Thank You

To my brother Jack,
To my nephew Travis,
To my nephew William,
To all American Veterans,

Thank You.
Thank you for putting on that uniform everyday.
Thank you for taking up my cause.
Thank you for fighting on my behalf.
Thank you for risking your life for me.
Thank you for helping to keep my country, the United States of America safe.
Thank you for keeping me and my family safe.
Thank you for giving America the most precious of gift of gifts, freedom
Thank you for making America the greatest country in the world.

Thank you for offering your life for me, the greatest sacrifice any person could ever make.

Thank you for all that you've done.
Thank you for all that you do.
Thank you for all that you will do.

From the deepest part of my heart and soul,

Thank You.

You make me very, very proud.

Gob Bless you.

God Bless America.

Hems, Memes, Limes, Mimes...MIMES!!!! please make them go away...please make them go away...AAARRRGGGGGG!!!!

Jean, our newest blogger entrepreneur (see and use the link on the upper right hand corner of this blog) has blessed little old me with 'Over The Top' blog award and at the very same time, has also cursed blessed me with a thirty-five FREAKIN question meme:


Where is your cell phone? In my pocket.
Your hair? Short for now, but I only get it cut twice a year.
Your mother? Living and still ornery.
Your father? Passed on to a better place.
Your favorite food? Chicken, could eat it for every meal, especially if I cook it!
Your dream last night? Not a freakin clue.
Your favorite drink? A nice glass of Riesling.
Your dream/goal? To win the W.C Handy Award.
What room are you in? Dinning room.
Your hobby? Playing guitar.
Your fear? Obama scares the living crap outta me.
Where do you want to be in 6 years? Retired
Where were you last night? At home, feeding the livestock.
Something that you aren't? Thin and bald
Muffins? What about them?
Wish list item? To get thin enough to jump out of a perfectly good airplane.
Where did you grow up? Wisconsin and Florida.
Last thing you did? Fed the Chickens.
What are you wearing? Jeans and a nice shirt for my gay collection (my wife bought it).
Your TV? Seldom on anymore, cable sux wind.
Your pets? You really want to go there???
Ok, sit down and take a break, this is going to take a bit... meet the livestock
Horses:
Ranger
Vanessa
Rosie
Mule:
Shiloh
Dogs:
Hopeless
Batgirl
Cats:
Amtrak
Q
Pinhead
Cookie
Mooch
Casie
Sonny
Chickens:
George (rooster)
The Buffs (two hens) no names
Opie (young rooster)
The Plymouth Rocks (all hens)
Dino
5 others (referred to as "The Girls")

Sorry you asked aren't you?
Friends? Few, but the few that I have mean a lot to me.
Your life? A medical merry-go-round, but things seems to be winding down.
Your mood? The full spectrum, happy, sad, quite, loud, mad, you name it.
Missing someone? Yes....
Vehicle? Ford F-150 and a 90ci Suzuki Boulevard.
Something you're not wearing? Underwear! HA... gotcha... weren't expecting that were you????
Your favorite store? Guitar Center
Your favorite color? Blue
When was the last time you laughed? Really gut wrenching laugh...can't remember, a small giggle, today.
Last time you cried? When the Doctor told me that I did NOT have cirrhosis of the liver.
Your best friend? Hmmmm I have a few friends, and they are all the best.
One place that I go to over and over? The inner sanctum in my mind, which is where I've been for the last few weeks, months, years???
One person who emails me regularly? Jean and vch.
Favorite place to eat? The Pig Barbecue



I'm supposed to pass this on to six other people. I'm afraid there aren't that many people visit this blog anymore, so I'm gonna piss my brother off and name him, ok That Dude, you're up!!

Is This Real? Me Thinks It Is Quite Real!!

I'm not sure if Arnold did this on purpose or not, but as far as this being a fake, well, ABC News ran with it, which doesn't mean squat, but it's out there. Read this then click here... but before you read it, there are two paragraphs in this letter. Read the first letter of every sentence down, and have yourself a good laugh.

I'm telling you, this is as funny as it gets....

SLACKER!!!!

WOW! I knew I was slacking, but didn't realize how bad... do you want to hear all of the excuses I can come up with or should I just move on... aw hell... here come the excuses...

