I read a book on marriage that said I should
treat my wife like I treated her on our first date, so we ate dinner out
tonight and afterwards I dropped her off at her parents' house.
Monday, September 30, 2019
Sunday, September 29, 2019
Monday, September 23, 2019
California - The New Rustbelt?
Back at the turn of the century, around 2001, my new job took me back to Ohio for an nationwide company meeting. We met in Akron. The hotel we were staying at provided a complimentary newspaper. I remember seeing for the first time, page after page of near microscopic type, listing all the delinquent tax bills of individuals and businesses, and statements that John Doe was no longer responsible for the debt of Jane Doe, etc.
On the way from the hotel to the meeting site, we'd pass by many closed and boarded up buildings on the main street of town. The Rust Belt, I thought. Being from California, I gave it little more thought than to feel sorry for the residents.
Fast forward two decades. You'll never guess what I've been seeing on the pages of my Dead Tree Newspaper. That's right! Today, there were two and a half pages full of near microscopic type, listing delinquent tax payments. And it wasn't the first time. Just like Akron, 2001.
The next time I hear Gavin Newsom or some other California Democrat crowing about how wonderful the California economy is, I've got a list two and a half pages long, microscopic type, who people who might want to disagree with them.
Sunday, September 22, 2019
Monday, September 16, 2019
Corn Pop Joe
Joe Biden never made it to a Wheaties box, because of the asthma that kept him out of Viet Nam, but not life guarding or college sports. He has related though, an incident where he fought off a serial gang offender. At least, I think that's what he said!
Cup of Joe for a Joe
Green Beans Coffee has a program, Cup of Joe for a Joe that I like to contribute to now and then. Here's a sample of some of the responses I get from the troops:
The link is here: GreenBeansCoffeeCompany if you want to give a cup or three. I don't know about you, but the cost of a cup of coffee to someone far away from home serving their country is a small price to pay. And the rewards are worth it to me! Nobody is paying me to say this, because it makes you feel good! It's $2.50/ cup. You can write a short message, as I usually do, or not. You can be anonymous if you wish or you can even post your email addy if you are open to corresponding.
C'mon! You've got $2.50 in the couch cushions! Give it a try! You'll be glad you did!
Thank you so much! Much love and respect to you
Service member serving in Bagram PAX Terminal, Afghanistan
Thank you! It’s Sunday morning and this is exactly what I needed!
Service member serving in Al-Jaber Air Base, Kuwait
Michael thank you so much! Coffee is the fuel that gets me through the day. I really appreciate the gift and the support
Service member serving in Camp Buehring (Udairi), Kuwait
Thank you Michael. You're support means alot!
Service member serving in Bagram Main (south), Afghanistan
Thanks Michael! Woke up to this nice surprise this morning! I appreciate it! Davy - Baghdad
Service member serving in Union III, Iraq
Thank you Mr Butler, I appreciate the kind gesture!
Service member serving in JTC, Jordan
Thank you for your support . I appreciate it .
Service member serving in Buehring MOAB, Kuwait
Mr Butler, from the bottom of my heart, thank you. It's so humbling that folks like you are thinking of us back home and taking money from your wallet to spread a splash of cheer. From all of us... Thank you. -Nathan
Service member serving in Al Azraq, Jordan
Thank you
Service member serving in Bagram PAX Terminal, Afghanistan
Thank you sir! This made my week!
Service member serving in Al-Jaber Air Base, Kuwait
Thanks for the coffee and even more for the support, Nick
Service member serving in ATOC (Ops Town) - Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar
Michael, Thank you very much for the coffee! Anthony
Service member serving in Bagram Main (south), Afghanistan
Thank you for support the deployed troops. This cup of joe has made my day better, thank you!
Service member serving in ATOC (Ops Town) - Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar
Thank you for your generosity!! It makes a huge difference.
Service member serving in JTC, Jordan
Thank you for the cup of coffee, I really appreciate it. It’s nice to know people back home keep us in their thoughts.
