Awesome scenery

I can't find a way to embed the video on the blog here, you'll have to go to the website.  It's a video shot from the cockpit of a passenger jet landing in Queensland, New Zealand.

The part where they fly into the clouds and have to rely on their instruments to guide them would have me puckered up so damn hard they'd have to unscrew me from the seat, especially when the last thing you see before you go into the clouds is a big mountain right in front of you.

Maya Angelou is dead

Have you ever read anything of hers that you weren't forced to read by someone else, such as a teacher in high school?

I haven't.

Yeah, you can call me a troglodyte for that if you wish.  I'm the guy with the collective works of Edgar Allen Poe on his shelf, next to Robert Heinlein and the Federalist Papers.  But I never once ever felt the urge to read an entire book of Angelou's poetry  There was no there there, if you get my drift.

Liberalism is a mental disorder

First you have some douchebag named Toure shooting himself in the dick with his keyboard by claiming that Holocaust survivors made it out alive via "the power of whiteness".

Now you have Ronan Farrow, who's famous because of Woody Allen, making Schindler's List jokes.

Do they put crazy into the water at the Commie Propaganda Center MSNBC studios?

What drove the UCSB shooter?

I've seen a lot of posts regarding why the little maniac did what he did, but I think it can be summed up in one paragraph:

Elliot Roger grew up steeped in liberal dogma, subscribed whole-heartedly to progressive ideology, and possessed an entitlement mindset that you would expect from a Red Diaper Doper Baby that grew up in Hollywood.  He was a microcosm of the Democrat Party; emotionally stunted, sexually frustrated intellectual midgets who think that the entire world owes them something.  And his actions are also a microcosm of what the Democrat Party wants to do if they don't get their way.

The fact that the Left is once again desperate to pin this guy on any kind of right-wing group only shows that they know exactly who and what he is.  They look at Elliot Roger, and they're staring into a mirror.

Memorial Day

Huh...

If I asked you who gave this quote:

People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf

...most of you would shout "GEORGE ORWELL!"

But as I just learned today, that is incorrect.  Makes you wonder a little bit about the other quotes that are used quite frequently out there.

Now, don't get me wrong - Orwell stated several things that in essence are that quote, but he never directly came out and said those exact words.

Ragin' Dave's Quote of the Day, Procreation edition

Procreation is the biological purpose of sex, after all, and as the Contraceptive Culture encourages us to have unnatural sex — to thwart the natural purpose of sex — it also disconnects sex from love, marriage and parenthood, so that sex becomes a meaningless recreation of no more ultimate consequence than a video game.

Sex, as like everything else, has complex biological functions, reactions and counter-reactions that are part and parcel to the act.  One of those functions is the production of hormones that literally cause us to bond with our sexual partner on an emotional level.

However, those bonds are funny little things; the more you make and subsequently break, the harder it is to build another bond with a different person.  It all boils down to brain chemistry.  A bond you make with one person, so long as you're faithful to them, gets stronger over time.  Humans are literally meant to bond with a partner and stick with them.  We're designed for monogamy, believe it or not.  But having partner after partner after partner leaves the brain worn out, as it attempts to build those chemical links that provide emotion with person after person after person, until the brain figures out that it's not worth trying to boost that neural link, given that it's going to be discarded after 24 hours.  So after a lengthy period of promiscuous sex, it is now harder to bond with your sexual partner, and less likely that you'll have an emotional attachment with them.

So in other words, there is a very good chance that your promiscuous lifestyle can screw up your marriage later.

Is it any wonder that the divorce rate is so high?

Quote taken from R.S. McCain.

One more "Caring post 'o the Day"

Just because I can.

At this point you should know that "caring" means "don't you dare click this link at work", right?

Caring post 'o the day 2

Yeah, I'm just mailing it in today....  I stole this one from the Sultan of Snooch.

It's NSFW.

Caring post 'o the day

Is not a repeat.  Just a different angle.

A NSFW angle.  So you people at work stop clicking right now.  Dirty pervs.

Busy Again

Gonna be away from my computer for the better part of a couple of days, and to be quite honest when I actually have time to sit down and relax I won't be doing it with a keyboard in front of me.  So let me load of a few things to keep people happy with the free ice cream machine we got here....

Oh, that's just awesome

"What you call privilege is me just being better than you!"



Well, yes.  Anyone who thinks that I'm "privileged" is an idiot.  I got to where I am because I'm working my ass off, and I'll continue to work my ass off until I get to where I want to go.  And then I'll work my ass off, because that's what it takes to stay there.

And I'll hopefully die an old, old happy man with no ass.



!!!!!

I want to live in a place

that has no leash laws.

I mean, you have people living in RV's, camped out at a local park, with fat old men pissing on a tree in broad daylight, but do you think the cops give a shit about them?  Hell no, because those fuckers are still there after four months or more.

The homeless guys camped out all over the area?  Not a problem, buddy!

But a clean-cut guy running with his dogs in the early morning?  OBVIOUSLY A LAW-BREAKER WHO MUST BE DEALT WITH!!!!!

Los Angeles needs to fall into the ocean and drown.  For the good of humanity.

Good God....

I knew P.J. O'Rourke could be acidic when he wants to be - this letter to the 2014 graduates of Rutgers University is like forcing them to take a bath in hydrochloric acid, and then dumping a little lemon juice on them for good measure.

You need to study history, so that it doesn’t come around again and, per Santayana, bite you in the Ukraine. You’re thinking, “Santayana—historically great guitar player.” 

You need philosophy, not the modern bull session kind but the Socratic method of “What the hell am I thinking?” And what the hell were you thinking, majoring in History of Film? At least you got to see So-crates in action in Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure. 

You need literature and the arts so you can read something longer than a Beyoncé tweet and throw Bartok into the iPod mix and hear what Jay Z is up against experimenting with music.

The more I look at modern universities, the more I see indoctrination centers full of group-think and people striving to be the most special victim, because victimhood trumps accomplishment on a college campus.

I'll get my degree online, thank you.  Less victimhood bullshit, more learning.

I want this so very much

And I want to put it in my desk at work, so that when people open up the door to the upper storage cabinet they freak right the hell out.

Anyone know where I can get that?


!!!!!

There's nothing that says "Los Angeles"

Like having the electricity in your house flicker for no apparent reason.

I'm serious here, folks.  Los Angeles is just a third-world shithole that happens to be attached to the USA.  And apparently, it used to be WORSE!!!!

I can't think of any reason why someone would want to live here.

Where was Dave today?

I'll give you a hint:

Ooops, sorry.

Been a crazy busy two days.  Forgot to put up a post today or yesterday.  Let me make it up to you.


(NSFW, again)

Why does the USDA need machine guns?

The US Department of Agriculture just requested .40 Cal S&W Submachine guns.  Why?

According to the solicitation, the Dept. of Agriculture wants the guns to have an "ambidextrous safety, semiautomatic or 2 round [bursts] trigger group, Tritium night sights front and rear, rails for attachment of flashlight (front under fore group) and scope (top rear), stock collapsible or folding," and a "30 rd. capacity" magazine.

I wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that the military is sworn to protect and defend the US Constitution, while un-elected beaurocrats in the USDA don't have that safeguard.

In short, they know they can't get the military to start firing on civilians, so they're going to get someone else to do so.

It's called SCIENCE

Dear people who think that melting Arctic ice is going to raise sea levels.


Please take a glass.  Fill it with ice.  Now fill it with water.  Mark the water level in the cup.



Let all the ice melt.






Check your water level.


GOLLY GEE GOSH, WHY DON'T IT RISE, CLETUS???????

And because it scores traffic...

Let me introduce you to Haiden.  Or Hayden.  Take your pick.







NSFW, got it?

Priorities

When the level of vitriol aimed at Tim Tebow for being a Christian matches the level of vitriol aimed at Michael Sam for being gay, let me know.  Until then, I'm going to do my level best to ignore the sports anchors all masturbating live on TV about how a gay man just got drafted into the NFL.

You know what?  If Michael Sam weren't gay, he wouldn't have been drafted.

Sorry, but thems the facts.  Sam was a dismal show at the combine.  He had the sixth lowest 40 time out of 200+ combine attendees. Did he even have a pro day?  If so, I didn't see it trumpeted in the news, which means it either did not happen, or was embarrassing to the people pushing the pro-gay agenda.

No, I think the NFL saw Sam dropping in the draft, and made a few phone calls to certain teams and offered a deal.  I don't know what that deal is, and I don't know if we'll ever know what it is.  But Sam wasn't good enough to be draft material.

Oh, and for all of you people sputtering about SEC co-Defensive player of the year?  There's a certain Mr. Jeffcoat who was the Big-12 Defensive player of the year who signed as an undrafted free agent with my Seahawks.  He'd love to have a chat with out about what being the DPotY means to your draft status.

The bottom line is that Michael Sam wasn't very good, and if he were not gay, he wouldn't be in the news at all.

Which is probably why he came out when he did.

There are police helicopters circling my block.

Again.

At least they didn't shut down the road this time.

I don't think many of you people understand when I say things like "I want LA to fall off and drown in the ocean" that I am not joking.

Can't come quick enough

Experts predict thousands dead in big LA quake.

Well, that would be my dream come true, don't know about all of you out there.....

I don't think I hated Los Angeles nearly as much as I did before I went on vacation, and spent time in areas where people actually care about someone other than themselves, where the air wasn't brown, where traffic, while heavy, wasn't full of arrogant, selfish pieces of shit.  And then had to come back to Los Angeles.  Gack.

I think that having LA fall off into the ocean would be one of the nicest things California could do for the rest of the country, short of dropping San Fransicko into a deep, dark hole and filling it in with liquid hot magma.

Books, books, books

One of the gifts the Ragin' Mrs. got for me at Christmas was an Amazon Kindle Paperwhite.  No fancy tablet, just a book reader that I could take with me.

Holy hell, have I been using the heck out of that thing.  There are more books at a discount for digital copies than you can shake a stick at.  I think I paid full price for a grand total of four books; all the rest have been on sale, discounted or free.

I'm not going to argue about Amazon vs. Barnes and Noble, because quite honestly I like them both.

If you have someone who likes to read, get them one of these things.  Nook or Kindle, take your pick.  I must have read six books while I was on vacation, and they all fit on my reader.  I didn't have to pack them away at the end, I just archived them off the reader onto my computer.

Yes, I'm finally entering the modern age.

For the record

Eleanor Clift has been a shit-eating Democrat Party apologist douchebag for years.  So to hear something this vile and disgusting come out of her mouth should be no surprise.

There is nothing too low for Eleanor Clift to vomit out of her filthy cock-holster if it might help her Democrat Party masters.  She's a filthy, disgusting, slimy anti-American piece of shit from the word "Go", and always has been.

The anti-Midas touch

Where everything you touch turns to shit.  Turns out that Eric Shinseki has that.

You don't know who Eric Shinseki is?  He was the Chief of Staff of the Army back in 2001 who mandated that all Soldiers wear a beret as their headgear.  He wanted everyone to wear the beret in order to improve the esprit de corps.  This pissed off just about everybody.

The Rangers hated it, because Shinseki demanded that all Army Soldiers wear a black beret, and the black beret was the Ranger's color.  They now wear tan.

The rest of the Army hated it because we now had to wear a floppy hat that took two hands to get it sitting on your head correctly, that held in heat thanks to the fact that it was BLACK and WOOL, and stank to high heaven after a period of constant wear.

All in all, it was a decision that was a self-inflicted dick-stomping, and rather than improving the esprit de corps of the Army it did the opposite.  The beret was universally reviled by everyone who had to wear it, and in 2011 the Sergeant Major of the Army, who had listened to the troops, ordered that the soft cap be returned as the headgear for daily wear in garrison.  The beret still exists for the Class A Uniform.

So I told you all that just so I can tell you all this - the same guy who made that colossal mistake was put in charge of the Department of VA back in 2009.

And now we get this.....

A Veterans Affairs employee at the VA Medical Center in Cheyenne, Wyoming, has been placed on administrative leave after CBS News obtained an email showing an employee directing his staff on how to game the appointments system to make it appear as though veterans were being seen within the VA's 14-day directive.

And this is on top of the crap going on at the Phoenix VA...

Look, the VA has been in trouble for a while.  You can't conduct a thirteen year war and expect that the facilities you had in place before the war are going to be adequate to deal with the amount of healthcare that's going to be required by the troops coming home.  But Shinseki has been in place for five years now.  And what, if anything, has he done?

Everything he touches, it seems, turns to shit.....

Oh, the horror!

Yeah, keep in mind that this number is only valid if you don't take into account the number of military positions that were lost.  And since I'm neck deep in that area right now, let me assure you - the military is getting hacked into chunks and tossed out in the trash.

Too Much

Can we be done with the NFL Draft yet?  Please?

I was done with it a month ago.  I really don't give a damn about it right now.

Anyone actually paying attention knew this already

Reagan Recovery vs. Obama "Recovery".

One of America's greatest presidents versus the current Stuttering Clusterfuck of a Miserable Failure.

Free Money

And all you have to do is learn a trade that will make you employable up to the day you die.  And someone else pays for that education.

Dear Lord, were I not already in the military for the long haul, I'd jump on this like a dog on a bone.

Got home late

Crawled into bed way past midnight, and got maybe four hours of shut-eye before I was back in the office.  Keep in mind that technically, I'm still on leave.  But I spent the better part of the morning in the office trying to get things in order because the people up the chain have screwed things up so badly that everybody is hopping and popping trying to limit the damage.

I can't wait to leave this job.  Lordy, I can't wait to leave this job.

In Lieu of Actual Content, Part 8

And by now I'm pretty confident in my ability to spell the word "lieu" without needing any help...


(apropos of nothing, NSFW)

In Lieu of Actual Content, Part 7

I play the banjo!

(not really.  I'm a drummer.)

((yeah, as if you've ever listened to a band front-manned by a drummer!)

One Hour, Seven Minutes

I didn't break any land-speed records, but I'm only one minute off of my pace from 22 years ago, when I was 50 pounds lighter.

