“A happy New Year! Grant that I May bring no tear to any eye When this New Year in time shall end Let it be said I’ve played the friend, Have lived and loved and labored here, And made of it a happy year.” – Edgar Guest I am a quotes guy so you think I could easily find a quote to start off this New Year. But that proved to be more difficult than I imagined. Even my hero Will Rogers let me down; he just didn’t seem to have much to say about New Years day.  But I … Continue reading Plain and Simple….

Source: In Memoriam: 9 Tech Titans Who Died in 2012 | Wired Enterprise | Wired.com. He was just one of several tech titans who died over the past year. None had the name recognition of a Steve Jobs — who passed in 2011 — but they may have moved our world in bigger ways. Among those that passed in 2013 are the IBMer who invented the bar code and the Zenith engineer who devised the first wireless TV remote — not to mention one of the physicist who helped built the atom bomb dropped on Nagasaki. Click on the images above … Continue reading Techie Titans …

Dexter, our cat has been chasing a mouse around the house for the last few winter days. When he does he gets Beulah our sixty pound basset hound all excited and involved in the chase. It is funny to see Beulah with her tail wagging a mile a minute sitting next to Dexter staring at the bottom of the refrigerator where a mouse is currently hiding.  When I started this post that picture came to mind but that is really not the topic at hand. Instead it is about giving up my computer mouse.

I started out my computer life with a Radio Shack TRS-80 computer in the 1980s. It had no mouse or graphical user interface (GUI for all you techies). Everything had to be typed in on a keyboard and I spent hundreds of hours on doing just that.  I was hooked from the very beginning.

Continue reading “Giving Up the Mouse…..”

  Some time ago I came across a blog from a Romanian blogger named Cristian Mihai that got my attention. On many of his posts he seems much too mature for his twenty-two years.  But then other times he seems to fit right in to that bracket.  He is an ambitious young man who has totally conquered English as his second language. He is also a self-published author. Below is one of the posts that seems almost profound to me. He is talking about what it means to be a writer: Source: You either write or live « Cristian Mihai. You … Continue reading You Either Write or Live

  You will not be punished for your anger; you will be punished by your anger. Let a person overcome anger by love. Hate is never ended by hatred but by love. — Buddha — These words could just as easily come from the mouth of Jesus as from Buddha. But in reality Buddha lived on this earth several hundred years before Jesus. It amazes me how similar the reported lives of Jesus and Buddha are. Here are some of those similarities as found at Wikipedia and other sources:  Buddha is actually a title which means “the awakened one”, his … Continue reading You Are Punished By Your Anger, Not For Your Anger…

It seems we hear a lot about how the Republicans say they can’t vote for this or for that because they must “follow their principles”.  The trouble with all this is that they don’t want any government so blowing up the system IS following their principles.

Their hero told them that “government is the problem”. But what is a country without government?  That condition is called “everyone for themselves”. Is that what we want for our country? I think not; at least for 99% of us.

Is there really anything except shutting down government that can pass through a GOP controlled house of representatives now days? Are they really so head strong on eliminating their own jobs? That would be a first for any government employee wouldn’t it?

Continue reading “Following Their Principles…..”

  Source: Home for the holidays: Fewer US troops are absent this year – CSMonitor.com. When President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama issued a special holiday greeting over the weekend to US troops fighting overseas, they were addressing the smallest deployment of combat troops in at least five years…. Then, as Mrs. Obama emphasized in the video greeting, there are the 2.4 million veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and their families, who will continue to require services beyond holiday acknowledgments from the president.  Even though I don’t have any friends or relatives in harm’s way now, this is … Continue reading Home for the holidays: Fewer US troops are absent this year…

Source: Norquist: Tea party resurgence if no “fiscal cliff” deal – Political Eye – CBS News. Grover Norquist is predicting that President Obama will be the political target of tea partiers if a deal on averting the “fiscal cliff” fails to materialize. No this quote from the article is not a joke.  But it sure should be. As if the tea partiers will suddenly love the president if he averts the fiscal curb. We will see pigs fly before that group has more than four letter words for our president. Grover seems to want to predict the future and so do … Continue reading Grover Predicts….. And So Do I….

I am a tool guy. I have had many of them throughout my life. My barn is stuffed with specialized tools I purchased when I had a cabinet making business. I am also a firm believer in the old phrase The Right Tool for the Job That is you don’t use pliers when the job really calls for a socket wrench.  In that regard when I looked out on our 150 foot driveway covered with over fourteen inches of wet snow I knew I didn’t have the right tools for this job. My Craftsman garden tractor is the top of … Continue reading The Right Tool….