Service member serving in BPC Mall, Qatar
The link is here: GreenBeansCoffeeCompany if you want to give a cup or three. I don't know about you, but the cost of a cup of coffee to someone far away from home serving their country is a small price to pay. And the rewards are worth it to me! Nobody is paying me to say this, because it makes you feel good! It's $2.50/ cup. You can write a short message, as I usually do, or not. You can be anonymous if you wish or you can even post your email addy if you are open to corresponding.
C'mon! You've got $2.50 in the couch cushions! Give it a try! You'll be glad you did!
Flowing Curves Of Beauty
Women will never be equal to men until they can
walk down the street with a bald head, a beer gut, and still think they are
sexy.
Sunday, September 15, 2019
Saturday, September 14, 2019
The Trouble With Tribble
A former top administrator of FEMA was arrested on Tuesday in a major federal corruption investigation https://t.co/yu1eY9s9gn [We’ve deleted an earlier tweet to this story that lacked clarity and contained a grammatical error.]— NYT National News (@NYTNational) September 12, 2019
"She has traveled with President Obama and Vice President Biden to disaster areas to provide technical support on Federal response activities."Some of it must have rubbed off!
Friday, September 13, 2019
Happiness Is Doubled And Sorrows Halved In The Company Of A Friend
Three days before Hurricane Dorian lashed the coast of South
Carolina, my friend of 40+ years called her son saying to him only, “Help!” and
hung up the phone. He rushed to her home
to find her in respiratory distress. An
ambulance was called, and she was admitted to the critical care unit.
Two years ago, she nearly died.
This time around the situation was not as dire, but she remains in
critical care.
Her son and widowed daughter-in-law insisted while my friend remained
sedated and intubated there was no need for me to travel to see her. I have waited on pins and needles for some
sign of improvement in my friend’s condition.
It’s approaching two weeks now without success in removing the
ventilation tubing or easing up on the sedation that is being administered.
I was told only two days ago that she was also being treated for
pneumonia. I feel strongly that I must
leave to be with my best friend.
I haven’t spoken with co-bloggers Proof or Sig94 about posting during my
absence, first because I have no notion of how long I will be away and
secondly, because they have their own lives to lead and I don’t want to lay
that burden at their feet.
I have queued up the very popular regular weekly features of “A
Walk On The Wild Side” and “Flowing Curves Of Beauty” through the
end of October. I have notified my
neighbor to scoop up my mail and keep an eye peeled on my house while I’m away.
I apologize to my readers for this abrupt notice and hope you
will not abandon this blog because I have made the choice to be with my friend.
A quote I love that has been attributed to blind and deaf American
authoress Helen Keller seems most appropriate for this moment in time:
“I would
rather walk with a friend in the dark,
than
alone in the light.”
Alabama Crimson Tide VS South Carolina Gamecocks
A lot of people in the
run-up to the game between the Tide and the Gamecocks are happy to remind you
the last time Bama lost to an SEC East team was nine years ago in Columbia, SC
when the Cocks won 35-21.
That year the Gamecocks
were led by “Head Ball Coach” Steve Spurrier; the pipsqueak known as “Darth Visor” for throwing and
stomping on his visor when he succumbed to fits of anger like a brat kicking
and screaming on the floor of a toy store.
The same Steve Spurrier who left a successful Florida Gators program to
coach in the NFL when somebody pissed him off.
The same Spurrier who left the Redskins to come crawling back to college
ball when things got bad.
Three years before he
resigned in the middle of his 11th season at South Carolina, Spurrier threw
some shade at Nick Saban saying, “He’s got a nice little gig going. A little bit like Calipari. He tells guys, ‘Hey three years from now,
you’re going to be a first-round pick and go.’
If he wants to be the greatest coach or one of the greatest coaches in
college football, to me, he has to go somewhere besides Alabama and win,
because they’ve always won there at Alabama.”