Not too damn bad, I'd say.

In Lieu of Actual Content, part 6

Hey!  Guess what I'm doing?

Last time I did it was in 1991.  How's that for a blast from the past?  I want to see what my time is compared to the young, stupid, out-of-shape me.

Of course, if I recall correctly, the route was only 10k back then....

In Lieu of Actual Content, Part 5

She's got that whole "biting my bottom lip" look that made Kristen Stewart famous...

(NSFW of course)

In Lieu of Actual Content, Part 4

Gimme some rope, I'm coming loose.....



If that doesn't explain the "in lieu of actual content" posts, I don't know what does....

In Lieu of Actual Content, Part 3

She's got that inviting look in her eye, I think...

(NSFW, of course)

In Lieu of Actual Content, Part 2

I must have played this song for weeks on end, trying to get the drum fills just perfect.  As usual, the songs that sound the simplest are some of the hardest.

In Lieu of Actual Content, Part 1

I'm in an undisclosed location right now, doing my best to enjoy life.  So in lieu of actual content, today you get bewbs.  NSFW of course...

Feel the "Tolerance"

You want to know why you shouldn't even bother trying to have a dialogue with the Left?

Because they hate you and they want you to die.

Remember, Conservatives think that Liberals are dumb.  Liberals think that Conservatives are evil.

We want to educate them.  They want to round us up and kill us.  For the good of the world, of course.

Brainless, pathetic and Criminally Incompetent

The State Department Spokeshole is using Daily Kos and Thinkprogress as reference sources.

Think about that for a while.  Our foreign policy is being run by people who not only read websites like Daily Kos and Thinkprogress, but they're using them as REFERENCE SOURCES.

Well, that certainly explains why America has become the laughingstock of the globe, doesn't it?

The problem with the Peacetime Military

Megan McArdle has a decent write-up about the Peacetime Military.  It's not bad, and from the perspective of someone on the outside looking in, it's pretty damn good.

However, what's missing is the perspective of the inside looking out.

The Peacetime Military is generally a smaller military.  Less spots to fill, and more people to fill them.  Think the 90's, when we had scores of Company Grade officers getting forced out, or more often as not leaving after making Captain or Major once they see who's in charge and what their chances are.

So less positions, more people competing for those positions, and since this is peace-time, we can't really judge you on how effective you are in combat.  We can only judge you based on your Evaluation Reports and track record in training.

Which means that the risk-averse politician rules the roost.

That was what I saw happen in the 90's.  The boot-lickers, the ass-kissers, and the zero-defect-menality morons were the ones getting promoted.  The commanders who demanded spit-polished boots in the field, because looking good was more important than actually doing your damn job kept getting promoted up, while the risk-takers, the guys who would possibly make a mistake but get up, dust themselves off and learn from it were either forced out or left of their own volition.

That means when the flying fecal matter impacts the rotating air-movment device, the people in charge, all up and down the chain, are the ass-kissing politicians who may or may not know what the hell to do once the lead starts to fly.

So how do you solve this?  Hell if I know.  This isn't just an American phenomenon, after all.  Other than having actual war fighters in charge, people who understand combat and what it takes?  And after a while, those people filter out.  We went from 1975 to 1991 without any major mobilization.  That's three quarters of a military career right there.  The remainders from Viet Nam in Senior positions were mostly gone, and the folks taking their place hadn't really done any heavy fighting.

And think about how many flag officers Obama has gotten rid of lately.  All that experience, gone.  All that knowledge, gone.  All that wisdom, gone.  And in their place?  People who aren't going to rock the boat, because you can ensure that to a completely political man like Obama, who has accomplished absolutely nothing on his own outside of politics, the political is all he cares about, especially in the people that he picks for leadership positions.

It's a lesson that will have to be learned repeatedly, over and over and over, until the Final Day.  Politicians make lousy leaders, in all aspects of life.  And the Peacetime Military gets taken over by politicians bit by bit, until the next war, when the politicians get weeded out for a short time.

Two competing philosophies

Laid out in an essay about economics.

For the conservative, people are an asset — in the coldest economic terms, a potentially productive unit of labor. For the progressive, people are a liability — a mouth to be fed, a problem in need of a solution. Understanding that difference of perspective renders understandable the sometimes wildly different views that conservatives and progressives have about things like employment policy.

Emphasis mine.  This difference in how the two philosophies see people needs to be laid out at every turn.  Beat it into people's heads.  We see people as assets and allies.  They see people as slaves and liabilities.

The cause is the cure?

I might need to try this:  Using yeast to avoid getting intoxicated.  I do love me some beer, but these days I don't drink too much of it.  And I certainly go light when I'm out on the town.

But boy, do I enjoy beer.  IPAs, stouts, Belgian ales, porters, all of 'em.

Memories

I was but a yoot when my brother introduced me to Joe Satriani's "Surfing with the Alien" album.  And one of the most smoking hot songs on that tape was "Satch Boogie".



Joe can still crank it these days, too.

I can smell rain

I've always liked the rain.  Hell, I enjoyed living in Seattle because of the rain.  But I never thought that I would get so damn happy to smell rain on pavement like I do here in Hell Los Angeles.

Boehner needs to go

That Flaming Orange Douche-Nozzle knows there's a camera at him, and he deliberately starts taking swipes at other GOP members who refuse to cave in to Amnesty for ILLEGAL ALIENS.

I am sick and tired of the GOP establishment targeting the Tea Party.  If it weren't for the Tea Party, the Flaming Orange Douche-Nozzle would be the House MINORITY Leader.  The only reason the GOP has any clout to begin with is due to the Tea Party.

But if the GOP establishment actually stood by the principals they claim to have when they're running for election, the Tea Party wouldn't exist in the first place.

In any case, if the Flaming Orange Douche-Nozzle actually had integrity and leadership ability, he would have been working with the Tea Party rather than attacking them and trying to get invited to all the right cocktail parties inside the Beltway.  So fuck off, Boehner, you stupid prick.  Time for you to go, and time for some real leadership to step up in the House of Representatives.

If you support Illegal Immigration, then by extension, you also support the rape of those female illegal aliens

This would not exist without the pipeline for illegal aliens to come to the USA - therefore, by aiding and abetting illegal immigration, you are also aiding and abetting the rape of female border-jumpers.

As a priest in the town of Altar, near the Arizona border, the Rev. Prisciliano Pedraza sees migrants stocking up on supplies such as food, water and medicine for treacherous treks through the desert. 

But he sees female migrants stocking up on something else: contraceptives, which they take preventatively to protect themselves against sexual violence all too common as they make the journey through Mexico to the United States. 

“The women passing through here know that they’re going to be raped,” said Father Pedraza, director of a shelter for migrants in Altar.

It's really, really simple - when you accept, allow and support an action to occur, you are accepting, allowing and supporting all the 2nd, 3rd and 4th order of effects from that action as well.  Which in this case means the rape (and sometimes murder) of females who are trying to illegally cross the USA/Mexico border.

