Sunday Funnies 2014.08.17

Reducing the backlog...

An 80 year old man was requested by his doctor for a sperm count as part of his physical exam. The doctor gave the man a jar and said, 'Take this jar home and bring back a semen sample tomorrow.'
 
The next day the 80 year old man reappeared at the doctor's office and gave him the jar, which was as clean and empty as on the previous day. The doctor asked what happened and the man explained, 'Well, doc, it's like this -- first I tried with my right hand, but nothing. Then I tried with my left hand, but still nothing. 'Then I asked my wife for help. She tried with her right hand, then with her left, still nothing. She tried with her mouth, first with the teeth in, then with her teeth out, still nothing.'

'We even called up Arleen, the lady next door and she tried too, first with both hands, then an armpit, and she even tried squeezin' it between her knees, but still nothing.'

The doctor was shocked! 'You asked your neighbor?'

The old man replied, 'Yep, but none of us could get the jar open.'

A dedicated golfer needed an operation on his arm. Just before he was put under, the Surgeon dropped in to see him. "I have some good news and some bad news," says the Surgeon. "The bad news is that I have to remove your right arm !!"

"Oh God, no !!" cries the man. "My golfing is over !! Please Doc, what's the good news ?"

"The good news is I have another one to replace it with, but it's a woman's arm. I'll need your permission before I go ahead with the transplant."

"Go for it, Doc" says the man. "As long as I can play golf again."

The operation went well and, a year later, the man was out on the golf course when he bumped into the Surgeon. "Hi, how's the new arm ?" asks the Surgeon.

"Just great," says the businessman. "I'm playing the best golf of my life. My new arm has a much finer touch and my putting has really improved."

"Not only that," continued the golfer, "my handwriting has improved, I've learned how to sew my own clothes and I've even taken up painting landscapes in water colours."

"Unbelievable !!" said the Surgeon, "I'm so glad to hear the transplant was such a great success. Are you having any side effects ?"

"Well, just one problem," said the golfer. "Every time I get an erection, I also get a headache."

The pastor asked if anyone in the congregation would like to express praise for answered prayers. Suzie Smith stood and walked to the podium.

She said, "I have a praise. Two months ago, my husband, Phil, had a terrible bicycle wreck and his scrotum was completely crushed. The pain was excruciating and the doctors didn't know if they could help him."

You could hear a muffled gasp from the men in the congregation as they imagine the pain that poor Phil must have experienced.

"Phil was unable to hold me or the children," she went on, "and every move caused him terrible pain." We prayed as the doctors performed a delicate operation, and it turned out they were able to piece together the crushed remnants of Phil's scrotum, and wrap wire around it to hold it in place."

Again, the men in the congregation cringed and squirmed uncomfortably as they imagined the horrible surgery performed on Phil. "Now," she announced in a quivering voice, "thank the Lord, Phil is out of the hospital and the doctors say that with time, his scrotum should recover completely."

All the men sighed with unified relief. The pastor rose and tentatively asked if anyone else had something to say.

A man stood up and walked slowly to the podium. He said, "I'm Phil."

The entire congregation held its breath.

"I just want to tell my wife the word is sternum."

Simple Truth 1:

Lovers help each other undress before sex.
However after sex, they always dress on their own.
Simple Truth: In life, no one helps you once you're screwed.

Simple Truth 2:

When a lady is pregnant, all her friends touch her stomach and say, "Congrats".
But, none of them touch the man's penis and say, "Good job".
Simple Truth: Some members of a team are never appreciated.

We had a power outage at my place this morning and my PC, laptop, TV, DVD, iPad & my new surround sound music system were all shut down.

 Then I discovered that my iPhone battery was flat and to top it off it was raining outside, so I couldn't play golf.

 I went into the kitchen to make coffee and then I remembered that this also needs power, so I sat down and talked with my wife for a few hours.

 She seems like a nice person.

Speaking Of Vacations

Congress and obama went on vacation about the same time we did.

Thank God for small favors!

Vacation After-Action Report Part Two

Following up on yesterday's vacation AAR, I wanted to expand on something I said.

