother Josh.



He's a medic, just made Sargeant.

Both warriors just fighting a little different type of battle day by day.

Updated:
To make the post complete.
Here is a picture of their younger brother graduating from Basic at Ft. Sill, Oklahoma



And not to worry ladies, the beautiful youthful lady he has his arm around is my sister, his mother.

I feel a little weird

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No, I don't really have any reason to say that, except that it's almost as if a feeling of calm has washed over me. May be getting the meds adjusted or me adjusted to them.

Yet it's such a strange feeling. I who always feels something lacking, or wrong, or disgusting. Who loathes politicians with a feeling of having just puked my guts out after trying to pick up a dead dog by the hind leg only to have the hair and skin come loose in my hand and a half gallon or so of maggots burst from the distended stomach.
Who holds bankers in a position of low esteem only slightly higher than lawyers. Which are on an equal footing with politicians since most pols are or would like to give signals to lawyers under the bathroom stall divider.

I can't explain it. Probably a bad bit of beef.

9/11 Six Years On

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Time goes by quickly, and our memories are short. Our individual memories can sustain us for lifetimes baring head trauma or Alzheimer disease, but our national collective memories seem too often shaped by our viewing of the boob tube, or even by our adherence to a particular party line.

Mostly we don't like to look back at the bad things in life, or if they didn't happen to us directly we don't want to think that they might next time, so we squint our minds eyes as if looking at the sun too closely and pretend they didn't happen.

Men like Churchill could see the signs of WWII coming ten or more years in advance.
George Patton knew that our alliance with Stalin during that same war was a deal with the devil and that we would pay the price afterwards. Senator Goldwater knew that the way to keep our precious freedoms was for freemen to exercise those rights given to us by our Creator. Ronald Regan knew that you didn't sit with your pants down in the Oval office getting a Lewinsky while foreign governments supported terrorists who tried to blow up the twin towers or blew up our warships and our troops stationed in foreign lands.

Whoever said that "those who don't learn from history are doomed to forget it" was pretty wise. The question is are we?.

I've always been moved by the writings of our founding fathers. Patrick Henry's "Give me liberty or give me death" speech (you can read the text here, the sound plug in didn't work for me) has always roused a fire in my heart that takes days and weeks to quench, and never goes out entirely, but, like the clamor of the ambulance siren, seems to make most people I try to express those sentiments to smile weakly while nodding there head and casting their eyes around for the nearest emergency exit. Nothing like a zealot to run most people off. And I wonder what it is about me that does that to them. I do take a shower every Saturday after all. And in my opinion Old Spice is still in fashion. My Grandfather wore it by golly, and so do I.

I had started this post with the intention of repeating last years post for this date. If you didn't read it then you can look it up in my archives.

All I want to say is, Look at the threats ( and there are many more than Islamic fanatics alone) and don't hide your eyes, but face the enemies of freedom full on and Never surrender, Never give up.

Sharpen your bayonets, see to your weapons. Get some sleep, you're going to need it.

There are disadvantages

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.........to being a lone wolf.

"There is a primal reassurance in being touched, in knowing that someone else, someone close to you, wants to be touching you. There is a bone-deep security that goes with the brush of a human hand, a silent, reflex-level affirmation that someone is near, that someone cares.

It seemed that, lately, I had barely been touched at all"

White Night, Page 185

Just because it's beautiful.............

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..........I stole this from GOC.


I've always wished that I could sing in a way that would make people stop and listen.
These girls make it look easy but I know that it's not.

Good music enlarges your heart and soul. According to some research it will increase the intelligence of children. Don't know how good it works on adults as we sometimes scoff at that which enthralls us as we don't want to be labeled geeks. Too late for me of course. My geekdom needs only a pocket protector to be complete.

Just asking............

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.............but is there anything better that a bowl of peach cobbler along with a little vanilla ice cream on top.
Well, at least in the typical food groups anyway.
At least that is the opinion of this ol' redneck country boy.
I can remember as a young child our mother cooking up apple pies and peach cobblers and my favorite, blackberry cobbler. Served still hot from the oven. So hot that we would take real cream, skimmed off of milk from our own jersey cows, and pour it liberally over the top, cooling it down enough to eat. And if you had it the next day there would be a film of congealed butter on top sweetened by the copious amounts of sugar it took to make. Yum doesn't hardly begin to describe how it tastes in my memory.

All of this triggered by the last bowl of cobbler I'm eating on right now between every sentence.