When I say "Dammit, I'm eating that banana sundae!", I'm also accepting the 2nd order of effect that I'm going to get fat from that sundae unless I run it off.  I support X action, and X action leads to Y and Z effect.  Therefore, I support Y and Z effect.  And if I don't support Y and Z effect, then I damn well either NOT support X action, or find a way to negate that effect!

But the people who want illegal aliens in this country really don't give a shit about the lives of the people who cross our borders illegally; those people are all just pawns in their political game, and their lives mean less than nothing.

By their works you shall know them

If anyone wants to see the Right-vs-Left battle in a microscope, go check out Larry Correia's blog post regarding the Hugos, a Science-Fiction writing award.

Take a look at the sheer hatred, slander and invective being thrown against Conservative SciFi writers.  And then look at the response from the supposedly "hateful" conservatives.

Really, all you have to do is look, and learn.

The Affirmative Action Supreme Court Justice

At this point, can we simply admit that Affirmative Action was a bad idea?  Affirmative Action was one of the most insulting concepts the Left has put out there, because it was so insidious.  "Oh, it's OK, we know that you're dumber and not as capable as whites, so we're going to lower the standards just for you based on your skin color, because there's no way that you're smart enough or good enough to meet the standards that white people can meet."

When you boil Affirmative Action down into one statement, that's the statement right there.

I'm willing to bet that Affirmative Action also gave us the "Wise Latina" on the Supreme Court, which is one of the worst mistakes to happen to that body since FDR.  When a Supreme Court Justice writes an opinion that could be a carbon copy of a high-school girl's grievance letter, you know that the Supreme Court as an institution has taken quite a fall.

But of course

Another lie from Obama about Obamacare.  Really, at this point, does anyone trust a damn thing that comes out of Obama's mouth?

Corruptocrat Harry Reid called protesters "Domestic Terrorists"

Really, Harry, you worthless, corrupt piece of crap?

Maybe of you spent half as much energy protecting our border as you did trying to push ranchers off of their land so that you can make sweetheart deals with Chinese businessmen, you wouldn't have any protesters there at all.

Hey, you know who else could be called a "domestic terrorist"?  George Washington.  Thomas Jefferson.  Patrick Henry.  Knox, Adams, Franklin, and a whole lot of people who stood up to government tyranny and told the people who would lord over them to piss up a rope.

So fuck you, Harry.  Go fuck yourself sideways with a chainsaw, you Marxist cankersore.

Good Friday

That always struck me as just a bad name.  This is the day that our Lord and Savior died.  For those of you who aren't of the religious bent, perhaps this is the time for you to skip this post.

Ann Barnhardt has up a post that ties both Christmas and Easter together.  If you claim to be a Christian, I ask you to go read it.

As for me, I've spent quite a bit of Lend and most of Holy Week preparing and singing at my church. We take Lent seriously.  This is a time of repentance.  It's a time when we think about our many sins, and how Jesus took our sins to the grave with him, so long as we are willing to follow him and his teachings.

You have to ask yourself what you want more: the rewards of this life, or the rewards of the next.  It's really your choice.

Tax Returns came in

Yay, I finally got my money back from the government, who's been using it as an interest free loan!

Paying off a few debts that we have instead of splurging.  I have to debt free by the time I retire, or the whole plan and shebang comes to a grinding halt.  Still I could have paid those debts off without the government taking my money and keeping it.
 
Photo courtesy of A Nod to the Gods.  I recommend going and reading that post.

One of those days

I spent most of yesterday ready to blow....

Not a good day.  Not a good day at all.

(Wha?  No, that ain't me.  That's a graphical representation of what my day felt like.)

((Yes, that's an ANTI AIRCRAFT ARTILLERY shell shoved up some old man's patoot.))

Got a CD the other day

Someone gave it to me.  They didn't need it or want it in their collection anymore, I guess.

Damn, I forgot just how much I enjoyed this band.



Good music to crank up in the car.

Look, there's a reason so many pot-heads vote Democrat

They're brain damaged.

For the first time, researchers at Northwestern University have analyzed the relationship between casual use of marijuana and brain changes – and found that young adults who used cannabis just once or twice a week showed significant abnormalities in two important brain structures. 

“For the NAC, all three measures were abnormal, and they were abnormal in a dose-dependent way, meaning the changes were greater with the amount of marijuana used,” Breiter said.  “The amygdala had abnormalities for shape and density, and only volume correlated with use.  But if you looked at all three types of measures, it showed the relationships between them were quite abnormal in the marijuana users, compared to the normal controls.” 

Because these brain regions are central for motivation, the findings from Northwestern help support the well-known theory that marijuana use leads to a condition called amotivation. Also called amotivational syndrome, this psychological condition causes people to become less oriented towards their goals and purposes in life, as well as seem less focused in general. 

Given these eye-opening results,  Breiter said that more research is needed to look into marijuana’s effects on the brain – even in those who use the drug only once or twice a month.

Now, I know I'm going to piss some folks off with my anti-pot rhetoric.  But folks, if you're going home and lighting up a blunt every night, that's no different from going home and getting drunk every night.  THERE WILL BE NEGATIVE EFFECTS TO YOUR CONSTANT INTOXICATION.

"Oh, but Dave, weed is like NATURAL, man!"  So's arsenic.  Your point?

With few exceptions, every pot-head I've ever known has been a hard core leftie.  Now, whether or not that's due to their drug use, or the mindset that goes with accepting getting intoxicated every day, or the culture that says it's fine to get intoxicated every day, I don't know, and we can have a lovely debate about that.  But you cannot expect to do a drug that messes with your brain, and have no side-effects from it.

THC is fat soluble, meaning it sticks around in fat.  Guess what organ in your body is two-thirds fat?  Hmmmmmmm.......  And unlike water-soluble drugs, you can't just flush it out.  Anything that gets you high is toxic in large enough quantities.  Allow it to build up in your system, and you're going to have some huge problems.  Allowing THC to build up in your system is like pretty much like taking stupid pills every day.

OK, enough of me harping for today.

Screaming at idiots

There are times when I forget that I have a convertible vehicle, and the back panel is off.  One of those times was when I was stuck behind some brain-dead idiot who was parked in the middle of an intersection with the green light.

"GO, YOU FRICKING MORON!  YOU HAVE THE RIGHT OF WAY!  IT'S A GREEN LIGHT!"

I had forgotten that with all the windows down and the back panel off, people can hear me.  As this guy's head jerking around proved.

Ah, well.  Put the phone away next time, you fricking moron.

Aw, Crap

Folks, Blogger used to notify me if I had any comments caught up in the Spam filter.  Not so much these days, I guess.  So I just unlocked about twenty comments going back two months or so.  If you posted a comment, and it didn't show up, I'm sorry.  Gerry N, I'm looking specifically at you - I think I unlocked about ten comments from you alone.

Mea Culpa.

This is the kind of thing that requires tar and feathers at minimum

The US Government is now seizing money from people who's parents may or may have not gotten overpaid by the Social Security fund.  Go read.  The whole thing stinks to high heaven, and the proper response that needs to be said when one of these government thugs starts demanding money is "How many of you must be tarred and feathered for this to stop?"

