Thursday, March 31, 2016

Wordless Throw Back Thursday

Combining the best of Wordless Wednesday and TBT, we have this...

I remember being hauled around in the back of pick-ups. Never got hurt, either.



Technology has certainly come a long way...


... but we don't really take advantage of it.



Another thing that's changed - and not for the better - is our income tax system.



But perhaps the biggest change is how we deal with those who attack us.

Wednesday, March 30, 2016

Eye Opener

Here's a link to what is IMO a very good - and possibly eye opening - blind quiz that will determine which 2016 presidential candidate you are most closely aligned with. I'm not going to reveal my results, but I will say that it confirmed some of what I believed, and surprised me on other fronts.

Give it a shot. It should only take a few minutes, but if you're like me, you'll think about the results for much longer than that.

I Side With:

Speaking of 2016 presidential candidates:







Tuesday, March 29, 2016

Placeholders

I'm out of town today and tomorrow. Here's a few things to keep you amused until I can resume regular posting.

How Donald Trump Decided To Run For President



Proof of Death 



The Dog Ate My Homework



Religious Tolerance



Monday, March 28, 2016

The World Has Gone Mad

You just can't make this stuff up.

Organisers cancel Sunday's Brussels attacks 'March Against Fear'
The organisers of a "March Against Fear" planned for Sunday to mark the Brussels terror attacks said they had cancelled the event after the authorities asked them to do so because of security fears.
Oh my aching back. Cancelling a "March Against Fears" due to fears about what might happen - words fail me...

...other than to note that, in accordance with political correctness run amok, the people responsible for causing this fear aren't identified.
In an earlier statement, the organisers said the march planned for Sunday was meant to show that Brussels and the country at large refused to be intimidated by terrorism and that everyone stood together.
I guess "Brussels and the country at large" can be intimidated by terrorism after all.

Although, to be fair, the terrorists - islamic terrorists, to be specific - have once again shown their murderous intent and capability by killing dozens and injuring hundreds, mostly women and children, in an Easter Sunday attack that deliberately targeted Christians celebrating Easter.
A breakaway Pakistani faction of the militant Taliban group has claimed responsibility for an Easter Sunday bombing that killed 65 people in a park in the eastern city of Lahore that was crowded with Christians, including many children.

Ahsanullah Ahsan, spokesman for Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, told the Associated Press that a suicide bomber with the faction deliberately targeted the Christian community.
Maybe the officials in Brussels had the right idea after all.

Here at home, all this is playing right into Donald Trump's hands.
The Islamic State’s bombing of an airport terminal and subway station in Brussels, Belgium on March 22 horrified the world. But Donald Trump saw a silver lining in the latest terrorist atrocity.

During an interview a few hours after the bloodshed in Brussels, Trump announced that foreign threats benefited his presidential campaign. He proudly observed that “every time we have a problem in the world, I do better” in the polls. The reason, he asserted, was because voters view him “as much stronger” than his opponents.
I don't know if that's true or not, but keep in mind that Jimmy Carter's ineffectiveness during the Iran hostage crisis helped propel Ronald Reagan into the White House.

Of course, Trump isn't Reagan by any stretch of the imagination, but still...
 

Sunday, March 27, 2016

Sunday Funnies 2016.03.27

I hope everyone out there has a Happy - and Blessed - Easter.



Easter and the 2016 Elections:
Fluffy, the young Easter orphan bunny and Cedric the orphan snake lived in the forest; they were, by an amazing coincidence, both blind from birth.

One morning, bright and early Fluffy was hopping through the forest when he tripped over the body of Cedric who was basking in the sunlit undergrowth. Fluffy landed quite hard on the prostrate body of Cedric.

'Crikey,' exclaimed Fluffy the bunny, 'I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to squash you. I've been blind since birth, so, I can't see where I'm going. In fact, since I'm also an orphan, I don't even know what creature I am.'

'That's OK, mate,' commented Cedric the snake. 'Actually my story is much the same as yours. I, too, have been blind since birth and also never knew my mother. Tell you what, maybe I could slither all over you and work out what you are, so at least you'll be able to find that out.'

'What a marvelous idea,' replied Fluffy the bunny.

So the Cedric slithered all over Fluffy and said, 'Well, you're covered with soft fur, you have really long ears, your nose twitches and you have a soft cottony tail. I'd say that you must be a bunny rabbit.'

'Oh, thank you, thank you,' cried Fluffy with tremendous pleasure. Then Fluffy the bunny suggested to the snake, 'Perhaps I could be allowed to feel you all over with my paw and help you the same way that you've helped me.'

