Being left behind...

  So as I am watching the football games, which cost big money to sponsor (or get one's ad upon) I am noticing little ap games being offered. For free! Excuse me while I smile since I don't have a platform.

  I think I need to go find a store that sells what I want. A tactical game, by turn game but only against the computer, I can conquer the computers, humans are more difficult. Especially since real humans need supplies, the electronic ones remind me of the old westerns where the six guns blazed and the cartridge loops on the belts were always full. But I can't decide what platform I should go for, and I am not a joystick jockey, I have no appreciation for jerking and such, I am wanting to put the correct troops into the fray in sync with the battle flow. Any advice would be appreciated.

  So many important things to do, but only a demonstration at Olympia for this week. Well, time to head for the YMCA, the Zumba instructor will be dancing soon...

Coming up for air..

Been swimming in an alternate author's universe, lovely gift of a Barnes and Noble gift card for my birthday, and having tons of time. I ran off and purchased print books that I can't put down.... lovely. Not hardly enough excitement and violence in my life, I go from fighting with the Black Prince, to with the Sissies, to Bob Lee Swagger, to an embedded intelligence in a dead alien lifeless form trying to get back to a working body...

I should go off to the YMCA, the range, the movies, the backyard to rake and maybe even meet some humanity along the way... but adventure calls. Thank you, Mom, for showing me the way to leave home.

New Year, anything new?

  I am reading Crisis of Empire: Britain and America in the Eighteenth Century, by Jeremy Black an Englishman. Very well done look at the subject from a world viewpoint. In our self-centered approach, it should only be important if America is the big player - the movement of populations, clashes of commerce and culture, the struggles for dominance in Europe - the need for controllable labor - supplied by poor folks, slaves and indentured servants, the assumption that nobles and wealth mean superiority - and the swimming against the currents.  All fascinating stuff. Especially when comparing and contrasting to today - it is the same with different names for the why.

  Started on taxes today, sigh. Don't have enough paperwork yet but I have one. I also have a new improved income number - increase of 1 percent or 1.7 percent or none. So the tithe check has changed. I am still happy that gasoline prices have come down, although Sunday Morning wants me to worry about fracking in public near Teddy Roosevelt's Ranch. Get real, if you are a trust baby and think that you know what is best for the world, go to fix Africa and then return to make America truly perfect.

  Fixing my world, I am the tall guy that opens the curtains in the bedroom (and closes them, come to think on it). No one else is reaching that high. Need to write more checks and get them in the mail after church today, there is a combined service - which means it is given in two languages. The cultural orientation will be that New Year is an opportunity to celebrate again, and be even more generous. I am of the opinion that more time in Sunday School study and stirring sermons in our native tongues would be better - but I am not in charge. Converting American Protestants to Korean Wannabes isn't going to happen, but the Korean elders need the sound of salvation and success in their own language - they understand it better than English.

  So in the last week, I have exercised, virtuously and virtually, 117.4 miles, in 10 hours and forty-two minutes, for a calorie burn of 11,209, in six sessions (one per day - resting on Sunday).  My question then becomes why am I such a fat old man, but it doesn't need an answer from me - I am the fellow that eats, and I can open all the doors to opportunity in this home.

  Saw my grandchildren on Skype.com, and laugh at knowing once one has conquered self and the local world - I have run out of time to really enjoy it - so I will take it as I can. In the end they will do well, but not because of any PROGRAM from several government agencies love of them. Mostly because they have parents, and community that do love them. The government is more problem than solution to competent people, so sad. I could say that the competent people would like the government to control those less able than themselves - but I would be repeating what I have been reading about why the King of England was a great thing, or the Khan, or the Tsar, or the Pope --- someone has to do it. Control the unwashed masses.

   Don't you ever wonder why if most of the humans in your country are not as intelligent as you are, nor as capable, why they have any vote that counts the same as your own? Maybe that is why those special elite folks will use every advantage to maintain position on top of the heap.... they are afraid, very afraid.

Don't cross the streams... something very bad will happen...

"And speaking of guns.....I have no problem with private gun ownership as long as it's regulated. Guns have great killing potential. That being the case, I feel if you want a gun, you should first show that you are capable of hitting what you aim at, 2nd show that you know the basic rules of gun safety and 3rd pass recurring BG checks for criminal and mental health red flags that might appear. If you want to own guns, carry insurance against "accidents". Pretty simple." commentor from Facebook.