Land of the "free".  Yeah, right.  Pull my other leg.

But of course they would....

Obama admin plants false stories to attack Israel.  Because when you're a lying, Marxist piece of shit, why shouldn't you use sneaky tactics with the only real democracy in the Middle East who until the reign of the Obama regime was our strongest ally in the region?

Los Angeles explained in one article

City Building Inspector who took bribes and spent two and a half years in jail for his felonies still gets to keep his $72,000 a year taxpayer-funded pension.

Just another day in a Democrat American Communist Party controlled city.

If I have to explain to you why a public employee should lose his or her pension after committing felonies while on the job, I will, but only after beating you about the head and shoulders with a wet sack of dog crap.

The "Wage Gap"

Look folks, if you want to explain the "wage gap", just look at the jobs that are filled with a majority of men.

Steelworkers.

Plumbers.

Electricians.

Roofers.

Carpenters.

So on and so forth.

If you take a good look at those jobs, what do they all have in common?  They take a huge amount of physical labor to do, and they all tend to carry risks of some sort to life and limb.  Thus, they pay more.  Look at any job that has those qualifications, and you'll find a job that is done primarily by men.  And, since they are so physically demanding and carry such risk, you're going to pay those people quite a bit more than you will someone who's job requires them to sit in an office all day, or a job that doesn't risk cutting off various body parts if you get careless.

Sometimes it really is that simple.

Do not apologize! Hit them AGAIN!

So the Donks are up in arms over a Breitbart advert showing Nancy Pelosi's head on Miley Cyrus' twerking body.

I'll pause to let the bile go back down for you....


In any case, the Democrat American Communist Party has their knickers in a twist and are crying and screaming about what big meanies Breitbart is, and how the GOP must condemn Breitbart, and blah blah blah.  The usual subjects are all crying and whinging and what not, and boo-freaking-goo big babies need their ba-ba.

First of all, should any GOP politician condemn Breitbart for this ad, they can go take a flying fuck at a rolling donut.

Second of all, Breitbart is using this moment to once again highlight the hypocrisy of the Democrats regarding Miley Cyrus being used to impersonate politicians.

Third, when the avowed enemies of America, i.e. the Democrats, are squealing like pigs then you know you've hit a good target.  HIT THEM AGAIN!  DO NOT STOP HITTING THEM UNTIL THEY ARE DOWN AND IN THE FETAL POSITION SOBBING FOR THEIR LIFE!

Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. And moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.

You know you're on target!  HIT THEM AGAIN!

Have I mentioned...

...just how much I loath people with "tuned" engines and fart-can mufflers on their rice rockets?

Dude, if your dick is that small, just get a dildo and strap it to your thigh.  Leave the rest of the world out of your compensation issues, OK?  The world is loud enough, we don't need you to add to it in order to try to impress chicks.

Back on Safari

Uninstalled Firefox last night.  Let Mozilla know that if they're going on a witch-hunt over support for traditional marriage, then they don't need my support or patronage.

Using Safari, which is the standard Apple browser that comes pre-loaded.  I'm going to give Opera a try later.

You knew it was a lie, didn't you?

Every promise made on Obamacare has been a lie.

"If you like your plan, you can keep your plan."  Obama knew this was a lie for years, and he repeatedly lied directly to the American people about it.

"If you like your doctor you can keep your doctor."  Obama knew this was a lie as well, and he repeatedly lied directly to the American people about it.

"It'll reduce the cost of insurance by $2,500."  Obama knew this was a lie as well, and he repeatedly lied directly to the American people about it.

Every promise made by Obama about Obamacare has been shown to be a flat-out intentional lie.  So when that Marxist tyrant comes out and crows about 7.1 million people signing up for Obamacare, well..


You just know it had to be a lie.

Go read the story.  The government was signing people up for Obamacare without their knowledge or approval.  Isn't that great?  Isn't that lovely?  Isn't that just what Marxist tyrants do when reality and truth don't fit their agenda?

Congratulations, America.  Your tin-pot dictator just re-confirmed what a worthless, lying sack of shit he truly is.  No wonder this country is a laughingstock right now.  Look who's in charge.

In the closing days of the open enrollment period for the Affordable Care Act (ACA) , the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) was mailing out letters notifying certain Americans that they had already started a healthcare coverage application on their behalf. The HHS letter stated that the information they used to begin the application for individual Healthcare was obtain by the state agency in charge of implementing Obamacare. The next step for the individual would be visit Healthcare.gov and complete the already started application to see if they qualify for “Marketplace coverage.”

Read more at: http://www.shark-tank.com/2014/04/04/hhs-started-individual-obamacare-applications-prior-to-deadlineobtained-personal-info-from-states/ | The Shark Tank

In the closing days of the open enrollment period for the Affordable Care Act (ACA) , the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) was mailing out letters notifying certain Americans that they had already started a healthcare coverage application on their behalf. The HHS letter stated that the information they used to begin the application for individual Healthcare was obtain by the state agency in charge of implementing Obamacare. The next step for the individual would be visit Healthcare.gov and complete the already started application to see if they qualify for “Marketplace coverage.”

Read more at: http://www.shark-tank.com/2014/04/04/hhs-started-individual-obamacare-applications-prior-to-deadlineobtained-personal-info-from-states/ | The Shark Tan

Hey, guess what would happen

If I used a government car to go grocery shopping?  I mean, if I just grabbed the keys to a GSA vehicle and took my wife out on a date, you want to guess what would happen to me?  I'd get hammered flat.  You DO NOT EVER EVER EVER TAKE A GOVERNMENT VEHICLE FOR PERSONAL USE. 

Unless of course, you're Eric Holder, the most corrupt and despicable Attorney General the United States has ever been forced to endure.  And then you can take a government plane on personal flights at least 27 times and not have to do anything about it.

This is a common theme with Democrats.  Anyone remember Granny Rictus and her six figure booze bills on government planes when she was Speaker of the House?  She'd load up her entire extended family and throw a party on her plane, all on the taxpayer's dime.

Eric Holder needs to pay back every single one of those flights, and then he needs to go to jail.

The "Tolerance" Brigade claims another victim

At Mozilla.  Makers of FireFox, which I have used since version 1.2, until now.

Anyone know a good browser?  I don't want to use Chrome, as Google already has too much information of mine, but what about Opera?

I mean, if they revolt over a CEO who supports traditional marriage, they don't need my support, business or patronage, do they?  No, they don't.

The Fort Hood Shooting

Once again, proving that disarming people and forcing them into "no gun" zones is the best way to get them shot by a maniac with a gun and a grudge, even if the the victims happen to be trained in combat techniques. 

Man, it's been a long week

And it's only Thursday......  Horry Clap.

Oh look, it's Laetare Sunday

So Father O'Leary was walking home from Mass, when he saw Mrs. O'Malley walking home as well.  Since Mrs. O'Malley was a newlywed, Father O'Leary struck up a conversation with her.

"So, Mrs. O'Leary, how is your husband on this fine morning?"

"Oh Father, he's working to provide a home for us."

"Ah, grand.  And do you have any children yet?"