So Fluffy the bunny felt Cedric the snake all over and summarized, 'Well, you're smooth and slippery, you have a forked tongue and no backbone.  I'd say you must be a politician.'
Easter and the NCAA Basketball Tournament:
Q: What do Easter Bunny helpers get for making a basket?
A: Two points, just like anyone else.
Easter and ... well, just Easter

After the big egg hunt on Easter Sunday, a farm boy decided to play a little prank on all of the chickens. He went into the chicken coop and replaced every single brown egg with a brightly colored one from his Easter basket.

A few minutes later the rooster walked in and saw all of the colored eggs. He let out an outraged "Squawk" and then stormed outside and killed the peacock.



A man was blissfully driving along the highway, when he saw the Easter Bunny hopping across the middle of the road. He swerved to avoid hitting the Bunny, but unfortunately the rabbit jumped in front of his car and was hit. The basket of eggs and candy went flying all over the place.

The driver, being a sensitive man as well as an animal lover, pulled over to the side of the road, and got out to see what had become of the Bunny carrying the basket. Much to his dismay, the colorful Bunny was dead.

The driver felt guilty and began to cry. A woman driving down the same highway saw the man crying on the side of the road and pulled over. She stepped out of her car and asked the man what was wrong.

"I feel terrible," he explained, "I accidentally hit the Easter Bunny and killed it. What should I do?"

The woman told the man not to worry. She knew exactly what to do. She went to her car trunk, and pulled out a spray can. She walked over to the limp, dead Bunny, and sprayed the entire contents of the can onto the little furry animal.

Miraculously the Easter Bunny came to back life, jumped up, picked up the spilled eggs and candy, waved its paw at the two humans and hopped on down the road. 50 yards away the Easter Bunny stopped, turned around, waved and hopped on down the road another 50 yards, turned, waved,
hopped another 50 yards and waved again!!!!

The man was astonished. He said to the woman, "What in heaven's name is in your spray can?"

The woman turned the can around so that the man could read the label. It said:

"Hair spray. Restores life to dead hair. Adds permanent wave."



One Easter Sunday morning as the pastor was preaching a children's sermon, he reached into his bag of props and pulled out an egg. He pointed at the egg and asked the children, "What's in here?"

"I know, I know!" a little girl exclaimed, "pantyhose!"










Saturday, March 26, 2016

Random Observations On Brussels

Life has been a little hectic lately. Plus I didn't want to comment on the tragedy in Brussels until more information was available. But I think the time is right to toss out a few random observations regarding the bombings and subsequent events.

First, a comment by the esteemed Thomas Sowell. I wish more people would pay attention to what this man has to say.
"Historians of the future, when they look back on our times, may be completely baffled when trying to understand how Western civilization welcomed vast numbers of people hostile to the fundamental values of Western civilization, people who had been taught that they have a right to kill those who do not share their beliefs.“
One of the first things that occurred to me was "What are the chances of a similar attack here in the U.S.?"
U.S. intelligence and security capabilities make a Brussels-style attack less likely on American soil, but porous borders leave the USA vulnerable to terrorists, said David Deptula, a retired general who led Air Force intelligence efforts.

From Oct. 1, 2014 to Sept. 30, 2015, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) apprehended 337,117 people trying to enter the USA illegally...
No word on how many people actually made it inside our country illegally.

Somehow, that doesn't make me feel comfortable.

But not to worry. obama is doing his usual outstanding job of protecting and reassuring the American people.

Oh, wait...

Obama criticized for doing tango 2 days after bombings in Brussels
President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama were coaxed from their table at a state dinner in Argentina on Wednesday night to dance the tango. And critics already furious that the president had attended a baseball game in Cuba following Tuesday’s deadly attacks in Brussels were unmoved.

“When everybody else is worried about where ISIS is, who they are going to kill next, and [if they] are going to come over here,” former Judge Andrew Napolitano said on the cable network’s morning show, “the president shouldn’t be in Argentina doing the tango.”

Nicolle Wallace, former communications director for President George W. Bush, said Obama’s reluctance to alter his itinerary “puts him vastly … out of step with the entire American public, not just Republicans.

“His policy choice was to proceed with everything on his schedule and not to react to the threat of terrorism,” Wallace said on MSNBC. “There were mothers lying dead while their, you know, family members were at the crime scene yesterday, and to [make it] look like the priority is to go on a foreign trip instead of pausing for a minute and explaining that to America is a communications crime.”
Meanwhile, in Eastern Europe:

Poland's Leaders Want No Refugees After Brussels Blasts
Poland's president on Thursday threw his support behind a government decision to renege on a deal to accept thousands of refugees, blaming security concerns raised by Tuesday's attacks in Brussels.

The move could prompt similar decisions by other countries in Central and Eastern Europe, many of which have protested — or, like Hungary and Slovakia, sued over — the European Union's plan to divide up some 120,000 refugees among member countries.
Poland's conservative, anti-migrant government had grudgingly confirmed the previous government's commitment to take in 7,000 refugees from Syria and Eritrea over the next two years. At the same time, sensing general uncertainty about receiving migrants into a mostly homogenous nation, the officials stressed that permissions to settle would be preceded by meticulous security and identity checks.