1. I've been busy. (might be true).
2. I've been lazy. (more than likely true).
3. I've been pre-occupied. (guess that one falls under been busy).
3. My computer was down. (ooo.... that's a good one, not true, but a good one!)
4. I have Comcast Cable. (they invoke serious negative air pressure).
5. I've been involved in a plot to overthrow the Bama administration. (yeah me and 500 million others)
6. I've been hiding from the Bama cause he heard I was going to overthrow his administration. (yeah me and 500 million others)


Ok... ok... enough. It's number 2...

A New Threshold In Life

I became a Grandpa today (again), as my youngest daughter, my baby, blessed the world and me, with an 8 lb, 3 oz 21 inch baby boy, that I can't wait to see, but it'll be awhile, they live in KC Missouri, but that's ok, cause Momma and baby are doing fine and everyone is healthy.

(I love a good run on sentence.)

Tyler James... (what a great name!! ) welcome to the world! These are all my blogger friends... you'll like them very much.

I guarantee they'll like you....

This Just in....

Breaking News...

Kanye West just interrupted Patrick Swayze's funeral to let everyone know that Michael Jackson's funeral was better...

Film at 11:00

Fair and Balanced
We Deliver... You Decide...

Dance To The Music

I was in the bar yesterday when I suddenly realized I desperately needed to fart. The music was really, really loud, so I timed my farts with the beat.

After a couple of songs, I started to feel better. I finished my beer and noticed that everybody was staring at me.

It was then that I remembered that I was listening to my iPod.

Storm Update

I'm not going to give a blow by blow of these storms, but I do want to show you the progression of how the ebb and flow progresses until the storm either steers clear of the east coast and goes spinning off in to the much cooler waters of the north central Atlantic or actually hits the mainland.

As you can see, Ana is still only packing sustained winds of 40 MPH, but her speed has increased from 17 MPH to 23 MPH. That small but significant change in speed (hopefully) will not allow Ana to gain any strength as she passes over the bath tub commonly referred to as the Gulfa Mexico (see previous post for spelling explanation) and will prevent her from becoming a devastating hurricane. The other really important factor that you have to keep an eye on is the central pressure. Ana's is currently 1005 mb (measured in millibars)

millibar (ml-bär)
A unit of pressure equal to 0.001 bars. It is equivalent to 100 newtons per square meter, or 0.0145 pounds per square inch. Standard atmospheric pressure at sea level is 1,013.2 millibars.

So Ana's minimum central pressure is not much less than what is normally seen at sea level, but don't let a mere 8.2 millibars fool you. It can make all the difference in the world as the pressure continues to drop.



Bill, on the other hand is still traveling at a whopping 16 MPH, but his strength has increased to 60 MPH sustained winds. Just a mere 13 MPH increase and it will be a full blown hurricane. Bills pressure at 11AM is down to 997 mb. However, if you will notice, there has been a slight change in Bill's projected path, making it more of a problem for South Carolina (hopefully not). If it continues to keep swinging north this early, there's a good chance it will keep swinging become one of those storms that visits the middle of the north central Atlantic.



Central barometric pressure of a hurricane tells the strength and damage potential. Here are a list of the worst hurricanes to hit the states and their associated central pressure.

The Labor Day Hurricane, Florida Keys, September 2, 1935, Category 5, 892 mb, Approaching 200 mph
Hurricane Camille, Mississippi, August 17, 1969, Category 5, 909 mb, Approaching 190 mph
Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, LA, Mobile, AL, and Gulfport, MS , August 31, 2005, category 3, 920 mb, 125 mph
Hurricane Andrew, Southeast Florida, August 24, 1992, Category 5, 922 mb, 165 mph
Hurricane Charley, Punta Gorda, Florida, August 13, 2004, Category 4, 941 mb, 150 mph

One more thing, to show the unpredictability of these storms, here's the path that Katrina took. Notice the sharp turn at south Florida... you just can't trust these things to follow any logic.



Thought I'd throw this one in just for laughs... they don't call it "Crazy Ivan" for nothing...

Just When I thought It Was Safe....

I'm ok with Custer (though he was wacked out), custard (mmm vanilla if you please), mustard (grey poupon preferably), bluster, bruster, buster (not touching it), huster, juster, kuster, muster, shuster, thruster.

I'm even ok with a little wind guster, even though they make me fluster, and sometimes, I hate to admit that I'm a luster, when her skin is full of lustre (chill... I'm referring to my wife), but I hate storms that come in CLUSTERS!!!

Here we go again folks. It's that time of year when the words or phrase of the season is "Hunker Down".