"No Father, none yet."

"Well, as I'm going to Rome for my next duty next month, I'll light a candle for you to have children and have a grand large family!"

So Father O'Leary goes to Rome, and lights a candle for the O'Malley family, and finally makes it back to Ireland three years later.  And going to his old church, he sees Mrs. O'Malley with a stroller, and greets her with a joyous prayer.

"Ah, Mrs. O'Malley!  I see you have children, praise be to God!  Tell me, how many young children do you have?

"We have seven children, Father.  Two sets of twins and one set of triplets!"

"Oh, that's grand!  And where is Mr. O'Malley?"

"He's gone to Rome, Father....  to blow out that fookin' candle!"

Sunday Musings

Courtesy of Matt Walsh, and it's a good one.  You need to read the whole post, but this one simple sentence really boils down the whole "health care is a right" argument.

YOU DON’T HAVE A RIGHT TO A PRODUCT THAT MUST BE PROVIDED TO YOU THROUGH GOVERNMENTAL COERCION OF A THIRD PARTY.

This is the whole kit and kaboodle of the "rights" argument.  A right can only be a right if nobody else has to provide it.  The moment you make a claim to a "right" that someone else is forced to provide, either through goods, services or money, you are claiming that you can make that person your slave, because your "right" to whatever it is, be it health care, contraception, or food, is more important than that person's freedom to do as they wish with their goods, services or money.

This is why I call the pro-Obamacare people slavers.  They want to make slaves out of everyone, in order to provide "health care" to folks in order to harvest their votes.

Ragin' Dave's Quote of the Day, Never Back Down edition

From the comments at Vox Day:

We're often told that an institution -- the Catholic Church, the Republican Party, now Mozilla -- must compromise with liberals or perish. It's a lie. The perishing is a result of the compromise, not the alternative to it.

The Left does not want compromise, period.  The Left wants you to shut up and be a good slave that doesn't start any trouble.  You cannot compromise with a Leftist, because their default position is that you are nothing more than a revenue-generating slave, not an individual.  You are not a person, you are a number.  You are not a living, breathing human being, you are just another pawn to be used to buy votes with and keep the Free Shit Army happy.

Never compromise with a Leftist.  Never, ever, ever.  Your life will not improve through this compromise, and everyone's life around you will become less..... 

This should be required reading

The Unified Field Theory of Madness

Have your kids sit down and read it.  If they can't understand it, they're probably either too young or they've been in the publik skool sistim too long.

The theory must explain, first, the honest decency of the modern liberals combined with their astonishing indifference, nay, hostility to facts, common sense, and evidence; second, it must explain their high self-esteem (or, to be blunt, their pathological narcissism) combined not merely with an utter lack of accomplishment, but with their utter devotion to destructiveness, a yearning to ruin everything they touch; third, it must explain their sanctimoniousness combined with their applause, praise, support, and tireless efforts to spread all perversions (especially sexual), moral decay, vulgarity, and every form of desecration; fourth, their pretense of intellectual superiority combined with their notorious mental fecklessness; fifth, it must explain both their violence and their pacifism; sixth, the theory must explain why they hate the very things they should love most; seventh, the theory must explain why they are incapable of comprehending an honest disagreement or any honorable foe.

I honestly wish I had read this long before I started blogging.  This essay explains pretty much every liberal area I've ever lived, and why they always turn into crapholes of idiocy and failure.

The Leftist has only two choices here: accept reality, in which case he is no longer a Leftist, or deny reality, in which case his loyalty to the ideals of Leftism becomes rarefied and refined, and he become of their Cathari, the Pure Ones, an arhat of enlightenment.

I spoke above of the Unreality Principle. Here is where it comes into play. The Unreality Principle is the moral imperative to ignore and deny reality at all costs, and remain loyal and faithful to the consensus-made make-believe illusion-choked funhouse-mirror Wonderland of Liberal Bullshit. You must bathe in the bullshit, eat the bullshit, drink the bullshit, and stuff the bullshit up your nose as far as far can be, because from now own the offal will be feast and wine to you, and will be your baptism and your oxygen. It will feed and sustain you.

However, the Unreality Principle demands a cost. First, there is something like a daily maintenance cost: you must attend closely to whatever the social cues are telling you, and believe them and not your lying eyes. 

 Read the whole thing.  It'll be a good start to your day.

Home Again, Home Again

Jiggity-Jig.  Sorry bout the lack of postings; I had no idea I was going to be pretty much running from the moment my feet hit the ground to the point where I got back on the plane.  Time was short, to say the least.  And now I get to try to catch up, as well as do all the work I couldn't do because I was too busy hauling ass on a bunch of make-work bullshit set up by higher.

So yeah, give me a bit to see just what the world's been doing.

Oh. Hai!

Um.....  soooooo, I was out of town...  still am...  Seems I forgot to post any scheduled blog posts.

Sorry 'bout that!

Boom

Thank God that states are waking up.

On Thursday, Idaho Governor Butch Otter (R) signed a bill, which would effectively nullify future federal gun laws, by prohibiting state enforcement of any future federal act relating to personal firearms, a firearm accessories or ammunition.

S1332 passed the house by a vote of 68-0 and the senate by a vote of 34-0. Alaska and Kansas have also passed similar laws.

Erich Pratt, Director of Communications for Gun Owners of America, cheered the governor’s action. “By signing this nullification bill into law, Idaho has joined an elite class of states that are telling the feds to ‘get lost’ — especially when it comes to unconstitutional gun control infringements”

Emphasis mine.

It's time for the States to tell the FedGov to piss up a rope.  Enough is enough.

!!!!!

New experiences

In all my years of shooting, I have never once engaged in Trap or Skeet.

Until today.

Damn, I can see my money getting used up quick on that.  That's way too much fun.

SSDD

Same Shit, Different Day.  Is there anyone who's actually surprised that Moochelle is her usual classless self?

Michelle Obama and three of her family members are staying in a $8,350-per-night Beijing presidential suite, but despite a 24-hour butler and other perks that come with the lodging, her entourage has inconvenienced 'pretty much everyone' and made the hotel staff 'fed up,' a well-placed hotel staffer has told MailOnline.

The sumptuous pad at the Westin Beijing Chaoyang hotel – its website calls the room 'an oasis of comfort – is a 3,400-square-foot masterpiece including a private steam room, 'corner sofas with silk pillows,' and in-room dining for six. 

But the Obamas' stay has already affected staff and guests at the hotel, with the Westin front-desk veteran alleging that Mrs. Obama's mother Marian Robinson has been 'barking at the staff since she arrived.' 

Not only do Barry and Moochelle waste hundreds of millions of US Taxpayer dollars on their world vacations, but they ruin the day for everyone else around them while they do so.  They are the Ugly Americans.  Classless, clueless, hopeless.   I cannot wait until they finally leave the White House, and I'm pretty sure that most of the civilized world feels the same way.

!!!!!

Be careful for what you ask....

Since I had a request to continue this story.....