The dynamics of the ranch are interesting. We've been meeting up with the same people there every year for the past couple of decades. Since there's no TV, cell phone service, or Internet connection, you basically spend two weeks interacting on a personal face-to-face basis with folks. You get to know them on a much closer and deeper level than you do most people in your everyday life. We've formed some extremely tight relationships with people we've met there.

Our core group of regulars covers a wide range of backgrounds, attributes, and outlooks. We have doctors, lawyers, ranchers, businessmen, a PR person, a couple of journalists, an engineer, some retirees (like me!), even a writer and a field hockey coach. They come from all over - Boston, New York, the midwest, the northwest, the southwest, even some Europeans. There are conservatives (one guy is so far to the right he makes me look liberal), moderates, a few token liberals (two of who said they weren't going to support Hillary in 2016 because she was too conservative) - the whole spectrum. Most are straight, a few are openly gay, all are white. We have Protestants, Catholics, Jews, atheists and agnostics, and one semi-practicing Buddhist. No Muslims.

I give you these demographics because of the nature of the relationships among us. Given the lack of technology and links to the outside world, we spend many hours sitting around and talking with each other. Note the use of the preposition "with." We don't talk TO, we talk WITH. A small, but IMO critical, distinction.

The conversations are wide-ranging and free-wheeling. Family, sports, politics, religion, philosophy, food, cars - no topic is off limits. The discussions often get passionate (especially the after-dinner gatherings, which are invariably lubricated by adult beverages) but never personal. We somehow manage to disagree without disliking the person we're arguing with debating talking with. I wouldn't call it civilized in the British drawing room sense (there's plenty of raised voices and profanity), but we manage to end each evening still as friends.

And we are friends - close friends. Even though we only see each other once a year for the most part, we stay in touch. Phone calls, social media, and occasional visits are the norm. I've been to weddings, funerals, graduations - I'm even godfather to a couple of kids. I don't know how we manage to do it, but I wish the rest of society could emulate us.

Anyway, here's a few more pictures from our most recent trip.

The main creek that runs through the ranch, where we go wading, fishing, and moose-viewing.

One of the things I like about the ranch is the timelessness of the place. Very few things change from decade to decade, mush less year to year. Here's a good example. This old truck is still in use on the ranch. It receives no special care or maintenance, outside of routine tune-ups and oil changes. Any problems are dealt with in time-honored 'shade tree mechanic' style. The upholstery is ragged, the clutch chatters and slips, the patches on the tires have patches, but it's still hanging in there.

I've mentioned the consumption of adult beverages a few times. For some reason alchohol consupmtion goes up once you're there. If I drank as much at home as I drink in Wyoming my liver would be hard as a rock. Here's a pre-lunch favorite (the small cup is a side serving of Blacktooth beer from a local microbrewery).

Yes, that's a piece of bacon in it. Yummm.

And here's an example of Wyoming cup holders.

Parts of Wyoming remind me of Texas - the same blue skies and wide open spaces.

The sunsets are pretty nice as well. This one came towards the end of one of our evening rides.

Oh, yeah. I forgot to mention that obama slipped away from Martha's Vineyard and spent a day at the ranch. Security was tight but I managed to get close enough to take this candid shot.

Friday Follies Happy Hour 2014.08.15

Reminds me of my escape from Houston and the corporate world back in the 1990s...

Students Drive Teacher To Drink

I've raised three teenagers. I've also spent a couple of decades in the classroom. While I don't condone this person's actions, I can understand how she felt.

Arizona teacher accused of being drunk in class

An Arizona high school teacher who feared she was too inebriated to drive took a cab to work, then continued drinking throughout the day until students alerted administrators that she was cursing and yelling at them, authorities said Thursday.

Students at Poston Butte High School in San Tan Valley, about 35 miles southeast of Phoenix, called the school's main office Wednesday afternoon to report the behavior by Kathleen Jardine.

The school's principal and a sheriff's deputy met with Jardine. According to the deputy, Jardine initially denied being intoxicated. She later admitted that she had been drinking the night before, that morning and during lunch in her classroom.

The math teacher had a blood-alcohol level of 0.205 percent, which is 2 1/2 times the legal limit for drivers. A school security officer found a bottle of vodka, a bottle of white wine and a bottle of Sunny D orange drink in her classroom.