Ah, the shrill voice of sanity. Since I have met all his artificial requirements, and he hasn't - I get to carry a gun and he doesn't. In his reality. In mine, he may carry a firearm, a machine gun, a submachine gun, an anti-tank weapon, an explosive device, explosives, fuses and detonators, own a tank or a fighter aircraft with weapons, a submarine with torpedoes  - he may have anything he wants, because we refused the government to LORD it over us folks with good intentions.  

If you replaced gun with any of the other rights and then tried to regulate it like he did, no one would be happy.

Regulation and restrictions law enforcement oversight and periodic inspections have yet to stop traffic deaths - but they do keep trying. For some reason, unknown to people, what fails with transportation is going to be perfected with gun control? 

I had drifted somewhere in the universe where unions aren't an arm of the Democratic Party, the organized crime control of workers, and more stuff to slow the economy down.... and left a comment or two - and was immediately attacked like whatever I say had little merit. Now I understand why my brother gets attacked by my Facebook friends - he sound exactly like the ENEMY, as I do when I commented on his comment on that post... 

I am sure the fellow that designs his gun control hasn't implemented it for criminals already regulated from firearms that seem to find them everywhere. He also gives Hollywood and News anchors a pass on breaking laws about firearms all the time. But then I am also sure the person spouting nonsense was not a gun owner. I also am not a Democrat, Union member, and know more about the world than those I seem to have just crossed streams with....

A New Year's Resolution - quit playing with ugly, stupid and definitely harmful folks - they will hurt the world, with all their good intentions to cage me up where I can be fed, and photographed and made fun of.

The problem with being perfect...

 Someone that I stalk online (no, I don't really - but I do read her stuff) mentioned not being perfect and having constant troubles with the adjustment to that.... or so I think she said. So I responded that I thought she was perfect, but I have been wrong before.

  But that has bumped into my personal disgust with the fact that in a nation of over 310 million citizens, with a pool of eligible candidates of perhaps a hundred million men and women of character with a love of people, and possibilities that could be elected to be the next President that - the two major political parties and the media, and those bankrolling this farce are going to tell us the choices is between these twenty-two best qualified because of their quantified evaluations and the dark secret cabal wins again!

  When King Harold Godwinson fought William the Bastard of Normandy for the throne of England - at least they had God on their side. Now the way we pick Presidents I am almost positive that God is very far from the fray, no one even prays about the votes now... the Devil is into all the details.  Abraham Lincoln could never have called for 75,000 volunteers to conquer the Confederacy, but to free the slaves he could, which by the way was not why he fought the Civil War. He could free the slaves by Amending the Constitution, which he did with only a few slave states voting. Men march to war for reasons that may have nothing to do with why the nation has entered into the conflict.

  I in my quest for more knowledge about Boston in 1775, bought the kindle version of Boston 1775, by Francis Russell. I don't recommend it since the History is presented as if it should never have happened and why can't we all get along. Not written by a Whig nor a Tory, most certainly by a fence sitter. And I, when I read the author's name and other books, wondered if there were a relation to the owner of the Russell house in Arlington, Mass. Disturbing just when I thought that History was being researched and written well by both sides of a conflict (I love reading the British side of the issue recommending Sergeant Lamb's America and Proceed, Sergeant Lamb - fiction but good to think upon). But then I might expect too much.

  I have an idea, in my mind, of what a man is - mostly based upon my father, grandfathers and other men around me as I grew up like teachers and coaches, sergeants and officers, and characters from stories, histories, and historical fictions and science fictions....  Jack stands tall in fairy tales, Greek, Norse and some Roman mythology and fables, then the Germanic sagas... yep, but none of that stands for the current popular cultural view of a modern great man.... duh.One of the things about the myths of long ago was how imperfect they were - the heroes and the gods, how they handled things and often couldn't win even if they knew the outcome and what their enemies were going to do to them. And I did notice that sexuality was much more a Mediterranean myth subject than the Northern Europeans. Just my observation, I am sure it worked the same. Again, since I don't aspire to Robin Hood, King Arthur, Wyatt Earp or the Man with no name I would have to be content with my father and his, and they weren't perfect. Which makes my aspirations and ideals much easier to reach than trying to be David of Michelangelo's mastery... or even of the David of the Bible.