So there I was, seated upon the porcelain throne Monday morning, enjoying the peace and quiet that normally accompanies being up early and having the loo to yourself, when the earth moved.  A normal stress reaction is to have your sphincter clench up.  So when my porcelain throne began bouncing up and down and side to side, my body does what a body does when caught in a stressful situation and clenched up.

However, since I was halfway through the act when I clenched up, it had a two-fold effect; it was one part defecatus interruptus, and one part rocket-propelled poo, as my body's reaction to the entire house bouncing like a trampoline being abused by Micheal Moore caused my lower intestine to empty out at the speed of light.  I was alternately caught halfway between painful constipation and crapping at such velocity that it caused a backsplash that wet my nethers and required quite a bit of ass-wipe to dry completely.

And as I said, the first thought in my head was "I'd better flush this before we lose water."

Luckily there was no interruption of services, as the earthquake and the noise the dogs were making woke up the Ragin' Mrs., who had to use the facilities herself immediately upon getting out of bed.

I'd been through other earthquakes before, including the Nisqually earthquake in Seattle in 2001.  But I'd never been through anything like that while in the middle of deep contemplation, as it were.  It was an interesting experience.

So... ahem....

Apparently someone wrote a piece about the "sorrows" of monogamy.

What a load of crap.  Let me just excerpt a small part.

In Jones’s view, long-married humans confronting boredom have three basic coping “strategies” to choose among. Some spouses become “quashers,” resigning themselves to their sexless fate either bitterly or with frenetic, Facebook-posting cheer. “Sneakers” stalk old flames online.

(.....)

Unexpectedly, however, Jones reserves his most astutely acerbic commentary for the third group, marriage “restorers.” “Overachieving” restorer couples (according to him, there are no underachievers in this cohort) are typically “affluent, educated, successful, and highly motivated,” and they attack their sexual malaise as a project:

Look, folks - I speak as a monogamous man, happily married, who has been together with the same woman for over a decade:

As long as you work on keeping your marriage strong, the sex just gets better.

There are plenty of married folks out there who seem to think that once the ring is on the finger, all work towards improving the marriage or making yourself presentable to your spouse can end.  Those people are idiots, and it's no wonder they're bored with monogamy.  Then there are the general assholes, who look at marriage as a way to control the spouse.  Those people are also idiots.  Got it.  Great.

But if you put the same amount of effort into your marriage as you put into getting your spouse to marry you in the first place?  If you and your spouse constantly work to keep your relationship strong?

Mind.  Blowing.  Sex.  Peel-paint-off-the-walls sex.  Curl your toes and straighten your hair sex.  Make the neighbors call the cops due to the noise sex.

Just because I got married didn't mean that I stopped dating my wife.  We go on dates.  We watch movies together on the couch.  We do all the same things we did when we were dating and more.  And our sex life is better now than it's ever been.  Because we both care enough about each other not NOT take each other for granted.  We don't just expect that life will go on without any effort on our part.  And as we've grown in our relationship and our love for each other, we've found out even more about what makes each other tick, and what trips our triggers. 

Monogamy is not boring.  If you're bored with monogamy, you're bored with your relationship, and that's a signal that there are huge problems in your marriage.  It's not the sex that's bad, it's your marriage.

The Modern Man

Taken from John C. Wright's blogpost, which of course is a must read.

Now, an odd suspicion should be growing in the mind of the reader at this point, having heard this list of passions. These are all matters the modern men, especially men of the Left, the cynics and nihilists, have taken particular pains to mock and deride.

Lust and fornication, the moderns certainly admire and support, but lust and romance are opposites, even as fornication and marriage are opposites. The idea of a bride and bridegroom both coming to the marriage bower as virgins and cleaving to each other in tender yet fierce mutual adoration, worshiping each other with their bodies, and forswearing all other partners, this is an image the moderns find repellant, if not incomprehensible. It reminds them of the suburbs, or white picket fences, or Ozzie and Harriet. To them it is saccharine and nauseating. The only marriages they favor are gay marriages.

As for glory and honor and patriotism, love of chivalry and love of nation, the modern mind regard these things with distaste or disgust or even horror. They are regarded as machismo, as sinister attempts to oppress the weak, or to glorify violence and aggression. Patriotism to the modern man is bigotry, and vile; love of God they dismiss as superstition. The moderns have an insolent double standard: The superstition is harmless or even admirable, in an avuncular and condescending way, when practiced by Mohammedans or Buddhists or Animists, but it is an appalling enemy of enlightenment and progress when practiced by Christians.

The mere fact that a matter so basic as the difference between the emotions called appetites and the emotions called passions needs here to be introduced is itself a symptom of the disease that afflicts the modern mind, and hence part of this autopsy.

 Well, go read the rest!  It involves the Lord of the Rings!

Relatives showed up yesterday

No, that's not a euphemism.  In-laws.  My in-laws lack the ability to plan ahead, or to inform anyone else of their plans, so I got the call from the Ragin' Mrs that they were inbound and due to arrive in a few hours.

They were home when I got here after work.  Had a good dinner, drank a glass of wine, and then they were off on their trip.  Took up my evening, though.  Perhaps I'll post something substantive later.

You can't absolve yourself

Absolution requires repentance, correcting yourself, and restitution for your sins.  And I'm willing to bet that this rube who just self identified can't check any of those boxes.

You can't be absolved until you make reparation and correct or fix the damage you caused with your actions.

You can't absolve yourself, although the Me Generation obviously is so clueless about how the World actually works that they are unaware of this fact.  Hell, this brainless bint voted for the Marxist Messiah twice - she's already proven that she's on the lower end of the intelligence scale.

And Nature Said....

...."WHASSUP, BITCHES!  I'M IN YUR GROUND, RATTLIN' YUR BASE!"

4.4 magnitude.  Not a huge one, and it was quick enough that by the time it was over I just realized what it was.  At first I thought a truck had driven into our house. 

And no kidding, I was on the throne for my morning constitutional when it hit.  My first thought after the floor stopped shaking was "I'd better flush this before we lose water!"

The things you think about.....

Saint Patrick's Day

Yes, he is a real Saint in the Catholic Church.  And yes I'm Irish on my Dad's side so we celebrate St. Paddy's day here in the Ragin' household.

I quartered an onion and set the pieces in our crockpot.  Then I put a corned beef on top of that onion.  Then I poured Guinness into the crockpot up to the bottom of the corned beef.  Put a lid on it, crank it up to high for about two hours, and then turn it to low for the rest of the time.

It's been cooking since last night.

It's going to be awesome.

The wife is going to make an appropriate potato, leek and bacon dish to go with it.  I'm a lucky man.

Catholicism 101, Part 1

OK, since Erin asked, I'll try to answer.  I can't say that I'm the best person to explain Catholicism, but here we go.

First, for those who don't really know much about the Catholic Church, let's start with the fact that the modern Catholic Church as most people today know it is fairly new.  The modern church follows the rules laid out by the Second Vatican Council in 1965, or Vatican II as it's popularly known.  Prior to Vatican II, the Mass offered by Catholic churches world wide was the Tridentine Mass.  That's the Latin Mass.  The modern Catholic church service is known as the Novus Ordo.