 Hey, at least she was responsible enough to take a cab to school instead of driving.

Vacation After-Action Report Part One

I'm finally getting around to organizing the pictures from our recent Wyoming vacation, and thought I'd share a few to give you a feel for the people and place.

As I previously mentioned, every year we go to the same ranch. We stay in a century-old log cabin, which is very well maintained.

The ranch sits in the foothills of the Bighorn Mountains. If we turn right when we leave the cabin, we're headed for rolling hills and open spaces, with a few cottonwood trees scattered along the creek bottoms. If we turn left we go up the mountainside through aspen and spruce groves.

View from the foothills looking up at the mountains.

Main trail leading up into the mountains.

On our first full day there we rode out through the foothills. That's our traditional first ride, where we can get the horses into a gallop and assess our steeds. On the return trip we were about to cross a little creek. The banks were covered with heavy brush. As I approached the creek I heard a rustling in the brush. My horse pricked up his ears but didn't seem overly concerned, so we kept going. All of a sudden a moose poked her head out and gave me a dirty look.

I was riding a pretty good sized buckskin (about 16 hands high, for you horse people - that's around 64 inches high at the withers, or shoulders, for the rest of you). I'm a little over 6 feet tall, so when I'm perched on a saddle my head is about 3 1/2 feet above the horse's back. In other words, my head was close to 9 feet above the ground.

The moose was looking down at me.

You don't realize how big those critters are until you get up close and personal with them. Fortunately, this (female) moose didn't have any young 'uns around, so she contented herself with snorting disgustedly and then turning away. We decided to back off and cross the creek a little higher up.

Not a very good picture, but I was on top of a moving horse at the time.

Moose sightings at the ranch are somewhat rare, but not unknown. They usually stay up in the mountains during the summer, and come down to the lowlands when the weather gets cold. I guess this one was just trying to beat the winter rush.

Day Two we headed up into the mountains. Our objective was the Roosevelt Trail, named in honor of Theodore Roosevelt, who visited the ranch in the early 1900s. The trail begins on the ranch and goes up into the Bighorn National Forest. The trail is very isolated, very narrow (2-3 feet wide), and bordered on both sides by very thick brush. It winds its way up through a series of switchbacks, with sheer drops on one side and sheer walls on the other. You definitely want a sure-footed horse for this trail.

We were working our way up the switchbacks when all of a sudden the horses got very antsy. Their ears pricked up, they started dancing around, and they tried to back up. Since we were single file on a narrow trail, hemmed in on both sides by brush and trees, with a drop off on our right side, this was somewhat troubling.

About that time we heard the sound of something coming down the trail towards us. A small black bear suddenly popped into view, followed by a second one. They weren't cubs, but they weren't full grown, either. My guess is that they were a couple of yearlings out on their own. (Thank goodness they weren't cubs - I wouldn't want to meet Mama Bear on that trail.)

I don't know who was more startled, them or us. The wind was blowing from them to us, so they hadn't scented us. Between the winding trail and the heavy brush they didn't see us until they rounded the bend about 10 feet in front of us. I have no idea why they didn't hear us. Maybe they were listening to their iPods.

Anyway, they were so surprised they jumped back. One of them lost his footing and went tumbling down the side of the switchback (it was only about a 20-30 foot drop to a ledge below, so he wasn't seriously hurt). This unnerved his sibling, who turned around and went back the way he came.

There was no way to turn the horses around. The trail was just too narrow. So we had to back up seven nervous horses in single file until we reached a place where we could swap ends and get out of there. Got back to the cabin an hour later and headed straight for the liquor cabinet.

Sorry, no pictures of the bears. I was a little busy.

After that things calmed down a little. The only other real excitement was getting caught in a thunderstorm one evening. The weather in those parts comes over the mountains, and it comes quick. There wasn't a whole lot of warning. The wind picked up, the temperature dropped, and dark clouds came boiling over the mountain tops. We headed back to the corral tout suite, but didn't make it in time. We got soaked, and the horses weren't too happy about the whole thing.

Here comes the rain. You can see the corral and barn - the large white building - in the middle left hand side of the picture.

