Sometimes I Just Don't Care

I am having a hard time caring about what is going on these days. The control of our borders is a job the government won't do. Meanwhile in New Mexico the city of Sata Fe is trying to get state law changed to allow foreign nationals to be police officers. More jobs Americans won't do?

While I was in the service, and just after, there was a huge fight to allow black Americans into the construction trades. Somehow in the last three and a half decades both whites and blacks have been replaced by low wage illegals.

No wonder I spend my days with the dogs.

Friday Dog Days

I got a couple of good pictures of the dogs this week. See CAP and her green stuffed elephant? It has an electronic 'trumpet' when she bites it it roars. Help! Help! It's the horrible Heffelump!

In other news I will be more than a little broke this month. My desktop computer has been dead since October, we thought it was the modem and so I had Comp USA put one in, instead I had a horrific case of viruses. Viri? At any rate Linda Lou only lets me use the desktop in the living room to post pictures, the rest of the time I was using an elderly, clunky laptop in my study/gun room.

So I finally got my desktop fixed. It had quit getting on line so I had Comp USA put a new modem in, turned out that wasn't the problem. The antibiotics to kill the computer viruses were as expensive as people medicine. So this month there will be no shooting or excess driving or even much meat.

Oh well, it's nice being able to actually use my computer. I was up until near five in the morning setting it up, all of my everything was gone. I had to put Firefox back in as well as aol. Yes, I know there are better servers than aol, it's too bad they are all long distance from here. High speed? In my dreams. Linda Lou says I can have high speed once she gets her social security. By then gas will probably be five dollars a gallon and we still won't be drilling and refining. The Democrats will investigate, though. Let's see, will those investigations show that there has not been one new refinery built in over thirty years? Will any of these crusading Donk investigate why there are Cubans and Chinese drilling for oil off the coast of Florida but no American companies?

If only we could buy some Democrat offsets.

Doctors And Grandkids

I went up to Dallas and Plano yesterday to see my Cardiologist and then our daughter and the grandkids. Not a whole lot to talk about with the Doc, he is increasing my weekly dose of rat poison, er, Coumadin. For some reason the Docs hate it when I call the rat poison rat poison. They like the term blood thinner. This must mean I have thick blood. Or rats in my circulatory system.

Then we drove up and saw the kids. Josiah is pulling himself up quite nicely, he'll be walking soon. William won't hardly stop running unless I get him into a headlock.

We didn't stay long, we'd left Eddie in his crate and Princess outside. I hate leaving her outside in the back yard as she always turns over her water dish. As she did yesterday.

If I don't post pictures of the dogs tomorrow it will be because Linda Lou killed me after she saw that I finally posted a pic of her, she hates pictures of herself...

Just Who Is The Party Of Hate And Repression?

There is a question that has been running through my mind since the mid '70s, shortly after the events in Cambodia after the "end" of the war in Southeast Asia. I am not sure how well I can put it into words but here goes...

We on the Right side of the political line have grown used to those on the Left calling us "The Party Of Hate And Repression" for decades, at least since Joe McCarthy. What I don't understand is why we let them get away with it. Let's look back...

In the early days of the Soviet Union which group covered up the millions of Russians and Ukrainians starved to death in famines purposefully engineered by Stalin? Which group ignored the Gulags?

During the Spanish Civil War which group first ignored the rape and murder of the Nuns and Priests of the Catholic Church? Then towards the end of that war which group tried to cover up the way that the Communists killed the anarchists, socialists and everyone else not following the exact (and everchanging) Communist line?

During the runup to WW2 why did the American Left so want us to ignore the Nazis, right up until they invaded the Soviet Union? And why, all during that war when we were bombing Germany to splinters, did we not once bomb the Railroad stations at the Nazi death camps? Could it be because the Roosevelt Administration was of the Left?

Why, following WW2 was there not one peep from the Left about the enslavement of half of Europe and the millions of murders in China once the communists took over?