Wishing you all a peach cobbler weekend.

Are we alone?

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You meet many different people in your life these days.

Unlike days past (long ago and far away) when a person might live his whole life in the same town or village and possibly never travel outside a short distance (compared to how we measure distance today with automobiles and airplanes and rocket ships into outerspace and even once upon a time to the moon) from where he or she was born. Today we can in a few hours travel to the opposite side of this ol' world

The furtherest I've ever traveled was 13 time zones away, which is about half way around the world or a little better away from Georgia. But in terms of seeing much of this planet, I can't really say that I've seen much. About 37 of the United States, a couple of territories, 7 foreign countries. And really most of them I can only say that our plane landed there or we drove thru them on the way to somewhere else. So I really haven't seen much. To be sure we can turn on the Travel Network on TV or read about places and learn a great deal that once was the realm of only the rich who could afford to travel or the military who'll send you where they want you, but knowing a place or understanding it requires a little more I think.

There is something within most people, I think, which yearns to see and experience different places or things. We can admire the view from a roadside pull off high in the mountains where we can see for 50 miles or more, but I think in our deepest subconcious parts of our brains the explorer in all of us wishes we could experience all of what is within our view. And more if that is possible. That's why I have a lot of respect for researchers, scientists and deep thinkers of what ever persuasion.
They are reaching out for answers to question we may not even have thought of yet.

Several years ago I was in a small trading post in a little NE Ga town. They sold used furniture and appliances and STUFF.. They would also buy or pawn items from people. They had accumulated a good bit of old jewelry of various description and had decided to get rid of things they hadn't been able to sell. I sorted thru all their items and picked out the genuine gold from all the costume jewelry. Quite a nice little buy I thought. One of the items kinda caught my eye and after I got home I gave it a closer look.

It was an apparently hand crafted piece of 18 kt gold with a curiously crafted design on it which resembled a central or South American ancient carving. Anything like that gets my attention since supposedly my mother was 1/8 Cherokee Indian, so I feel a certain amount of kinship towards Native American cultures where ever they were.

I took the piece to my friend Renato, a Peruvian Lawyer who immigrated to this country many years ago and because his legal training was in that country could not practice as a lawyer since he didn't complete his JD in this country. He works as a legal aid to the hispanic community assisting with taxes, passports and other things they need help with.

A most interesting person. Highly intelligent, the author of 2 books now. A speaker on the ancient architecture of South America and very interested in many of the unexplained mysteries of that region and the world. I met him at church and our friendship seemed to have that bond of long knowing of each other.

He told me that the design was one of the smaller winged gods engraved on the Sun Gate of the Tiwanakuan culture high in the Bolivian Andes mountains at about 12500 ft above sea level.

This is a picture of my piece:



Click through some of the links to the Sun Gate or related sights and you'll get a better idea of the image shown.

An interesting item is that some of the cut stones making up Machu Piccu is that they weigh 400 tons or better. The largest stones in any of the pyramids of Egypt weigh about 300 tons and they're at close to sea level. These are at an altitude of two and a third miles in some of the steepest parts of the world. How did ancient workers get them there???

My friend has a website at http://www.renatolongato.com

I think you might find some things to consider and maybe even ponder there. I might try to get together a group to have him speak to sometime. I learn new things every time I visit with him.

Sitting in the Kudza picking at the lint in my navel. Never know what will turn up.

Circles

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Growing up in the 50's and 60's was a unique time, now that I think back on it.
The agricultural past of this country and especially the South was fast changing. I feel fortunate to have grown up on a small family farm, part of a tradition that stretched back to the early 1900's when my Great Grandpa moved his family out of the hills around Gainesville, GA (a place then known as New Holland) to a new farm in the center of Gwinnett County along the Alcovy river.

Dairy farming could be profitable there. Close enough to make daily deliveries of milk, cream, chocolate milk and even at times orange juice to the door steps of families on the eastern part of Atlanta. Decatur, Stone Mountain and other small towns that provided growing room for what became quite a bustling town rising out of the ashes of the War between the States.

Then a Farmer could pretty easily count the number of families he could feed. Now 1 farm can produce more that they ever thought possible.

Families provided the basis of your whole life then.

The small church we went to had a cemetery full of dead relatives that we never knew and the pews full of family with ties going back 3 even 4 generations, although as kids we didn't know that. Names like Buffingtons, Pratts, Dewberries, Dunagans, MaHaffee's, Hinton's all tied into a circle the that just kept growing.