The next day we went out a little better prepared.

City slickers.

Overall, though, the weather was great. Mostly sunny skies, highs in the 70s and low 80s, lows in the 50s ... a great change from hot and dry Central Texas.

The dynamics of the ranch are interesting. We've been meeting up with the same people there every year for the past couple of decades. Since there's no TV, cell phone service, or Internet connection, you basically spend two weeks interacting on a personal face-to-face basis with folks. You get to know them on a much closer and deeper level than you do most people in your everyday life. We've formed some extremely tight relationships with people we've met there.

I'm going to wrap this up for now. I'll have a second AAR in a few days. Till then, I'll leave you with this view from the foothills looking back at the mountains. You can see how the land rolls and climbs up into the mountains. There's a cattle loading chute in the foreground, and the creek where we encountered the moose winds through the brush and trees on the left. The main ranch compound is at the base of the notch in the middle of the mountains.

Un-Friggin'-Believable

"The Most Transparent Administration in History" my ass!

President Obama on Thursday hailed his administration for its transparency.

“This is the most transparent administration in history,” Obama said...

Okay, readers, here is today's assignment - compare and contrast words with actions.

"FOIA Denial Officer" Is a Real Job Title in the "Most Transparent Administration in History"

The latest from the "most transparent administration in history," a letter in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, signed by Taylor D. August, whose job title at the Department of Education is "FOIA Denial Officer."

Which begs the question: Is there a FOIA Approval Officer somewhere in the obama administration?

The irony is strong in this one...

Doomed To Repeat

I very rarely agree with Maureen Dowd, but lately some of her columns make it seem like she's beginning to see the light. I particularly enjoyed this one on the mess in Iraq.

Just when Americans thought they could stop trying to figure out the difference between Sunnis and Shiites, we’re in a new war in Iraq with some bad “folks,” as the president might say, whose name we’re still fuzzy on.

We never know what we’re getting into over there, and this time we can’t even agree what to call the enemy. All we know is that a barbaric force is pillaging so swiftly and brutally across the Middle East that it seems like some mutated virus from a sci-fi film.

We tend to refer to the savages as ISIS, but there is evidently no broad consensus on what to call them. I suggest "assholes."

If all that is not confusing enough, we also have to fathom a new entry in the vicious religious wars in Iraq: the Yazidis, a small and secretive sect belonging to one of the oldest surviving religions in the world. Their faith has origins in Islam and Zoroastrianism, a religion founded by the Iranian prophet Zoroaster in the 6th century B.C. As Time pointed out, though the name “Izidis” translates to “worshipers of God,” ISIS considers them “devil-worshipers” who must convert to Islam or be killed.

That's a common theme among the assholes - convert or die. Religion of peace and all that good stuff...

Speaking of the 'religion of peace' and the Yazidis, there are reports that the assholes have massacred Yazidi men, buried women and children alive, mutilated people while robbing them ("They took wedding rings off fingers, chopping off fingers if they couldn't get the ring off") and kidnapped other women for use as sex slaves (here and here)

Shades of Boko Haram and the still-missing school girls.

Anyway, Dowd gets in a few shots at obama, along with, of course, the obligatory Bush-bashing. Surprisingly, she also criticizes JFK as well.

Although it felt momentarily bracing to see American pilots trying to save innocents in a country we messed up so badly that it’s not even a country any more, some critics warned that the pinprick bombings were a political gesture, not a military strategy, and “almost worse than nothing,” as John McCain put it.

The latest turn of the screw in Iraq also underscored how we keep getting pulled back, “Godfather”-style, without ever understanding the culture. Our boneheaded meddling just creates ever-more-virulent monsters. The United States has taken military action in Iraq during at least 17 of the last 24 years, the ultimate mission creep in a country smaller than Texas on the other side of the world.

I hadn't stopped to think about it, but she's right. We've been wasting American lives in that miserable sandbox almost continuously since 1991. That's even longer than we muddled around in Vietnam.

She's also right in pointing out that we have no idea what we're doing over there - just like in 'Nam.