Dictionary: hun·ker (hŭng'kər)

v., -kered, -ker·ing, -kers.
1.To squat close to the ground; crouch. Usually used with down: hunkered down to avoid the icy wind.
2.To take shelter, settle in, or hide out. Usually used with down: hunkered down in the cabin during the blizzard.
3.To hold stubbornly to a position. Usually used with down: “As the White House hunkered down, G.O.P. congressional unity started crumbling” (Time).
n. hunkers
The haunches.

[Perhaps of Scandinavian origin; akin to Old Norse hokra, to crouch.]

Well... around here it means get out the Coleman stove and lantern, see if the generator is working, get ready to fill up the bath tub with water, make sure there is plenty of dry goods in the pantry... and be prepared to spend many days and nights listening to the wind blowing the rain against the side of the house and hope like hell no more trees fall...

Let me introduce you to two of the newest members of the Atlantic Storm Society. The first is Ana. Ana formed yesterday and is predicted to maintain the Tropical Storm Status until at least, the next 5 minutes... it's really hard to accurately predict what these things will do, but the National Weather Service thinks it's going to stay a Tropical Storm until Thursday... when it enters the warm bath like waters of the Gulf Of Mexico, or Gulfa Mexico as we refer to it in the south.

Do the clickety click thing on the two maps below to see the little white window that holds the current specs of each storm, or just look at the pretty little pictures in the smaller size if you are so inclined.


Next on our list of new comers is a quaint little storm called Bill. Bill officially was named today and as you can see below, as of the moment that this map was constructed, it appears it's headed for the Atlantic Coast of good old F-L-A, where me and a few million other people happen to reside.


Since I live in the State that probably sees (not necessarily experiences) more hurricanes, I've become somewhat of an amateur meteorologist. Though these images tell you what the National Hurricane Center predicts, it does not give you the whole story. So I usually go to a sight that will show you an 8 hours loop of water vapor over the storm area, to get a view of how fast a storm, in this case two storms Ana and Bill are growing and how big they're getting.

Guitar Hero

When most people hear the name Les Paul, they usuually get a vision of something like this...



and when they hear the term "Guitar Hero", this will quite often (these days) pop into their pointed little heads...



However, the only true Guitar Hero has passed.


Les Paul did more for Rock and Roll than any other single person, and he never played a lick of Rock and Roll music.

Say Hi to all of the rock and rollers in heaven Les, and rest in peace.

Science Fiction Fact

Remember this???




Well, it is now a new reality. Not quite to the Star Trek stage yet, but I've learned a long time ago that if someone can think of some future Science Fiction thingy, some one else can turn it into Science fact!

Free At Last, Free At Last

Capt. Michael "Scott" Speicher

One of Jacksonville Florida's own has been found.

Navy pilot Capt. Michael "Scott" Speicher was shot down over the Iraq desert on the first night of the Gulf War in 1991. Iraqi officials have denied any knowledge of his capture or whereabouts since that fatal day in 1991.

As it turns out, a tribe of nomads, Bedouins to be exact, found Capt. Speicher's body, and buried him. They continued to roam about the country, leaving Capt's Speicher's remains in a shallow unmarked grave.

Capt. Speicher went home to his maker 18 years ago. Finally, Rest In Peace Capt. Michael "Scott" Speicher, Rest in Peace my friend and hero...

And may God be with his family...

Bored?

If you're getting bored with this crap... go here and get bored with my other crap.

Welcome to an Old New Comer? ... a New Older Comer... Hmmmm The Return of Someone I Never Knew... Double Hmmmm

Here is a fine place I found last week, that I am going to add to my side bar. (clickety click the picture to be instantly transported to her blog or this link here to Asphixad's notepad, which ever one works). This lady, Arphixad, named after a rubber chicken (don't ask, don't tell) as rumor has it, has been out on the blog-o-sphere before, but has recently caught the bug again.
It's ok.. it happens to the best of us.

Take a few minutes... go pay her a visit. Let her know that I sent you because she said some nice things about me in the comments on one of her posts... not gonna tell ya which one...go see for yourself.

And That's The Way It Was.... July 17th, 2009

Walter Cronkite was there when President Kennedy was assassinated, during the Vietnam war and the first time man stepped on the moon.

Walter Cronkite died today at the ripe age of 92.

Walter, it gives me great honor to tell you,

"And that's the way it was, July 17th, 2009."

Rest in peace Walter.

Walter Cronkite
1916 - 2009