During his post-game
press conference following Bama’s drubbing of New Mexico State, Saban was asked, “What do you get out
of a game like this and do you think this level of competition can get you
ready for an SEC game a week later?”
His response was, “ Well
look, I’ve talked about this before.
We’ve tried to schedule the best teams we can schedule and we’re trying
to do that in the future as well. We can
only play the people who are willing to play us. I’ve said my opinion about
playing 12 Power-5 schools. That’s what
I would rather do, but a lot of other people don’t agree with that. I’d rather play 10 SEC games and then play
two other Power-5 schools, so all the games are exciting for the fans; all the
games are good football. You wouldn’t
have to go undefeated to get into the playoffs because you’d play a more
quality schedule.”
“I’ve been through and
covered that ground a hundred times. If
you asked me if we should play 12 Power-5 teams my answer would be Yes,” Saban
continued.
So…the Tide rolls into
Williams-Brice Stadium in Columbia to do battle with Coach Muschamp’s
Gamecocks. Muschamp took some heat for
his decision to punt at midfield on fourth-and-one in the fourth quarter
leading the Tarheels 20-17. They ended
up losing to the Heels 24-20. Muschamp
confessed, “ We played the percentages there with our defense, but I was
obviously wrong.”
In that game, starting
QB Jake Bentley suffered a season-ending
Lisfranc injury to his foot giving second string QB Ryan Hilinski the reins
against Charleston Southern last Saturday.
Hilinksi completed 24 of 30 passes for 282 yards in their 72-10 victory.
Will Muschamp was an
elite defensive coordinator back in the day, but as head coach he’s nowhere
near solving the SEC. It didn’t happen
in four seasons at Florida and it hasn’t happened yet in Columbia. He’s 12-12 through three seasons at South
Carolina.
The atmosphere at
Williams-Brice Stadium will be electric for Gamecocks fans. I had tickets to the game but will not be
able to attend. My best friend was
hospitalized in critical condition the day before Hurricane Dorian lashed the South
Carolina coast and I have chosen to be with my friend.
I know, however, Coach
Saban’s murderball will be too much for Muschamp to handle. The game will be largely lopsided in favor of
the Tide as Tua takes advantage of an inexperienced Gamecocks secondary. Bama’s defense will undoubtedly force
multiple turnovers giving Bama another blowout victory to start the 2019
season.
Funny Maine has disabled embedding his videos on other websites. I hope you'll click on the link to watch "How Bama Fans Watched Week Two Games".
Funny Maine has disabled embedding his videos on other websites. I hope you'll click on the link to watch "How Bama Fans Watched Week Two Games".
South Carolina Trophy case: pic.twitter.com/EIeM23Pixr— Blake, hold the B (@lbosey7) August 23, 2019
Thursday, September 12, 2019
The Trouble With Tribble
A former top administrator of FEMA was arrested on Tuesday in a major federal corruption investigation https://t.co/yu1eY9s9gn [We’ve deleted an earlier tweet to this story that lacked clarity and contained a grammatical error.]— NYT National News (@NYTNational) September 12, 2019
We have heard scornfully that she was Trump's FEMA employee. That is true, however, the former FEMA Official arrested was Ahsha Tribble, hired by FEMA in 2015, during the Obama administration.
"She has traveled with President Obama and Vice President Biden to disaster areas to provide technical support on Federal response activities."Some of it must have rubbed off!
Tuesday, September 10, 2019
The “Stache” No Longer Needed
Just a little after noon today the nation learned
President Trump’s National Security Advisor, John Bolton, had tendered his
resignation.
President Trump said, “I asked John for his
resignation, which was given this morning.
I thank John very much for his service.
I will be naming a new National Security Advisor next week.”
Bolton’s exit caused
shockwaves throughout the DC Beltway, though there had been numerous reports of
tensions between Bolton and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on some of President
Trump’s biggest foreign policy initiatives, including the now-collapsed peace
deal with Afghanistan’s Taliban and the nuclear talks with North Korea.