Then came my war, Viet Nam. That war was started by Kennedy and escalated by LBJ. Kennedy was probably the last centrist Democrat. Once LBJ got that war heated up he kept throwing more troops in while making absolutely sure that the strategy to win, taking the war to their turf, was off limits. Then, somehow, the war became Nixon's War. (We will see this again, in 1998 Clinton got a Congressional Resolution declaring that American policy is 'regime change in Iraq') and the Left forced and end to all money and ammunition and other supplies to the Republic of Viet Nam in the face of an invasion from the north. A slaughter of epic proportions followed, it is still not over.

There is far more, of course, why do American feminists side with those who treat women as property? Why do American Leftists Jews mostly side with the people who will kill Israel? Why do those who say the Right wants to kill people revere Rachel Carson who's fight against DDT has killed millions of (mostly poor) people per year?

Why did the Leftists in Congress, having voted overwhelmingly for the war in Iraq, start undermining it from the first day? The Left claims that it is we on the Right who are creating more terrorists. I believe that had we kept a united front that more than half of the rank and file terrorists would never have "enlisted". They know that they cannot beat us, their hope is that we will quit.

Well it is looking more and more like the Left will force us into quitting this fight. What then? How many people in the Mideast die? Does Israel have a way to prevent Iran from getting nukes? Does anyone really believe that Iran won't use those nukes, once they get them? I'm not, nor have I ever been, a Zoomie. Still, I do not believe Israel has the birds that can fly from Israel to Iran and back to drop precision weaponry. This means that Israel's only chance against Iran's nuclear program is cruise missiles from their submarine force. Since Iran's nuke program seems to be well dug in those cruise missiles will have to have nuclear warheads.

So, here is my question. If we on the Right are the Party of death and repression, shouldn't the Left just once side with those trying to keep people alive? Just once? Even by accident?

New Pictures

Linda Lou got some new pictures, professional type, for Mother's Day. William and Josiah, a couple of handsome lads, if I do say so myself. We're going to town next Wednesday, I have a doctor visit scheduled, so we'll actually get to see them.

Josiah is six months old now and William is four and a half. I am not quite sure how, in this new world where guns are so forbidden, William got so in love with shootin' irons. He turns anything into a gun and runs around going "bang".

I made the mistake of letting him run around the house with one of my cowboy action .45s once, carefully unloaded and double inspected of course. He is still so small that he can't lift it but still managed to raise a knot on his little head.. I reckon the recoil of the imaginary "bang" was too much for him. I noticed the bump and snuck off, quietly. Lump? What lump? Do you see a lump?

Anyhow he will need a good pair of cap pistols and a nice cowboy rig for his next birthday. Hopefully something light enough for no new lumps. It's going to be time to start looking for a nice .22 soon, several as a matter of fact. I'm thinking of lever actions in case any of the boys want to follow Gramps into Cowboy Action Shooting.

We Sure Showed Those RINOs

Well, the immigration bill seems to be a done deal. Last time by the Republican House stopped the idiocy but we had to show those RINOs how angry we were...

What else will we be giving up over the next two years? I hope we all remember this in '08 or by 2012 we'll be hearing "press 6 for English".

Nathaniel Turns Four Today.

Nathaniel turns four today, these pictures are from the last time they were in our part of the country.

Nathaniel is autistic. The kids got him to a good Doc and he is doing very well. Meleah, my DIL has him on a special diet that seems to control most of the symptoms.

I don't really understand autism all that well. The boy is as sweet as he could be but won't look anyone in the eye. Instead he has the thousand yard stare of an infantryman who has been in the bush too long. I look at the boy and think that a good R&R (not in the Bangkok of the '60s, though) followed by a six month tour as The Colonel's driver is just what he needs to get him back to normal. Then I remember that he's too young to drive. It just about broke my heart to see that boy afraid of Eddie when Eddie was only about four months old.