But following the Brussels attacks, Prime Minister Beata Szydlo said "I see no possibility for migrants to come to Poland now."
Our president dances. Poland's leader protects his country. I wonder if we could trade ours for theirs...?

Friday, March 25, 2016

What political party does your dog belong to?

We have two dogs. After watching this video (a short 3:46) I'm convinced they're democrats.

Thursday, March 24, 2016

Two Things

I'm unexpectedly out of town and my access to the InterWeb is limited, so don't expect too much from this post. Two things:

First, I have to give barack obama credit for one thing. I have very low expectations for him, and he constantly exceeds them by doing worse than I thought possible. The latest example is Barry's response to the tragic events in Brussels.


Second, in a previous post I referred to the power of tequila to make me other people behave foolishly. OldNFO commented that he was glad there weren't cell phones back in his youth. Today I ran across the graphic below.


Truth!

Wednesday, March 23, 2016

Wordless Wednesday 2016.03.23

I've had it up to here (visualize hand near neck) with politicians and the government. I don't know which is worse, but I know that neither is worth a damn.






To top things off, the president is busy sucking up to a country run by communists. I guess he missed that day in economics class when the teacher explained that communism doesn't work.


Tuesday, March 22, 2016

What Goes Around, Comes Around

Evidently what happens in Vegas doesn't stay in Vegas, but follows certain people around. This guy will always be known as The Guy Who Had Sex on a Vegas Ferris Wheel.

Man who was arrested for sex on Vegas Ferris wheel shot dead near strip club
A Texas man who achieved brief notoriety after he was arrested for having sex on a Las Vegas Ferris wheel in February was shot dead early Saturday morning after picking up his fiancée from the Houston strip club where she worked as a dancer.
Well of course she worked as an exotic dancer a stripper. Nothing else would fit the narrative.
Bryant Christopher Watts, 28, and Aaron Jones, 31, were charged with capital murder in the death of 27-year-old Phillip Frank Panzica. Police caught the pair after a brief chase and Watts allegedly confessed to shooting Panzica, The Houston Chronicle reported.

Panzica had just picked up his fiancée, who was holding the cash she’d earned at the club, and was driving the woman’s black Kia Sorrento (when he was shot)... (The two suspects) dumped Panzica’s body on the side of the road and stole the woman’s money and car. The woman, who has not been identified, eventually flagged down a bus.

In February, Panzica was charged with committing sex acts in public after he was caught in a raucous romp with a woman aboard a glass-enclosed Ferris wheel in Las Vegas.

Panzica told WTVR at the time that he had initially gone to Las Vegas with his fiancée to get married – but she was not the woman he ended up with on the Ferris wheel. The two began arguing soon after arriving in Las Vegas and then Panzica went gambling.

“Won a little bit of money. Lost a little bit of money. Got some margaritas. Probably like four or five,” he told WTVR. “One thing led to another. She was there by herself.”
I just knew tequila played a part in this story. Who hasn't has a regrettable experience (or two, or three, or...) fueled by an excess of that evil drink?

Panzica said he didn’t think anyone could see them when the Ferris wheel reached its pinnacle. Unfortunately for the couple, their quickie was visible on a video camera.

“We get up to the highest point, and we were like, ‘We’re golden,’” he said.

Panzica spent two nights in jail before his fiancée bailed him out.
If that isn't true love, I don't know what is.

Only in Vegas...


Monday, March 21, 2016

Wind And Sun

I've never been a big fan (pun alert - wait for it...) of wind farms (hah!). There are several reasons: they're noisy, they're ugly, they (and their associated high capacity power lines) spoil lovely views in remote areas, and to top it off, they adversely affect the health of those forced to live near them.

Oh yeah - and they kill birds.
It’s been five years since BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded and released 5 million barrels of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico.

Environmentalists are highlighting the disaster by pointing to the 800,000 birds that have died because of the spill in the five years since the disaster, but activists have been eerily silent about the fact that way more birds have been killed by wind turbines — a supposedly “eco-friendly” energy source.

A 2013 study found that 573,000 birds and 888,000 bats are killed every year by wind turbines — a figure 30 percent higher than the federal government estimated in 2009. These deaths have likely increased as wind power capacity increases across the country.

In the time since the 2010 BP oil spill, some 2.9 million birds have been killed by wind turbines, using (the study's) figures, compared to only 800,000 that have been killed by the oil spill... It should also be noted that wind turbines routinely kill federally protected birds and eagles.