What better symbol of the Middle East quicksand than the fact that Navy planes took off for their rescue mission — two years after Obama declared the war in Iraq over — from the George H.W. Bush aircraft carrier in the Arabian Sea?

Bush Senior’s war to expel Saddam from Kuwait — a gas station of a country chockablock with spoiled rich Arabs — would not have been necessary if Saddam, a tyrant first enabled by J.F.K.’s C.I.A., had not been given the wrong signals by our side. W.’s war with Saddam, the prodigal son’s effort at outdoing his father, ended up undoing Iraq and the neglected Afghanistan.

Spin it however you will, but obama has initiated U.S. air strikes in Iraq, and has sent in at least 130 U.S. military 'advisers' to that pathetic doomed country.

Isn't that how Vietnam started?

The U.S. military advisory effort in Vietnam had a modest beginning in September 1950, when the United States Military Assistance Advisory Group (MAAG), Vietnam, was established in Saigon. Its mission was to supervise the issuance and employment of $10 million of military equipment to support French legionnaires in their effort to combat Viet Minh forces.

What's that old saying about how "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it"?

Something To Think About

We've all heard about the shortage of women in STEM fields (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math). It has become a policy issue for the obama administration and women's advocacy groups. In fact, the first result of a Google search for 'women stem' is a link to the White House's policy statement on the matter.

The Office of Science and Technology Policy, in collaboration with the White House Council on Women and Girls, is dedicated to increasing the participation of women and girls—as well as other underrepresented groups—in the fields of science, engineering, and mathematics...

Also in the Top 10 of 'women stem' Google results is this link to the American Association of University Women's (AAUW) mission statement.

AAUW values the importance of supporting girls in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) as part of our mission to break through barriers for women and girls.

Nothing wrong with either of those positions. Our 18-year-old daughter is heading off to college in a few weeks with the intention of getting an engineering degree, so I'm happy to see her get all the support possible.

Take a look at the chart below. You'll notice that women earned only 18% of Engineering degrees conferred in 2012. They are obviously underrepresented.

However...

The chart also reveals that men were equally underrepresented in Education degrees: 79% went to women, and only 21% to men. Ditto for Health degrees (85% to 15%).

In fact, women earned more degrees than men in 7 out of the 10 most conferred degrees, and were pretty darned close in Business and Social Sciences. So where are the policy statements and support groups for men interested in the Health, Education, and Psychology fields?

Interesting, isn't it, how facts can help us see things in a different light?

(H/T to Carpe Diem for the chart.)

Captain Phillips Strikes back

Remember the Tom Hanks movie about Captain Phillips?

The true story of Captain Richard Phillips and the 2009 hijacking by Somali pirates of the US-flagged MV Maersk Alabama, the first American cargo ship to be hijacked in two hundred years.

While there may be some controversy about the movie, there is little doubt that piracy in that part of the world has been drastically reduced.

Check out these stats:

Somali pirates in 2011 attacked 237 boats in the oceans around northeast Africa. In 2014 there have been seven attacks, all failed.

In 2011 at the height of piracy, 237 attacks took place in the zone of the Horn of Africa, the Red Sea, and the northwest Indian Ocean. So far in 2014, there have been seven attacks, all of which failed, according to the International Maritime Bureau.

“With a few very small exceptions, we’ve had two years now without any successful piracy attacks,” says Alan Cole, regional coordinator of the maritime crime program for the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).

“What’s happened is that the odds of success for the pirates have dropped, and it’s become an increasingly hazardous business to be in,” Mr. Cole adds. “The chance of getting killed or captured is pretty high now, and watching so many men disappear off over the horizon and not coming back does suppress interest in this as a career path.”

When a skiff carrying a handful of menacing armed men swung alongside the Maersk Alabama in 2009, piracy was the best job going for a young Somali.

That hijacking, in part because of the movie that followed, is the highest-profile such attack that is familiar to Americans. But it was only one of hundreds.

Somali pirate methods have been straightforward for much of the past decade: Gangs that gathered on land and shore were financed by faceless kingpins, mostly in Kenya or the United Arab Emirates. The gangs put to sea in “mother ships” stocked with many weeks’ worth of food, water, fuel, and weapons, towing litters of smaller skiffs behind them.