The circle today is large enough that we have a hard time seeing from one minute of arc to any of the other 360 degrees. It both saddens and gladdens me to think of how it's grown. Sad to think of all those I've never known and never will, and glad to be a part of those I do.

It's kinda like life it's self. With no beginning and no end in sight, we just keep on marching around on the path before us, whether it's fated to us or just happenstance, I can't tell, and feel no real need to know at this point. I'm just glad to be a part of it.

There was a PBS documentary on The Carter Family on the tube tonight. I suppose that's what started me thinking along these lines.

They started a tradition that shaped the music world of their day and to great extent still does today. I wish I could have found the following song on YouTube by the original 3 Carter family members, A.B., Sarah and Maybelle, but 1 and 2 generations later they still kept the traditions alive.



May the Circle be unbroken.

I can get all misty eyed just hearing it again. I think of the almost 60 years behind me and the 135 years yet to go to reach my goal.

Maybe later I can find something by Gid Tanner and the Skillet Lickers.

Early on a Sunday

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I may not agree with all of his politics, but no one can reach me with this song better than the original. Seems appropriate for a cloudy Sunday morning.

When we're young...........

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...........we know that we're going to change the world.

When we're middle aged we just hope we survive the world

When we're older we just shake our heads at what the worlds become.

After we're dead the young know just how they're going to change the world from what we changed it into.

And so it goes.........

What do you want?

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What do any of us want?

Just to be loved as we love.

What......................

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...................would you do for a Klondike bar??

Not much, if this evening is to be any judge. Although to tell the truth I did drag my sorry behind out of the easy chair wherein I had parked it to crawl to the freezer and fetch my own.

Where I had flopped after a supper of pinto beans, cornbread, a slice or two of onion and 1 1/2 pork chops. This after a loooooong day of climbing up and down a set of stairs and a short ladder painting a bedroom and living room in a condo rehab I got suckered into helping on.

Still the heavy lifting of hanging the sheet rock and finishing and painting it lies ahead.

I tell ya, I'm getting toooooo old for this kinda stuff. I tried to talk Don into hiring a crew to hang the sheet rock. Oh no that didn't go over once he heard they wanted $400.00.

I'm not gonna get paid enough to cover my gas going back and forth, but right about now I would pay that $400 just to get this job over with. Can't confuse me about what a job is worth.

Ya'll pray for me. I'm off for a long cool shower and we'll just have to see if I have the strength to rant on anything tonight.

Hiding and cowering in the kudzu hoping no one wants me to carry the trash out.

40 years

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Can go by in a few blinks of the eye if you're not careful.

Time enough to get married, have kids, grow them to adulthood and send them off to have kids of their own. Sometimes you can try the getting married and having kids two or three times, if you try hard enough.

What brings this looking back on, you ask? And well you might.

Oh nothing, just that I attended my 40th high school reunion last evening. Getting together to see how much hair everybody else had lost and how many extra pounds the girls who wouldn't give you a second glance have packed on. And which had anything lifted and enhanced.

I must say that I was pleasantly surprised. Oh don't misunderstand. There was enough thinning and graying hair among the guys, for some reason women don't seem to get gray as soon as men. And lots of belly's were a little past the ol' belt far enough that I soon quit trying to hold mine in so much. What a relief. I did suspect at least one guy of having a elastic belt on under his shirt, but I'm sure it was to protect his back or something. And the girls, while there were a few who might have had a little of the sand shift, were seen with rose colored glasses, and surprisingly friendly for a change. Probably because they knew that I'd been married since 7 months after graduation.

A couple of surprises. Joe Ford got married 2 years ago. Charlie Ray 11 years ago. You'd have to have known them to understand and I don't have time to tell those stories here.

Wade is still an Anarchist and makes his living working in a silencer factory. Still lives with his mother in the Castle his father designed and built. But not for long, she's finally seen the money and is moving out of metro Atlanta.

Gail and Nancy inherited their mother's ability to cook. Coconut cream pie, ummmmmmm one of my favorites.

51 out of 56 still among the living and 33 attended, with assorted spouses.

Below is a CD cover of the music album my friend Charlie made. He's standing in front of the Methodist church I attended every Sunday of my youth. The graveyard out of sight to his right is full of mostly my kin.

The title Wagon Tracks refers to the still visible ruts worn by iron rimmed wagon wheels in the granite rocks of the church yard.