So what is the federal government's response?
Finally acknowledging that the economically inefficient, noisy, and unsightly wind turbines that they have been strewing across the formerly beautiful countryside have been killing large numbers of eagles and other birds, the bureaucrats have proposed a solution: stop the turbines whenever there is a bird nearby:

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), one of the Department of Energy’s 17 National Laboratories, partnered with industry to gather data about bird flight patterns, which will help the companies develop technology to reduce bird collisions with turbines. …

The ultimate goal is to detect birds flying near a turbine with enough time to for the turbine blades to stop spinning and prevent a collision.
Oh yeah, that'll work great. Have you ever seen a wind turbine up close? They're HUGE. Starting and stopping those things every time a bird flies near would wear those things out within a few months.


A better use for the money would be to send out crews to tear down the hideous wind turbines for scrap metal, so as to spare the lives of raptors and restore the beauty of the scenery. There are far wiser ways to meet our energy needs.
One of my pet peeves is this country's penchant for massive approaches to problem-solving. I get the whole economy-of-scale thing, but IMO a smaller-scale approach would be more effective. For example, I live in a part of the country where there are still plenty of old-fashioned windmills that pump water from wells for livestock.


More modern versions of those could be used in rural and even suburban settings to generate electricity on a local basis, reducing the need for large wind farms and transmission lines.


Along those same lines, massive solar power installations are proving to be economically unfeasible, inefficient, and environmentally unfriendly, while at the same time killing thousands of birds, along with unknown numbers of insects and reptiles.

Inefficient:
A federally backed, $2.2 billion solar project in the California desert isn’t producing the electricity it is contractually required to deliver to PG&E Corp. , which says the solar plant may be forced to shut down if it doesn’t receive a break Thursday from state regulators.
Environmentally Unfriendly:
A solar power plant at the center of the Obama administration’s push to reduce America’s carbon footprint by using millions of taxpayer dollars to promote green energy has its own carbon pollution problem.

The Ivanpah plant in the Mojave Desert uses natural gas as a supplementary fuel. Data from the California Energy Commission show that the plant burned enough natural gas in 2014 – its first year of operation – to emit more than 46,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide.

That’s nearly twice the pollution threshold for power plants or factories in California to be required to participate in the state’s cap-and-trade program to reduce carbon emissions.
A Death Ray...
The Ivanpah solar generating plant is located in California about 50 miles from Las Vegas near the California-Nevada border.  173,000 mirrors are used to concentrate the sun on 3 boiler-towers where water is turned into steam to drive turbines and generate electricity. The mirrors track the sun and concentrate sunlight so that the intensity of light falling on the boiler-towers is about 500 times stronger than sunlight -- a death ray. If a person were to be illuminated by this death ray, 3rd degree burns would follow within a few seconds. Insects that wander into the kill zone are quickly vaporized. Birds are severely burned or killed depending on how long they are in the kill zone.
...That Kills Thousands of Birds
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service previously called Ivanpah — the world’s largest concentrated solar project — a “mega-trap” for birds and insects, although the exact number of deaths has been a subject of fiery debate.
Home-based solar panels, on the other hand, are becoming more and more common, because (1) they work, and (2) they are affordable. (More info here and here.)


The biggest obstacle to more widespread adoption of residential windmills and solar panels is that it reduces the opportunity for large projects and contracts, with the accompanying graft and kickbacks. Until we resolve that issue our elected 'leaders' will continue to pour money down the wind/solar ratholes.

Sunday, March 20, 2016

Sunday Funnies 2016.03.20

Today is the first day of Spring. Time for gardening and spring cleaning...


I was so excited about spring that I wet my plants.


A woman's garden is growing beautifully but the darn tomatoes won't ripen. There's a limit to the number of uses for green tomatoes and she's getting tired of it.  So she goes to her neighbor and says, "Your tomatoes are ripe, mine are green. What can I do about it?''

Her neighbor replies, "Well, it may sound absurd but here's what to do. Tonight there's no moon. After dark go out into your garden and take all your clothes off.  Tomatoes can see in the dark and they'll be embarrassed and blush. In the morning they'll all be red, you'll see.''

Well, what the heck? She does it. The next day her neighbor asks how it worked.

"So-so,'' she answers. "The tomatoes are still green but the cucumbers are all four inches longer.''


"A man should never plant a garden larger than his wife can take care of."  
-  T.H. Everett  


A perfect spring day is when the sun is shining, the breeze is blowing, the birds are singing, and the lawn mower is broken.


You never know what you have…until you clean your room.

I love cleaning up messes I didn’t make. So I became a mom.

My room is not dirty. I just have everything on display. Like a museum.

A clean house is a sign of no Internet connection.

And the true, short story of every parent: “My house was clean. Then the kids woke up. The end.”


Good Housekeeping Tip:
Always keep several get well cards on the mantel…..
So if unexpected guests arrive, they will think you’ve been sick and unable to
clean.