Once a potential target was sighted, often hundreds of miles from Somalia’s shores, the skiffs were launched and would speed to the slow-moving prize ahead. Until recently, most commercial ships were undefended and pirates could easily board them.

Then, the captured ships would be sailed to Somali waters to be followed by the first calls for ransom to owners or family. Everything captured was monetized – crew, cargo, and vessels. Hostages were mostly well treated and released without harm when an agreed-upon ransom was paid.

Typically, the pirate gang then lived large on land for a week or two off their spoils, then put to sea again. The pickings were rich. Dozens of large container vessels, cargo ships, and oil tankers representing a chunk of global trade pass each day through the Red Sea via the Suez Canal on journeys to and from Asia and Europe.

Firhan Ali, a pirate who now finds himself unemployed, can testify from personal experience that these were “the good days.”

He went to sea a dozen times, and was involved in five successful hijackings, including that of a Greek oil tanker he refuses to name. The Monitor talked with him by phone from the Somali town of Galkayo.

Today, Mr. Ali and his former comrades-in-arms say things are very different. “Life is pretty bad now,” Ali says. “What used to be my daily income is now my monthly income. It’s all about struggle to make ends meet. During the heydays, none of us expected such an inferior life could come back.”

What has changed: The world has fought back. Three coordinated international naval forces run antipiracy patrols off Somalia.

One is the US-led Combined Task Force 151, with navies from six nations. The second, Operation Atalanta of the European Union Naval Force, has a special mandate to protect aid shipments to Somalia. The third flotilla is NATO’s Operation Ocean Shield.

Across the three deployments, dozens of warships from more than 40 countries have been involved. Patrols can include vessels from otherwise antagonistic nations: South Korea and North Korea have taken part, as have Ukraine and Russia. At any one time, an average of 20 warships are at sea.

Changes have occurred on land, too. Most important, justice systems in Indian Ocean countries including Kenya and the Seychelles have been boosted so their courts can process suspected pirates and their prisons can host them while they serve their sentences.

Well, good for the navies, and good for the legal system. But guess what had the greatest effect in stifling piracy.

Yet by far the most successful tactic contributing to the drop in successful attacks has been sending commercial ships out to sea past Somalia with armed private security on board.

What!?! Firearms are effective in reducing violence and crime?!? Who woulda thunk...

Teams of three or four guards – usually former British, American, South African, or Russian military – join vessels for the few days that they will be in what is known as the “high-risk zone” off the Horn of Africa.

For most, the passage is routine. But if a suspicious skiff approaches, under new “best practices” that most firms follow, they have a series of protocols designed to thwart a hijacking. Some are simple. Captains increase speed, trying to accelerate away or churn up a wake that is tough for a small speedboat to navigate. Decks are festooned with razor wire or electric fences to deter boarding. Powerful sonic devices have been used to repel pirates with directed, unbearable noise.

If a skiff continues to advance, security guards first show their weapons, then fire warning shots, or as a very last resort, use lethal force.

Forget that noise about passive measures. Shoot the SOBs.

“It’s just not worth their bother coming after a vessel with armed security, if they can peel away and go and find someone else without,” says Conrad Thorpe, chief executive officer of Salama Fikira, a Kenya-based maritime security company.

Ali, the jobless pirate, confirms that the combined effect of prosecutions, navies, and security is keeping him ashore. He has returned to his former job as a security guard in Galkayo.

"his former job as a security guard?!?!?" GMAFB!

“Because of frequent arrests of some of our top-notch guys, which disabled our coordination, hijackings have stopped,” he says. “Every attempt ended up losing men and money. In the end, it looked like we were flogging a dying horse, and that discouraged everybody. Even our investors have lost hope. Enemy warships are watching every corner of the sea, and many of our heroes are still in jails.”

Investors? HEREOS? I like to believe I resist knee-jerk reactions, but in this case the more I think about it the more I come to the conclusion that the best solution to problems in these parts of the world is a five letter word: nukes.

Chillingly, though, Ali says he and his friends are not finished. “We are still eyeing the waters,” he says. “Chances will come. I’m very much in no doubt those good days will come back. It’s very hard for now, but after some coordination, we shall return, and we will be stronger.”