I don't get to see these kids often, they live in North Carolina in the heart of NASCAR country, just north of Charlotte. After December, when Linda Lou gets her social security and we no longer have to throw nickles around like they were manhole covers we'll see them a little more often. I figure then we'll be able to afford two long trips a year instead of having to budget one walk to the mailbox per month like now.I just HAD to choose a profession where no honest man ever retires rich.

Anyway Nathaniel, his big brother Ethan, John Mark are all being home schooled.

Happy birthday, Nathaniel. I miss you.

The Birthday Bone

Today is Eddie's first birthday. In honor of that we thought about baking a cake but dogs aren't supposed to get cake. So, birthday bones for the dogs. I asked if they wanted candles on the bones, they just looked at me like I was nuts. I reckon dogs don't much care about tradition.

Eddie also didn't care about me singing "Happy Birthday". Not that I can carry a tune in a bucket. If he hadn't have been busy with the bone he probably would have ran off. Thank the Lord for a fence.

Note: I'm not writing about the three soldiers captured in Iraq. I simply have nothing useful to say, check the Milbloggers. All I can do is pray for them and curse their captors.

First Cowboy Shoot In A While

Yesterday was the first Cowboy Action Shoot for a few months for me. Each night there was a shoot scheduled I'd set my alarm clock and then it would start raining. I would roll over, turn off the alarm and go back to sleep as the range my club shoots at is on that black gumbo dirt and the Pards and their guncarts sink without a trace. Well, not quite but it is unmanageable and the cars and trucks get stuck, bigtime.

Linda Lou was eager to see me gone for a while, she says the biggest downside to being retired is that I'm always underfoot. So I loaded the guncart into the van, it was extra heavy as I had a pal that was supposed to come for his first shoot. I loaded it up the night before so as to let Linda Lou sleep, it takes a lot of ugly words to get that thing out the door and down the steps. It's easier bringing it home, having shot the ammo it's a lot lighter.

I have solved the problem of being too deaf for the alarm clock. Usually it rings until it wakes Linda Lou up and then she wakes me up. Well the instant the alarm rang yesterday Cochise' Apache Princess jumped up in the bed and stuck her cold, wet nose in my armpit. Thankfully I did not jump quite high enough to get into the ceiling fan.

I had my cup of coffee, poured the next one into a road cup which I carefully left on the counter and climbed into the van and drove off, cleverly forgetting to take my morning pills. The morning batch of pills contains the meds I take to control my tremors so it was an interesting day. I drove up to Greenville and stopped at the McDonalds to meet Joel. I called him, since he wasn't there and that's when I discovered he wasn't coming. Slug. A little thing like Mother's Day stopping him from shooting?

So I finished my health food breakfast and refilled my paper coffee cup and drove the rest of the way to the shoot. Fortunately I had dithered around long enough that the rest of the club members had already got the targets set. In my defense I stayed late enough to put them away after the shoot.

It's been rainy enough that we only had three sets of targets set up and we just shot two different scenarios on each set. That helped keep the mud down, a little, not much. But instead of pulling the trailer full of those big steel targets we humped them.

The very first stage marked my day, seventy-odd seconds and two misses. The Pards shooting the light recoiling, smokeless rounds got through that same stage in about 25 seconds. That is ten pistol, starting from the leather, ten rifle and four shotgun rounds, the shotgun staged empty and open. With the various physical problems I have I'll never shoot a stage in less than 30 seconds so I go for the style points. The BOOM! and the smoke, the big flame out the muzzle, the other shooters gasping for a breath without sulphur smoke...the CLANG! when that 250 grain soft lead slug hits the steel. Who am I kidding, I could be thirty five and I'd still shoot Frontier Cartridge warthog loads. The Pards shooting those light smokeless loads go "pop-tink" instead of "BOOM-CLANG!" If I wanted "pop-tink" I'd save money and shoot the .22.

Anyhow I did not shoot real well, I only had one clean stage (clean=no misses) and, as usual, the feller pulling Range Officer duty complained about having to put the electronic timer away and having to drag that eight-day Grandfather Clock around. Eh, he needed the exercise.