Balance

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There must be some kind of system that keeps things in balance in this ol' world.
Something that will remind a person that for every up there is a down.
My last post was about a person who was down while I was on the up. (Or so I thought)

But I've learned that the pawnshop owner (the husband half) is dying with inoperable brain cancer. My wife's brother in law who was supposed to have surgery on his throat for cancer Tuesday will have to wait because now his carotid artery is enlarged for some reason, causing additional stress on him and his wife. And just now I received a call from a friend who's daughter in law drowned at Myrtle Beach SC, and they pulled the plug this morning.

Sorta puts some of my wants into a lesser order of importance and makes me a little pensive.

Sorry to be on a downer, but, if you have a moment, send up a small prayer for these folks and remember to give thanks for your own blessings.

He stood

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Just outside the door.

As I exited the pawn shop after concluding my business with them, he said, "excuse me". I thought I'd bumped him with my bag. I said, "I'm sorry did I bump you"?

"Oh no" he said, "I"m sorry if I was in your way".

As I looked at him I saw tears trying to form in his eyes. A thin small man, about my age, I thought, wiry strength in his arms and shoulders.

"What's wrong?", I asked.

"I was trying to pawn my father's pool cue", he said, "made in Germany, a real antique". "They wouldn't even offer me anything on it".

I noticed the smell of beer on him, and the blue of his eyes were faded, as if he'd drank hard most of his adult life. He had a half empty pack of cigarettes in his knit shirt pocket. And I could see that he was trying to carry himself with what pride remained to him.

"I've been out of work for two weeks" he said, "and I need to buy some groceries for me and my wife". "My rents due, but I hope the landlord will go easy on me 'til I can find some kind of work". "There's no work to be had in this town, and I don't have a car to go anywhere in".

"What kind of work do you do?" I asked.

"Construction", was the reply, "I can do anything from framing to roofing, but there's no work right now, the mexicans have taken all the jobs in this town".

Suspecting that maybe that wasn't the only reason, I asked, "how much you trying to get for that cue?

"$50.00, but it's worth $400 and they wouldn't even let me pawn it".

I'll confess that my first thought was to commiserate with him and go on down the road. I'd just spent most all of my cash and still had to leave a $2200.00 postdated check for a third of the balance to be cashed after labor day.

But the first of the week I had been almost as broke as he with $600 of rubber checks out that I hoped wouldn't bounce. But I'd received several blessings this week, where I'd not expected and my foolish old heart went out to him.

I've seen drunks spin any old kind of tales in order to get enough money to buy a six pack or a few cigarettes. But his bearing and just something told me he'd never pawned anything before.

"Tell you what", I said, "I don't have $50 but I'll give you $40 for it". That wasn't exactly true, in fact I had $46.00 on me, but I figured I might need something before I got home.

Desperate gratitude came into his eyes as more tears fell. "You'd do that for me?", he asked as I told him I'd give him my card and if better times came he could come get the cue from me anytime in the next two months.

To make a long story shorter, I gave him a ride to his house about 4 blocks away. Don't ask me just why. I visited with him a while and tried to encourage him to speak to his preacher about his needs. He said there were others who needed the church and he didn't want to ask. Foolish pride leads to many a fall I said.

I can't say if his tale was true or not. I really don't care. The Cue is up on top of the bookcase where it will likely stay no matter if it's a long while before things are better, if ever, for him and his wife.

We go thru life making decisions all along the way. Whether they are good or bad they lead us to exactly where we are. But too many realize that only when it becomes too late.

I've made my share, so I'll not criticize others for theirs. But I kinda wish I'd let him have the other $6.

Rain on the Kudzu this evening, along with some nice lightning and thunder. Scared the pooch of course, but we're glad to get it.

On their Wedding Night

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I don't remember where I stole the following bit of humor, but it's still tickles me.

On their wedding night, the young bride approached her new husband and
asked for $20.00 for their first lovemaking encounter. In his highly
aroused state, her husband readily agreed.

This scenario was repeated each time they made love, for more than 30
years, with him thinking that it was a cute way for her to afford new
clothes and other incidentals that she needed.

Arriving home around noon one day, she was surprised to find her husband
in a very drunken state. During the next few minutes, he explained that
his employer was going through a process of corporate downsizing, and he
had been let go. It was unlikely that, at the age of 59, he'd be able to
find another position that paid anywhere near what he'd been earning,
and therefore, they were financially ruined.

