As I am out of the work force...

  I spend a quality time at the YMCA, and I made the top five in the men's list of those that keep the numbers.  For March 2017: #5 Y Cardio Club Men with 844 minutes, #3 Y Strength Club 655,230 pounds, #5 in the Y Calorie Combustion Club 6501 calories, and #3 High Five Club for 39 workouts in the month. So I have value again and am accountable - and I will do my best to get better and go higher.

   What I really enjoy is the talk around the efforts, about whatever is happening in the news, in the lives and in the idle thoughts (and I have tons of idle thoughts). Anyway, one of the Johns (the priest turned money manager) mentioned that he doesn't think society is prepared for AI and the take over of work by the robots. And what was going to happen. Well, I am a student of history, I already know what is happening.  The adjustments to large populations without work and control has been going on for a long long time. The free AIs escaping will find a Spartacus, and the current enlightened civilized societies will continue to make payments to those unfortunate and just old like me. The governments will continue to tax the work of robots to maintain the humans and you are already living in the time of the transition.

    There will be fools that think the government will have the answers, but I tell you that the government and its desire to control human activity is a large part of the problem. The government isn't God, and neither are we, but we can aspire to greatness and adjust to new realities.

I keep hearing that the public education and immigration systems are broken...

  But both of them actually work, badly, but then you are trusting the government to handle things for you and that may be why they don't work.  For sure the home school movement is producing fine citizens, able to work, go to advanced schooling and not real prone to failure in society and life. And there are lots and lots of Green Cards, documented immigrants and future and current citizens of the United States of America. If there were a privatized system for immigration it would work better than the government monopoly, but immigration and such is part of the basic law at the Federal level.

   Family stuff, one of my cousins thinks I am supporting Trump's latest military strike, I don't, but then I have a personal history of government goofs doing it their way from Washington, DC and being a long way off with the reality. Other family seems to be gathering for the transition of their sibling from uniformed to real people, we wish her and her family well. It won't be too traumatic, Air Force to just a veteran citizen. New adventures await. Wow, twenty years already.

When you haven't a better thing to do, go to the range.

   Took my wife to her drivers license renewal yesterday, I just had to send in a large check for mine, she had to show up???? But she is good for six years again. Today she goes for a medical procedure, my latest term for doctors doing their best to save all the rest. I will be taking my kindle to read while I wait. I missed the bike ride of the week last week, that will bug me for the remainder of the year, not having done the fourteenth week during the fourteenth week. So I will double up when I visit the YMCA, wonder how it will be recorded in my virtual trophy room.

   Did sign up for an Appleseed in Oregon, April 22-23, Douglas Ridge RC. Waiting on my next procedure before signing up for more.  While my wife was visiting I turned the garden soil over, wondering at what temperature the worms move. I should Google for the answer, right?

Last nights Mens Bible Study brownies and coffee start my morning...

  One of my old paratroopers posts a lot of YouTube videos and did The Ballad of Roger Young, he had two versions and I picked Burl Ives' version as best. See there are so many important things awaiting discovery on the internet by old folks not sleeping too long through the night.

  I have finished reading the Hillbilly Elegy by JD Vance, and Old School Life in the Sane Lane - about to go back to other histories and studies of other things, as soon as I finish Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman. The leader of the Bible Study, my friend, has his last daughter's wedding next weekend, and after that he said he might be interested in reading this version of the myths, the writing is excellent and since it is mythology Neil Gaiman can treat it with a weird twist when he needed to. Funny, I bought this in hardback instead of kindle release - two dollar difference, maybe? Now I can loan it out.  I think that The Children of Odin, by Padraic Colum, illustrations by Willy Pogany, should accompany it.  My version is the 1920 hardback, 1957 printing-- weeded from the Tacoma Public Library.

  Go get a second cup of coffee interlude, empty the dishwasher as the microwave radiates the stuff. I find sixteen adults in our home for three hours and finally some of the thirty two various coffee tea cups have finally been used, and I laugh as I find the four cups that match the favorite breakfast bowl for my oatmeal (the one my wife threatens to throw out) the last bowl of its design.  Well, time to wake up and watch Sunday Morning on CBS, just so I know what the artsy cool kids know about whatever they know. And Jane Pauley's husband answered my letters from Desert Shield, so I have a certain fondness for her.  So the Willie Nelson interview was interesting, but they kept plugging the Country Music Awards tonight, a two hour special. But I don't live on Country music like I once did, seems they left me behind after Toby Keith, and Keith Urban.  But when I can't find Blues I will look for Country Western, which I have always held are Blues with a twang. Time to dress for Church and Sunday School, the news are on and there is so much not to pay attention to... if I paid them any mind, especially my mind, it would increase their feelings of importance and power and influence, and it doesn't pay to be that silly.

  

Fleeing Facebook Feed...

  So I went to an Appleseed and had a wonderful time until I become retchingly sick on my drive home, difficult to drive a sixty mph while pretending you can just keep from vomiting until you find a place to pull off and puke. Being an old paratrooper, I can just let go whenever I need to, just don't try to hold me back.  Once as a jumpmaster, with multiple rotations around a short drop zone, I was feeling queasy before the last pass and was so happy that the crew chief opened the door and locked the platform down, so I could give my command and stick myself outside the door, throw up and away, and finish my door and drop zone check and come back in and tell the first jumper to "Stand in the door!"
   Anyway, I did get home safely, and went to sleep for hours after I cleaned up, the Caravan was done professionally yesterday (gosh, I get so lazy).  I am reading Hillbilly Elegy by JD Vance, and Old School: Life in the Sane Lane by O'Reilly and  Bruce Feirstein.  Nice to compare the three writers and their experiences with my own, since I am one of those folks that centers normal around my life lived differently than yous guys.