  Unreal expectations cause much of the unsettled issues in life, I want peace but some fool wants to make me do it their way. I want to be better, but they fear my becoming too powerful when I get my place in History, that wasn't defined by them.

  Americans are armed, they are always armed, and they are paying attention to what is happening around them without being nosy and interfering. Now that is MY expectation - but y'all aren't perfect, and I will allow you to not be armed, or always armed and still be an American, just realize I might live up to my expectations and be so. And the firearm, or weapon, isn't going to be used in any manner that I won't approve.


 

Time to review the year, 2014 is about History... hmm, just when one thinks nothing happened...

  I am so self centered, that I actually think whatever I did has lasting effect on the wobbly course the World makes through time and space, and humble enough to know - it ain't necessarily so. I have limited span of attention - me to other things (procrastination pile will grow as soon as I get around to it), and other things to me (was that a pothole or a speed bump we just sped across?). So quickly forgotten.

 Cousin Everett Dungey World War II veteran, glider command in England, and not enough known about his service. Not enough interest in following generations, or he didn't think it was a great story, or he just didn't want to talk about it - his family and future were to be secured. Wish I knew, but then my conversations with my own father about his war, were full of missing the action - we talked about the present, a little about my future, my present and his and what to do about women... the wonderful ones we married and then... I so do wish my son, father and I could have sat around a day or so before my son got married to talk. It would have been great. It couldn't have happened, it wasn't on the ladies' schedule of events for the wedding and my father had already gone to glory..

  So in general, I am still not working, am retired, paying off the home's mortgage, still trying to prepare my wife for my departure. Still marveling over how quickly children grow, and wondering why each generation has to think they have invented a better way ... only an illusion of not knowing it has been done before better.

  I did get the pacemaker, twice placed properly, and it seems to work very well. I haven't started running again, but I do exercise at length so probably could.

  I have all the Appleseed clothing I will ever need for instruction and seventh stepping. I have fine firearms in the three calibers I decided was enough for my needs and desires. My Appleseed year was pretty good, and 2015 should be even better.  Links are always there on the left of the page, yes, I do go back and re-look at them, and there must be special computer trolling programs lifting photos and comments regularly, no one needs that many looks at photographs, do they?

  I have had a very solid year in my wife's church, the Men's Bible Study group, and the Sunday School and Pastor Oliver's sermons have opened my mind to more than I knew, and that is always a great thing. Will miss Pastor Oliver as he moves on.

  In the end this thought process was started by a sudden realization that I have made an impression along the way.  ''Wish I was making a difference like you are with Marksmanship."  There are some future conversations about that to come, I hope. But for sure the comment is a wonderful observation surprise. Thank y'all for being around, making my world better than I could without you.

Christmas Day... what did I get for Christmas...

 Biblical wonders  Isaiah 9:6, sent by a cousin on Facebook;
     For a child will be born for us,
     a son will be given to us,
     and the government will be upon His shoulders.
    He will be named
    Wonderful Counselor, Might God,
    Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.

A Throwback Thursday photo of the 82nd Christmas Card from 1944

  to which I added my Christmas Card from 1990, Desert Shield.

Which meant I went into the mail home piles, I stopped at 1990, looking through lots of  'FREE' mail from Saudi Arabia and Iraq,  Which got me to some of my son's letters to me, and his artwork, and stuff from long ago and far away.... I refused to go back and look at the Vietnam era stuff, didn't like the last time I was there, looking for something my son wanted to know about. Seems I didn't like that fellow writing those letters much.

Came back out and scanned the Christmas Card from '90, missed the Skype.com call from my son, figure the computer isn't working because the North Koreans are upset at me, and President Obama went golfing in Hawaii for the holy days - they must really be angry at being so ignored. Kind of like the American people...

enough political nonsense for today.  I have my Warhammer 40.000 symbol for my IMPERIAL Space Marine FORCE.  Angels of Anarchy (Unnumbered chapter)

I am almost back to painting small warrior figures from fantasies of youth...
almost.

My wife is passing up on going out with one of her lonely friends to make sure I have dinner - turkey and ham, and all the trimmings. A wonderful woman, a lady and my love....

My response to my cousin's Biblical reference above, was that the government forgot Whose shoulders it was to 'be upon'.  Merry Christmas, everyone!