In the interim, Charles Kupperman, PhD will serve
as Acting National Security Advisor.
Kupperman has four
decades of national security policy and program experience serving in President
Ronald Reagan’s Administration. He served in several departments under Reagan: Executive
Office of the President, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and the
President’s General Advisory Committee on Arms Control and Disarmament. He also
served as foreign policy advisor to Reagan’s presidential campaign.
Sen. Lindsey Graham
(R-SC), a key Trump ally, said he liked Bolton but that the President deserved
to feel comfortable with his team.
“As National Security Adviser
to President Trump, I found him to be accessible and always pursuing an agenda
that not only helps the President but makes America safe. President Trump, like every other president,
has the right to a national security adviser of his own choosing.”
After John Bolton's firing, CNN's Jim @Acosta asks: "Is this National Security team a mess?" @stevenmnuchin1: "Absolutely not. That’s the most ridiculous question I’ve ever heard." pic.twitter.com/v47bYMd0Pr— Washington Examiner (@dcexaminer) September 10, 2019
Here we go. Acosta asks if NSC is "a mess." Hogan Gidley standing off stage mutters, "Is CNN a mess?" Rarely see that.— John T. Bennett (@BennettJohnT) September 10, 2019
The Extraordinary Rebuke Of CNN By Central Intelligence Agency And New York Times
Jim Sciutto was a
political appointee of President Obama working on foreign affairs when he was
hired by CNN in 2013 to be its Chief National Security Correspondent. The network never disclosed this fact to its
viewers.
Scuitto reported on CNN’s
air the CIA had extracted a Russian asset over concerns President Trump had
mishandled classified information that might “somehow reveal details about
intelligence operations.”
Scant hours after CNN’s
reporting, the New
York Times cited sources contradicting the story writing, “CIA officials made
the arduous decision in late 2016 [emphasis mine] to offer to extract
the source from Russia weeks before [emphasis mine] Trump even took
office.”
The informant,
recruited by the CIA decades ago, has been described as a mid-level Russian
official who was outside Vladimir Putin's inner circle, and yet saw Putin on a
regular basis and was privy to high-level information. This Moscow spy's intel
was key to the U.S. intelligence community's conclusion that Putin himself
ordered a Russian interference campaign in the U.S. 2016 election.
Former intelligence
officials said, "There was no public evidence that Mr. Trump directly
endangered the source" and current U.S. officials "insisted that
media scrutiny of the agency’s sources alone was the impetus for the
extraction," according to the Times.
The asset was offered
extraction in 2016 over concerns about his safety but refused causing some
American counterintelligence officials to become skeptical of his
trustworthiness.
Even publicly there was
talk that CNN's report missed the mark. Former CIA official Philip Mudd, a CNN
counterterrorism analyst, took issue with the report's "political angle" involving President Trump.
“I question whether
this angle of the story about whether the President’s engagement with
intelligence was actually a spur in the extraction of the informant," Mudd
said Monday on The Lead with Jake Tapper. "I suspect there
were other issues here."
CIA spokeswoman
Brittany Bramell said, "CNN's narrative that the Central Intelligence Agency
makes life-or-death decisions based on anything other than objective analysis
and sound collection is simply false. Misguided speculation that the
President's handling of our nation's most sensitive intelligence — which he has
access to each and every day — drove an alleged exfiltration operation is
inaccurate.”
Numerous other holes
quickly surfaced in CNN's reporting. Commentator Aaron Mate pointed
out in a Twitter thread that several major news organizations had
previously cited a high-level official in the Russian government as a
source — suggesting the Intelligence Community itself, not Trump, had
compromised the spy.