Anyhow I finished the shoot with no safety violations which means it was a successful shoot. I didn't go to lunch with everyone as I wanted to get home to Linda Lou for Mother's Day. For a Mother's Day meal she wanted her favorite, a Sonic double cheeseburger and tater tots. I did not really marry her because she was a cheap date but it didn't hurt, either.

For some reason I didn't take any pictures at this shoot but there are some of earlier shoots..

Back To The Time Machine.

I don't remember financial details but 1954 must have been a pretty good year for us. I know that in 1955 we got a new car and the new house and the pictures of that year showed a lot of travel. But, since it is Mother's Day this weekend, here are a few pictures of my Mama. As always click the photos for big.

In 1954 I was seven, my big sister was, I believe, fourteen and Mom was thirty-five.

It's time for a Mother's Day story about why my chin is lopsided to this day and has that scar. It was the summer before I started Kindergarten. No, Harv, I do not call that my senior year...had to be 1952.

One of the neighbors had a very tall tree that had, for some reason, a ladder leaned up against it. I do not recall what kind of tree, perhaps it had nuts. At any rate it did have the ladder. These were the days when small boys could roam the neighborhoods with nothing to fear but mean dogs or, worse, geese.

In those days there were Saturday Matinees at the local theater, we would walk there, a mile or so, in company with the bigger kids, each with our quarter for admission and a shiny dime for a soda and popcorn. There we would get our weekly ration of cowboys or pirate movies. I loved pirate movies...Mom loved getting me out of the house.

Back to the tree with the ladder. Since the tree was taller than the houses around the top of the tree made a perfect crow's nest. So I clumb the ladder to the top and put one hand above my eyes to shade them while I looked for enemy sails. Since I could see none I decided to try using my imaginary binoculars. Have I ever told you that it is a good idea not to hold both hands in front of your face while on top of a tall ladder?

Somehow I lost my balance and started downhill, fast.Since my hands were already up, they stayed up, higher because they hit the ladder. So did my chin. Ever run real fast with a stick alongside a picket fence? That is what it sounded like only it wasn't a stick or a fence. It was my chin and the rungs of the ladder. Fortunately my chin against the ladder must have slowed me down enough that I didn't break anything. My chin was bleeding like a stuck pig though and, like any brave five year old I ran home screaming for Mama. The Mama who had just swept and mopped. I ran in screaming and Mom hollered "Don't you bleed on my clean floor!" and hustled me, and my blood outside. Then she told me not to move, went inside and got the first aid kid and bandaged me up. All the while complaining how she'd never get those bloodstains out of that shirt.

She never did get those bloodstains out. That was also the last time I ever remember crying over a little blood. Well, a lot of blood, head and face wounds tend to bleed a lot.

In those days Dads tended to work, Moms took care of the kids. If I have any courage or pain resistance at all it came from my Mom. Happy Mother's Day. I sure miss you.

UPDATE:5/14/07: If you maximise the top left picture here you will see that my Mom was barefoot. In 1954. The durned old hippies didn't invent THAT, either.

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Eddie's Birthday

Eddie will turn one year old on the 16th of this month, mail your presents now! Linda Lou says Eddie is the best little boy dog in the whole world. A big old standing rib roast will do.

Cochise' Apache Princess will turn four months old the day before, on the 15th. I'm not quite sure what the proper four month present would be, a rack of spare ribs?

Raining All Week.

It's been raining all week so there are no new dog pictures. Let me dig around in Linda Lou's photo archives and see if any of the grandchildren are not too danged ugly to post. Out of the eight there should be somebody who's goodlooking enough...

Eh, I'd better prepare you all with a picture of the Elephant Seals on the beach, first, before anybody rips out their eyeballs on seeing William and Josiah.

Well, maybe we'll have some better weather soon. Then we can shoot some more pictures of the dogs.