I was raised in a Novus Ordo church.  I also walked away from it once I left my parent's house and started living on my own.  My return to the church started when I started thinking about marriage, and has to this point brought me back to the Tridentine Rite.

In my opinion, the Novus Ordo mass is the Catholic Mass with the spirituality and beauty removed.

Let's talk about a few of the fundamentals of Catholic faith, shall we?  First and foremost, we believe that Christ is present on the alter at Mass.  A priest doesn't "say" mass, he offers the sacrifice of the Mass.  We believe that Christ is present in the Tabernacle, which is why Catholics are supposed to genuflect before they sit in a pew.  Christ is our God and Savior.  We treat him as higher than any king who lived on the Earth.  I won't bow or kneel for any man or woman on this planet; I kneel before God and God alone.

When the priest consecrates the Eucharist, God is present in the Host.  That little wafer of bread?  Yep.  Trans-substantiation.  In effect, the bread and wine become the body and blood of Christ.  In the traditional Mass, when you take Communion (receiving the Eucharist), you kneel as you receive the body of Christ.  There is an alter server or deacon holding a plate under your chin just in case the priest drops the Eucharist, or you fail to keep it in your mouth.  Why?  Because you do not drop Christ on the floor,  period.

I suppose that there are a lot of folks out there wondering just why the hell Catholics are so darn caught up in the Body and Blood thing.  Well, because Christ himself commanded it.  "Take this, all of you, and eat it.  This is my body, which will be given up for you and for many."  The Mass is the bloodless recreation of God's sacrifice for us, and he has commanded us to perform that sacrifice.  So we do.

For those who wonder about the whole "Sit, stand, kneel, stand, sit, kneel, Sunday Calisthenics!" that Catholics do, it's pretty simple.  You stand for the entrance/exit of the Priest, and you stand for the word of God in the Gospels.  You kneel as you pray, and you sit for everything else.

I think that's about all I can write for today - my scattered thought patterns are pretty darn evident in my writing at this point.  In Part 2 I'll go over the Virgin Mary, who is an important person in the Catholic and Orthodox churches.

No Free Ice Cream Today

There are times when I leave work so brain-dead that I can't do more than eat dinner and do the dishes afterwards.  Today is one of those days.

If you are Catholic

Then I want you to go read another one of Ann Barnhardt's spot-on posts about Pope Francis and Cardinal Dolan.

And if you are Catholic, I am begging you to find a local chapel that offers the Tridentine Mass.  Go see what the Catholic Church threw away after Vatican II.  Go see the true Catholic Mass as it's supposed to be offered.  Find a church affiliated with the Priestly Society of Saint Peter, or Priestly Society of Christ the King, or the Society of Pope Pius X.

I don't think that most modern Catholics understand what has been lost.  I know that I didn't understand until I went to a Tridentine Mass and saw it with my own eyes.  I have learned more about the Catholic faith in the past year than I did in the previous decades leading up to this. 

I'll expound more on this after the workday is done.

They told me it couldn't be done

They told me I was insane.  But I showed them!  I showed them ALL!

With my COFFEE AND CHOCOLATE BACON!

Actually, it needs a few tweaks before it's ready to go.  Flavor is OK, salt is there, smoke is awesome, but a lot of the spices I put in there just got lost.  So we need to dial back on a few things, change an ingredient, and give it another try.

No pictures.  Maybe next time, when it's perfect.

Well, yes....

....Even the mice are better in Idaho.

Still wouldn't stop me from having a barn cat to keep 'em out of the hay.

The neighbor has an orange tree

That is as old as his house.  And these houses were build in the late 40's, early 50's.  I've never had oranges this good or this juicy.  The flavor is better than any other oranges I've had, and I can get gallons of juice from one picking session.  I have no idea what kind of oranges they are, just that it's a tree that hasn't been messed with genetically all that much.  It might be a hybrid, but it's far too old to really be GMO.

So with that being said, anyone want some seeds?  I set a bunch out to dry after my last juicing session, but realized that I probably won't be anywhere I can plant an orange tree after this tour.

Things what cause me to pray

The Demise of the American Dream in Two Charts.

 I pray that I make it back to friendly territory before the shooting starts.  I pray for my friends and family to be safe.  And I pray that this country wakes the hell up.

But God doesn't always answer prayers the way that we want.  And an ever-growing majority of this country has turned away from God, so they no longer have any claim to his blessings.  When you tell God to leave you alone, he does.

Sorry for the dark thoughts on a Sunday.  Maybe it's because it's Lent, and I've got repentance on my mind.

Kyrie Eleison
Kyrie Eleison
Kyrie Eleison
Criste Eleison
Criste Eleison
Criste Eleison
Kyrie Eleison
Kyrie Eleison
Kyrie Eleison

Aw Crap

Daylight Savings Time.  Tomorrow.

Whynthehell do we still do this crap every year?  There's no more point to it!  Having lived in places that don't dick around with DST, and having relatives in Arizona, who also doesn't dick around with DST, I can assure you, Daylight Savings Time is NO LONGER NEEDED!

So set your clocks ahead before you go to bed tonight, because God only knows that if we don't do Daylight Savings Time the world might end or some bullshit like that.

What a farking load of crap.

Spent all day outside

The Ragin' Mrs. and I took a survival course today; how to make basic tools out of literally nothing but the objects you find in a deserted wilderness.  Hopefully it will just be an academic exercise.

In the meantime, I'm tired, sun-burnt just a tad, and ready for beer.

As I watch the train wreck....

....otherwise known as the Obama Foreign Policy Circus, I just keep wondering how many hits can be taken before bigger pieces start to fall apart.

I mean, when is the modern-day assassination of Arch-Duke Ferdinand going to happen?

Europe has been riding America's military coat-tails for so long that they couldn't withstand a serious push by Putin.  All that Vlad has to do is turn off the oil and gas pipeline, and Europe is going dark and cold.  Ever since Obama decided to abandon our allies in Poland and Czechoslovakia, the rest of Europe knows that they can't rely on the USA to help out and keep the peace.

Thanks to Obama's never-ended efforts to weaken America and her allies, any missile defense systems that could have been in place were abandoned, thus leaving America and her allies in a position of weakness, which of course is Obama's preferred position for the USA.

Iran knows that Obama is gutless, pathetic and weak, and that they can maneuver with impunity.  The Middle East knows that Obama is gutless, pathetic and weak, and that they can't get any help from America when it's needed.

 Russia is invading Ukraine.  Iran is shoving weapons and money to Syria, which is sending them to Gaza.  And the entire world knows that Obama is a stupid, weak, gutless pathetic bitch, so America isn't going to do a damn thing.

Hey, where are we going and why are we in this handbasket?

It's dark, and I can hear people laughing.....

Flashback courtesy of MauserMedic

The Kabul Krud, I liked to call it.

Please keep in mind, this is the middle of the day.  There were no clouds in the sky.  What you are seeing in this photo is straight up air pollution.

As I stated in the comments to yesterday's post, I spent three days in Kabul, and spent the next week coughing crap out of my lungs.  Literally, crap.  The local population burns anything it can to stay warm, including dried dung.  You can smell it in the air.