Being that we are coming upon the end of another year I am in a self-reflections mode. I admit that much of what I post about is the result of reading a post or article about something and thinking that there is more to the story than is written. Sometimes it deserves an alternate view. Sometimes it needs expanding to attain its full meaning. And sometimes it’s just wrong, at least in my view. :)  I write to fill these gaps.  While I don’t like others putting me in boxes, particularly those that don’t really fit, I do sometimes try … Continue reading Being A Contrarian….

We have a white out here at the homestead so I will be hunkering down with a picture puzzle and a keyboard today but not at the same time, I don’t believe in multitasking. :)   We knew it was coming but don’t really believe it until we see it.  We are kind of like our Missouri neighbors in that regard. I stayed late after the Christmas meal at the soup kitchen and shelter yesterday to make food for the guys there through the next few days so they should be ok. My tractor plow is harnessed up and ready … Continue reading White Out in Indiana….

Merry Christmas Everyone   Continue reading Merry Christmas

  “We all want progress, but if you’re on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road; in that case, the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive.” — C.S. Lewis C.S. Lewis is my favorite non-theologian theologian. That is he like me was not trained in a seminary or such place. But his book Mere Christianity had a great impact on me and millions of other lay people. I think it is the number one theological book sold. He just seemed to understand things about Christianity that all those trained … Continue reading Turning back….

  Island House Hotel – A nice place to stay while visiting Mackinac Island.   Continue reading Mackinac Island

Source: What counts as a tax hike? Not Boehner ‘fallback’ plan, says antitax group – CSMonitor.com. The keeper of the GOP’s antitax oath has rendered judgment on House Speaker John Boehner’s fallback “fiscal cliff” plan that would allow Bush-era tax cuts to expire only for millionaires: It is not a tax increase. So decrees Americans for Tax Reform, the conservative advocacy group led by antitax activist Grover Norquist. With that step, the group gives a measure of political cover to congressional Republicans who back the speaker’s plan to retain current low tax rates for all but those with incomes higher than … Continue reading It Is, But It Isn’t…..

  “The devil is in the details” is a well-known quote that definitely applies in all this “fiscal cliff” talk going on recently. The congress in our version of government has the power of the purse. They determine where the money is spent and where it is cut. So, I find it strange that Mr. Boehner insists that the president and not him is responsible for identifying what would be cut from the budget in order to appease the GOP base. As mentioned in the article below Republicans do relatively well with the American people when they talk broadly about … Continue reading Good At Complaining But Not Good At Solutions….

Source:  The “fiscal cliff” isn’t a cliff at all – CBS News. Here is an interesting article that explains why the “fiscal cliff” is so falsely named. If you are still not clear about this I would encourage you to click on the source above. By the way, the article mentions that if nothing is done the “average” additional expenses will be $3,200 per family. But that is primarily because of the significant expense to the top 1% drastically weighting the “average”.  It has been stated that for a family with an income of $70,000 the increase would be less … Continue reading The Fiscal Slope….

According to news reports,  sales of the AR-15 are up dramatically in the last few days. How pitiful is that!!!! Continue reading The Balance????

I am a lifelong U.S. history nut so of course Thomas Jefferson is one of my heroes. I have read quite extensively about him over the years and have accumulated quite a library of quotes. I will admit that when it comes to slavery he has a dark side but don’t we all to one degree or another.  I treat my heroes as human and not gods in that regard.  They have wisdom to offer the ages but they are not pure in every respect. One of the reasons that Jefferson is my hero is because he was a free-thinker … Continue reading About Thomas Jefferson….

I know I said I wouldn’t post today but I want to tell you I just saw Michael Bloomberg on Meet the Press. He gave a very compassionate plea for gun regulations in this country. He very much impressed me with his words and the actions he has already taken in that regard.  I hope he can push President Obama off his laissez-faire attitude on this critical topic. By the way they said they invited 30 pro-NRA senators on the show and none accepted. If he were running for president right now he would definitely get my vote.  The guy … Continue reading A Must See….

Due to the totally stupid tragedy that took place in Connecticut on Friday I will not be posting here again until Monday morning. My prayers are yet again with the families of the victims of this latest event. Why do we let it happen over and over again? Continue reading Tragedy…..

How many more of our kids have to be killed before we come to realize that appeasing the gun lovers in this country is just not worth the cost……. Yeah, yeah, I know guns don’t kill people…….. Continue reading Another Sad, Sad Day…

Source: Schools in 5 states to add at least 300 hours of classroom time in 2013 – CBS News. Five states were to announce Monday that they will add at least 300 hours of learning time to the calendar in some schools starting in 2013. Colorado, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York and Tennessee will take part in the initiative, which is intended to boost student achievement and make U.S. schools more competitive on a global level. Although I have no children about 90% of my property taxes goes to our local school system. I don’t really know much about just how my … Continue reading School Time, School Time……