Calmly, his wife handed him a bank book which showed more than thirty
years of steady deposits and interest totaling nearly $1 million. Then
she showed him certificates of deposit issued by the bank which were
worth over $2 million, and informed him that they were one of the
largest depositors in the bank.
She explained that for the more than
three decades she had "charged" him for sex, these holdings had
multiplied and these were the results of her savings and investments.

Faced with evidence of cash and investments worth over $3 million, her
husband was so astounded he could barely speak, but finally he found his
voice and blurted out, "If I'd had any idea what you were doing, I
would have given you all my business!"

That's when she shot him.

You know, sometimes, men just don't know when to keep their mouths shut.

Saturday morning

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Another fine morning at the kudzu grotto. There was just the lightest of showers last night, just enough to barely disturb the dust on the truck. Nice temperature though right now. Soon hotter than is fit for man or beast, unless you're a fence lizard though.

As a youngster I was told they were fence lizards, and I thought that was only the country-fied name for them. Imagine my surprise to find out that common sense had reigned for once and called them correctly.

When our grandson Cody was small nothing would tickle him more than chasing lizards around the log pile and across the red dirt. He wouldn't catch them though, he wanted me to do the actual picking up and holding for him. Ain't scared though, just cautious.

They strike me as a pretty smart critter for a slithery reptilian. They'll wait patiently in the warm sun until any small insect crawls by and then, flash, snap, down the gullet it goes. But I have seen them stalk and attack prey with the ferocity of a Tyrannosaurus Rex. Makes me glad they don't get so big. Even if you were armed you'd likely have to shoot your way out, sorta like the guy in "Men in Black". You'd never know what hit you until you're all ready sliding down the gullet.

Hope your Saturday is as fine as you want it to be.

CNN

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Or as I like to refer to it, Communist News Newwork, was gleefully reporting about the numbers of US service people who are committing suicide nowadays.

Some moonbat had written in to them to suggest that since the military is an all volunteer service nowadays that they ought to be able to un-volunteer army with a two week notice in writing. I'd like to see that woman. Her neck must be 6 feet long to be able to reach that far up her fat ass.

Combat troops always see their share of suicides. Warfare when you're in the middle of it is a matter of survival, both yours and your comrades. And you'll fight harder to save their lives than you will for your own.. But after the battle is over and you have time to think (about those you knew or not who did not survive) of how you did and might have to do it again tomorrow .........well it's enough to cause even strong men to falter.

While in Quang Tri back in '71 the unit across the road from us had two men who took their own lives. One with a .45 to the head and another who was attempting to shoot his thumb off with a m-16 but forgot to move his head out of the way after he laid his thumb on the barrel.

I have a confession to make. When I volunteered in '69 while the draft was still in force, before the lottery, my basic training company was chosen to be the test company for the volunteer army. Made sense because the majority of us were volunteers for flight school or other specialized training. Each of us had our own reasons I suppose, I just figured that I'd rather fly over the jungle rather than walk through it, and if I did get shot at least I'd go down in flames. (Stupid Child)

Every other unit at Fort Polk, Louisiana had PT every day. They had to quick time to the ranges and every other place they went, while we had PT about twice a week and walked every where we didn't ride to. Oh boy, you should have heard the drill instructors put us down, and I don't blame them. We were really getting over on all of the other units. The funny thing was that we took the commanders trophy for that cycle by a margin that made the other units look like sissy girls. I've always felt a little bad about that because I've never thought that serving your country should be an option depending on whether your parents had money or you just didn't want to be inconvenienced.

Having said that though, I am extremely proud of those wonderful young men and women who do choose to volunteer to serve in the military, and I pray nightly for their safety.

I've always been partial to Robert Heinlein's idea that the amount of citizenship you were able to exercise in relating to voting or holding office depended on your service . It seems a given that the more you desire to live in the land of freedom and opportunity the more willing you'd be to earn that right

I rather like the Swiss military service PLAN.

The best way to avoid a war is to be prepared to win at all cost and to otherwise maintain a position of neutrality.

I don't envision a future ahead that has no conflict in it. Certainly not with the divide between cultures as they are today, but a gradual move to less interference with other countries while holding the biggest gun on the block here at home and an attitude of I'll not mess with you unless you insist, but then I'll grind you into bloody dust and sow your land with salt, might go a little bit toward re-establishing a bit of civility to the world.