NYT now reporting that @jimsciutto's core claim -- that CIA extracted a Russian source in part due to worries about "Trump’s handling of intelligence -- is bunk. Current & former officials blame media leaks -- that came from the intel community itself. https://t.co/AFKXbXap41 pic.twitter.com/JVz5XIZbob— Aaron MatĂ© (@aaronjmate) September 10, 2019
Monday, September 9, 2019
Flowing Curves Of Beauty
Studies show your best protection from attack by Big Foot or
abduction by space aliens while hiking in the woods is by carrying a camera.
Sunday, September 8, 2019
Saturday, September 7, 2019
Something Wonderful: Where There Is Love There Is Life
Nick and Gabi met and
fell in love while attending a conference of the National Down Syndrome Society. Nick lives in Ohio and Gabi in North
Carolina. When the conference concluded
they forgot to exchange telephone numbers.
The couple met up again
in Pittsburgh for another conference but were devastated when they had to leave
each other again. Gabi broke down crying to her mom, telling her how much
she missed Nick.
Gabi’s
mom reached out to Nick’s mom and together they hatched a plan to get the
lovebirds back together. Gabi and her
mom booked a flight to visit Nick in his hometown, but Gabi was told she was going
to another conference and Nick was told he was going to the airport to pick up
a friend who needed a ride home.
The
heartwarming moment Nick is reunited with Gabi is captured
on video. Nick briefly walks away in
disbelief and Gabi runs towards him dropping her bags. As they embrace you can hear Nick say her
name over and over again and if you listen carefully, you can hear him say, “This
is the reason I stay alive.”
Nick’s
mom said, “People with Down Syndrome have no ‘warm-up’ time when it comes to
love. They lean in and love fully.”
This
is Nick and Gabi’s first relationship and their moms are confident there will
be weddings bells for the couple down the road.
“You've
gotta dance like there's nobody watching,
Love like you'll never be hurt,
Sing like there's nobody listening,
And live like it's heaven on earth.”
Love like you'll never be hurt,
Sing like there's nobody listening,
And live like it's heaven on earth.”
Friday, September 6, 2019
Tasty, Tasty Cupcakes: New Mexico State Aggies VS Alabama Crimson Tide
NMSU Head Coach Doug
Martin knows he faces the unenviable task of playing No. 2 Alabama. The Tide is a lock to win Saturday’s home
opener in Bryant Denny Stadium.
The Aggies, ranked as a
dead-last FBS team by CBS Sports, were obliterated by the Cougars of Washington
State 58-7 last week. Can you say the
Aggies are the biggest underdog to face Bama in the Nick Saban murderball
era? Sure, you can.
New Mexico State was
booted from the Sun Belt Conference two years ago and is now a member of the FBS
Independents. With no conference revenue-sharing,
the Aggies are relegated to playing “fundraising games” and so the school will
be receive a big, fat check for $1.7 million for the privilege of getting
shellacked in T-Town.
Favored by 55 points,
Bama has an 83-game winning streak against unranked opponents. Aggies’ Coach Martin said earlier this week, “I’m
not so much concerned about the score as I am about us playing like a winning
football team meaning that we don’t beat ourselves.”
NMSU turned the ball
over three times to the Cougars of the PAC12-North Conference and allowed 618
total yards. If that’s not beating
yourself, I don’t know what is.
The Aggies will be
punting the ball a boatload giving the Tide plenty of chances to score a
non-offensive TD or three. And it’s not
unreasonable to assume Tua will carve up the Aggie defense before turning the
QB duties to Mac Jones and chillin’ for the rest of the game. And maybe, just maybe, we’ll also see Tua’s
brother Taulia replace Jones in the fourth quarter just like he did against
Duke last week.
Funny Maine, who always creates a wildly popular video of “How Bama Fans Watched…” has disabled embedding of his videos on websites, but you can view "How Bama Fans Watched Week One Games" on YouTube™ here.
Funny Maine, who always creates a wildly popular video of “How Bama Fans Watched…” has disabled embedding of his videos on websites, but you can view "How Bama Fans Watched Week One Games" on YouTube™ here.
Monday, September 2, 2019
Sunday, September 1, 2019
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