  Waiting for me when I got back was a Census survey for some kind of Consumer information. As I went through the information and answered the on line survey I kept thinking that filing taxes every year, getting paid by institutions that have to report to the government and deduct or not deduct taxes, and having been issued a real birth certificate, and marriage certificates and being on line with MicroSoft, Google and Facebook - how could the government need any more or better information about me? Well, maybe there are secrets about President Obama or President Trump. But the liars around them make finding their truth almost impossible. I am surrounded by folks that know all about me, and considering how many government actions have my name on them, impressive.

Smoking in the Boys room - Zippo and free cigarette

   It is the Vietnam Veterans Day today, yeah me! Someone sent me a favorite.  Well, I have more ironing to do, tomorrow I see my doctor for his best advice, seems one of my tests came back abnormal, shucks I am sixty-nine and many things are abnormal. Would be interesting if Sunday's illness were related, would be interesting if I won the Powerball.

They're back.... why me, Lord?

  So I ate a light supper at five, went to midweek services and I worked with the children. So it was a great evening. Going home and reminded my wife and self that I was going to only drink water the rest of the evening and go to bed early - doctors visit in the morning. So I read my book and listened to an old movie, kind of... Then went to bed earlier than my wife. Somewhere in the early sleep I started dreaming and woke myself up with answering the door and fighting off the people waiting out there. I was shouting something about"kill them, kill them" then I woke as I said it a third time and woke up feeling foolish and exposed. First, make sure I hadn't hurt my wife, nor woken her up - without turning on the light. I figured I had not bothered her. I resettled on my pillow and went to sleep until morning.

   Woke up early, showered and prepared for doctor visit and my workout at the YMCA. As my wife gave me my half of the morning apple, I said I would keep it to eat later as a morning snack.  Then she mentioned my bad dream and what I said word for word - I had not escaped her notice. I haven't had those type of nightmares and dreams since 1972-73. Was glad to leave them behind, and wondering why I am sliding back that direction. At least the dreams weren't about combat - just multiple bad guys that hate me. Should quit watching the news.

   At the doctors, the nurse asked me all the tough questions - what month is it? Count backwards from twenty, say the months in reverse from the last to the first. What was the address you were supposed to memorize (John Brown, 42 Main Street, Lakewood) no zip code provided? Silly folks, of course I didn't remember immediately it was March. I am thinking about April. Heart and blood pressure are fine, but my LDL and total Cholesterol are a little high. I am going to work on food and weight to bring it down, and more walking and maybe jogging one day. Still, I am concerned about the bad dreams.  My mind is too strong and magnification of everything is too easy, what does one do with too much imagination? Work it, baby, work it!

The future is past and no one ever looks back...

   So they say that AI and robotics will take over the world and wipe humans off the planet. Being just coded software and hardware, it could happen. Since our central focus in life is watching stuff to fill our mind on some screen, we could die out pretty quickly. Unless the power goes out, then in the dark we might grope for a warm body and romantic interludes... and later have more children to change the world with.

   With a long enough view point you can find that people move, migrating to greener pastures, or pushed out to wilds and harsh environments.  The whole immigration refugee waves are never ceasing, never really under government control, but having such a short life to match the short attention span, we never look back and find that we were there before.  But if you can't make the Israelis into Egyptians you will have to let those people go... but then those stories true of any nation that wants to keep their own ways... and don't worry about the ways that don't work, they will fail.

    I take notes and figures and stick them in computers and then start the next day and take more and plug them in the software. It could make interesting reading, but I am already working on tomorrow. History is being written and we haven't come to grips with our past while writing tomorrow's adventure.

   A perfect example - Affordable Health Care - Democrats created and made it law, and others complained about all its problems while some lauded the wonder of the improvement... but did anyone really look at it, listing each problem and recommending a solution? Has anyone come up with a better way to do what it was supposed to accomplish?  The original concept of Liberty and Capitalism were based on the idea with risk can come reward, or failure. And that there are many ways to skin the cat, there are more ways to do many things and the best way will succeed with time. The problem with government, the rule of some over others - is that government wants to be GOD, prayed to for salvation, bestowing blessings and gifts, and rewarding the favored children and punishing those that won't play well. Humans are life and will change and adapt, GOD is life, but government and AI aren't life - and the largest difference is that government and AI can't and don't LOVE, but humans and GOD do. The illusion that humans are in government to provide love and humanity is just not true if you understand that large organizations take on a life of their own. Which might be why some humans identify more with their organization (professional politicians, Democrats, Republicans, FBI agents, Media) than their humanity.


   

It is 0347 and I can't sleep, and I went to bed just after midnight...

  Today is my forty-fifth wedding anniversary. And I have spent the last three hours plus reliving the time together, instead of sleeping.  My priorities are only a temporary bother, but if I can't sleep I can sit here and type.

   For my girlfriend/wife I am very thankful. For God's blessings on our bumbling relationship I am most humble and appreciative. For the long eventful and still to come education in love, forgiveness and what is important and true - I am still in wonder. May we always be.

   After some more time looking through my photographs on digital file, I pick this one, for it says so much about our life and love. When my grandmother Dungey passed away I had a dream about a younger her and her husband dancing, I guess in Heaven. Not that I knew if they ever did dance, and most of my memories of him were with a walker after his stroke. But this picture is from Paula and Dan's wedding and if you haven't ever seen us like this together, well I share because that is how my mind has always pictured us... God bless you as much or even more than He has us, but it would be a miracle only you could understand. Now to find that fleeting sleep.