I rest my case.

First Day Back

As previously mentioned, I had to take my father to a doctor's appointment today. I love Dad deeply and would do anything for him.

But...

Got in late last night (1:30 a.m.). Had to get up relatively early (8:00) to pick the dogs up from the kennel where they'd been staying while we were gone. (Actually, it's not a kennel. It's a 'pet resort' - thank the wife and kids for that decision.)

Anyway, I retrieved the mutts, did a few catch-up chores around the house, and then left to take care of Dad. We live in the country, he lives in a nearby small town, and the doctor's office is in the Big City. Total travel time from my front door to Dad's to the doc is 1.5 hours one way. Add in two hours at the doctor's office, one hour to get something to eat, and another 1.5 hours for the return trip. Bottom line, it took a six hour chunk out of my day.

Made me late for Happy Hour.

Not to mention that dealing with all the assorted traffic, construction, and general assholes that one encounters in the Big City left me desperate for a cold beer.

Many, many cold beers...

Home Sweet Home

Left our cabin in Wyoming yesterday at 10:00 a.m. Got home last night (actually, this morning) at 1:30 a.m. Still sleepwaking, but I have to take my father to a doctor's appointment. Then it's unpacking, laundry, and catching up on 11 days worth of mail, errands, and chores. Sigh...

Still, it was nice to sleep in my own bed again.

I'm sure obama will experience the same things when he gets back from his vacation...

Vacation Update

Internet access is very limited up here, so this will be a short post. I also doubt if I'll be able to put anything up Sat. or Sun. We should be back home Monday, when regular posting will hopefully resume.

The trip so far has been 'interesting.' Day one we had an up close and personal encounter with a moose. Day two we were chased off the trail by a couple of bears. Toss in some late nights on porches solving the world's problems, a few hikes up in the mountains, and one evening ride where the skies opened up and we got soaked - and the horses got spooked by all the thunder and lightening - and we dang sure haven't been bored.

More details to follow sometime next week...

This Week In Pictures

Actually, this is the past two or three weeks in pictures. Since I planned to be on vacation, I prepared this post on July 30 and scheduled it for today. Somehow I have little doubt that these images are still fitting (plus I got to clean out my in-box).

Regarding the ongoing violence in the Middle East:

Here's some pseudo-Arabic writing that conveys meaningful messages.

This one depicts the media's attitude towards the Israel-Hamas conflict.

Remember obama's 2012 campaign slogan? Here's an updated version.

Golda Meir, former Israeli Prime Minister, nails it with this quote.

The next one wraps up commentary on the MidEast, and segues nicely into the U.S. border crisis.

These two point out the hypocrisy prevalent in dealing with the illegal immigrant situation.

obamacare continues to rear its ugly head, as does the VA scandal.

Eric Holder can't tell the difference between criticism and racism.

But don't worry, liberals progressives useful idiots. Help is on the way.

l

Surprise!

As illegal immigrants continue to flood across our southern border and overwhelm our ability to handle them, barack obama continues to foist them off in the dead of night on unsuspecting communities. Indiana is the latest state to wake up in the morning and experience a "Who are you and how did you end up in my bed?" moment.

Indiana's Illegal Alien Surprise

Indiana Governor Mike Pence is but the latest state official to discover that the federal government has been delivering illegal alien shipments to his area without notifying him.  Pence learned about the arrival of two hundred Unaccompanied Alien Children by watching the news.  Considering how frequently President Obama claims he learns about everything by watching the news, there’s a touch of irony there.

That's troubling enough. But what is even more disturbing is the obama administration's claim that the illegal immigrants have a 'right to privacy' that supersedes our right to know what's going on in our own communities.

White House: Privacy Rights of Illegal Aliens Trump Our Right to Know What the Government Is Doing to Our Communities

In case you are wondering why our government won’t tell us what it has been doing with the thousands upon thousands of welfare colonists it has been allowing to unlawfully invade the country, it is because illegal aliens allegedly have a right to privacy, whereas we do not have a right to know what our rulers are doing to our future, as absurdly named White House spokesliar Josh Earnest recently explained...

I'm really getting tired of this crap...