And Ladies, just so you know, I have no qualms about you serving if you wish, but feel that we need to preserve the only resource we have available to birth the future if we can. I note with interest that the Russians are having holidays now for the express purpose of every one spending the day trying to increase the population. A somewhat better idea than importing the least educated by not watching the borders.
That's a rant for another day.

Free enterprise

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While I am all for a capitalistic free market, the antics of these two Curlish sisters makes my blood start putting off a little steam.

They need to hang them up by their nipples from shark hooks with a couple threaded through their shoulder muscles so they won't tear free. And then pluck the hair from their legs with needle nosed pliers one every five minutes so they can spend the time anticipating the next one.

Just damn.

And where were our vaunted and over paid government accountants for the last 6 years??

Jobs need to be lost over this.

Updated website: Curlish Sisters

I really wanted to call them something else, but some of my family lurk here and while they've probably heard me before, no use making them winch in pain at my lack of couth.

Ever had a conniption fit??

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I mean a real old fashioned foot stomping, arm slinging, hair pulling, wild-eyed CONNIPTION FIT. Mad as a poked hornets nest, spittle flying, gasping for air, woe betide anyone within your narrowed range of vision further darkened by the RCOB over your eyes.

This is not to be confused with a "hissy fit" which is a more sissified girly type of fit which is generally directed at someone or gaggle of someones.

No a conniption fit had no direct target other than anything and everything that pops into your slithering reptilian brain at that moment. Much like my general feelings about all things political and your view in particular on the subject.

I used to have one on a fairly frequent basis when things went south in opposition to my well reasoned and plotted out course to the north. They come much less frequently these days. I'm taking all my medication on a daily basis and "I'm much better now". Either that or I just don't give a flip about what everyone else is doing wrong now. And it has to be wrong if you're not in lock step with me. (and no one ever has been)(probably a good thing).

Just wondering if you are taking advantage of your right to a good ol' fashioned fit every once in a while..

I didn't realize that there was a song about it till now. Lyrics follow since I couldn't find a video of the music.

I'm going crazy i'm lying on my back.
There's an army of idiots out on the attack.
Uniformed and armed with shotguns full of shit.
You better run or else you're gonna get hit.

I don't know if I can deal with this.
I'm gonna have a conniption fit.

You're in my living room I can see it on your face.
You're on my TV screen pleading your fucking case.
Well i don't want it.
No i don't care.
I'm stuck here pulling out my fucking hair.

I don't know if I can deal with this.
I'm gonna have a conniption fit.

I'm gonna have a conniption fit.
I'm gonna have a conniption fit.
Conniption fit Conniption fit.
Conniption fit Conniption fit.

Muslims

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Are our friends

And the IRS has a refund just waiting for you.

Those Lazy Hazy.........

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...............Crazy days of Summer have devolved into those Hot Sultry days we refer to as dog days. Or as relates to me, dog daze.

When the heat rises to over 100 degrees and feels like the fetid, rotting breath of a demon from hell. When you wish you could wear a space suit with an internal air conditioning unit, you know that the dog star is rising with the sun each morning and you just want to shoot anybody and everybody that asks, "Hot enough for ya?". Yeah, those days.

Don't get me wrong, I love the South and all that implies, but along about now every year I wish I lived in a nice cool cove in the Swiss Alps, high enough up that you could use a light blanket at night but still sit out on the edge of a cliff in the day and get an all over tan.

People say that money can't buy you love, but it could buy you accommodations in a cooler clime, perhaps with a long, lithe, Nordic house keeper to pick up after your slovenly rich ass.

Perhaps then I could shake off the ennui that seems to have me in it's grip and I would feel the urge to crawl out of the kudzu grotto.

Do you hear?.....................

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................without listening?

I causes me much heartache to think so many people in The United States of America are described by my wifes tee shirt which says, "Never under estimate the stupidity of people in large groups".

When a youth I was sure that the more we learned as individuals would carry over into the group dynamic and cause all humans to evolve into better and smarter people.

Now in my middle years my heart aches with the realization that while more and more knowledge about everything is being obtained, people as a whole, or at least those that I am most knowledgeable about, those in this country are devolving as far as their intelligence as a whole goes.

I stole this link from Pamela , I did tell her I was going to do it. Maybe you will find it interesting, because I know that most of my readers do not fall into the average group. You have to be above average, obviously, since you check in here from time to time.



I hate my thoughts on this matter. It pisses me off no end. We're supposed to be better than this damn it. Why aren't we?