The dog ate my homework...

The wife & I went out to eat last night at Lone Star Steakhouse. They have the best cheese fries (well it's a toss up between them and Outback). Anyway, we met an old friend I haven't seen in a while and had a great time catching up. (And eating steak).

Well, we actually ordered the steak/chicken combo meal and I ate 1/2 my chicken as the Mrs. only ate her steak. We put the remainder in a doggie bag for the Mrs.' lunch today.

I must note here that we usually take Oakley, the wonder dog, with us when we go to town as he just loves to ride in the car. He really knows we get stuff to eat when we get out of the car, as we usually bring him a leftover treat from dinner, if it isn't too spicy.

Last night was no different. He got bites of steak and chicken, practially a handful of meat.

Well, the Mrs. wanted to go to a store after dinner before we went home, so I put the leftover pkg in the back of the car (we drive a Saturn Vue). I even placed a large bag on top of it to prevent said wonder dog from investigating the lunch box. (It was one of those snap together styrofoam boxes).

We came out of the store to find that Mr. Oakley had found said lunch pkg, tore it apart and ate a healthy dose of bbq chicken. It was good too.

At least I told the Mrs. it was good, as she hadn't eaten any of hers.

The Left that Stole Christmas

Hat tip to my friend HShake...Thanks for the email!

by Robert Roper with respect to Dr. Seuss

All the folks in the Red States liked Christmas a lot
But the Blues in the Blue States did NOT.

The Blues hated Christmas! The whole Christmas season!
Now, we have to ask why? Is there any good reason?
It could be their heads aren’t screwed on just right.

It could be perhaps that they just like to fight.
But I think that the most likely reason of all
Is that twelve years in the minority has taken its toll.

But wherever their problems,
In their hearts or their heads,
The Blues stood there on Christmas hating the Reds.

Together they growled with their Blue fingers drumming,
“We must find some way to stop Christmas from coming!
“We must steal all their wreaths and nativity scenes,
“And Santa Claus, too, and all of the trees!”

“We’ll stop them from caroling all through the streets.
“We’ll make them feel guilty for enjoying their feasts!
“To teach these Reds tolerance… fairness… diversity,
“We must obliterate Christmas entirely…

You see?”

Then they got an idea!
An awful idea.
The Blues got a wonderful awful idea.

“I know just what we’ll do,” chortled one of the Blues.
“We’ll send ten thousand lawyers to all their kids’ schools!
“We’ll sue Christmas away, and when we’re done there,
“We’ll do just the same to every town square!”

Then they slithered and slunk, with smiles most unpleasant
Cleaned out every classroom, and cancelled the pageants.
They stuffed all the decorations away in their bags,
“And, as long as we’re here, let’s rip down the Flag.”

They took baby Jesus, they took all of the lights,
They took every present that was out in plain sight,
From every kid’s school and every town hall,
No Christmas was left… the Blues took it all.

They took it three thousand miles to a California Court
That knew just how to dispose of stuff of this sort.
“Pooh-Pooh to the Reds,” they were Bluishly humming.
“They’re finding out now that no Christmas is coming!
“They’re just waking up, we know just what they’ll do!
“Their mouths will hang open a minute or two
“Then the Reds in the Red States will all cry BOO-HOO.
“That is a sound that we simply must hear!”

Then the Blues put their hands to their ears,
And did hear a sound –but it was their worst fear…
No screaming or crying, just a long thoughtful hush,
As the Reds in the Red States were busy voting for Bush.

The Blues stared at the Red States!
They popped out their eyes!
Then they shook!
What they saw was a shocking surprise!
And the Blues with their feet ice cold in the snow,
Stood puzzling and puzzling: “How could it be so?”
And they puzzled and puzzled for three hours that day,
But the poor Blues learned nothing,
“Those Reds must hate gays.”

Cincinnati Bengals come thru in a pinch

I will admit it right up front. I am a fair weathered Bengals fan. Bungle's...Been gurls...whatever. Anyway, I've noticed that every time I watch them, I think my junior high school football team could beat them.

This season, they haven't done too bad. Not just a winning season, but a decent one. Prior to today's game, they were 11 & 3. So after the family Christmas dinner, we watched the bungles play. And true to form, they bungled it. I stopped watching their games 12 years ago in hopes that maybe they'd win a game every now and then.

So what happens when I watch the game today? It was just like watching games 12 years ago. They stunk. How did they win any games playing like they did today?

At least they lived up to expectations.

Bob Schieffer shows ABC news in $$ crunch.

Last night, the wife & I were watching Cold Case on CBS, when right at the tail end of the program, Bob Scheiffer interrupts the last 3 minutes of the show to give his pre-commentary on President Bush's speech to the nation. What an idiot.

He spends his 3 minutes of blabble reading portions of the NYTimes article about the Bush administration approval of wiretapping anyone and everyone's phone calls after 9/11 to try to catch terrorists who might be up to no good.

I bit my tongue while this dufus read on thru his script. But then something he said got my attention. Well, it was more the way he said it. He said something to the effect of Mr. Bush approved illegal wiretaps of millions of Americans' phone calls.

Hmm. I wonder if any of my phone calls were recorded? I hope so. I could use some of them to win a bet with my friend over whether or not something was said, but I'll forget that for now.

If that really happened, what were the effects? How many people's lives were ruined or destroyed? Hmm. Um. Er.... Well...none that I can remember.

Oh, now what's the big deal, you ask? Well, I'm asking myself the same question. Why is wire tapping such a big deal? Why should millions of Americans care whether or not somebody listened in on one of their phone calls?

I'm still trying to think of a reason.

If you're committing crimes via phone or discussing crimes you committed or crimes you witnessed, then something is amiss.

If you're committing crimes via phone, then I hope you get caught. All you do is cause my rates to go up. If you're discsussing crimes you committed, then I hope you get caught still. I can't remember reading anywhere in our national/state/local laws where you have the right to commit crimes and discuss them in secret over the phone. If you're discussing crimes you witnessed, then you had better have discussed that with someone else in authority so my phone rates will not go up so much.

Somebody please explain to me why the fuss about wiretapping. If they caught anyone trying to commit terrorism with the taps, then more power to them.

The really funny thing is the president did a good job of ignoring Bob Scheiffer.

Oh and how did good old Bob show that ABC news is in a money crunch?

Well, when I'd had about enough of Bob's flapper, I switch the channel over to ABC. And the color was horrendous. I then started to check other channels and everyone else's picture was fine clear, vibrant pictures with proper skin tones.

Did anyone check CNN to see if they posted any black X's or O's over the prez's face?

A Friday funny

While attending a marriage seminar on communication, David and his wife listened to the instructor declare, "It is essential that husbands and wives know the things that are important to each other."

He addressed the man, "Can you describe your wife's favorite flower?"

David leaned over, touched his wife's arm gently and whispered, "Pillsbury All-Purpose, isn't it?"

I demand my rights...

FrankJ of IMAO had an interesting post yesterday on questioning people's patriotism. The comments section got into a discussion on several points, some related directly to the post, some not so related, but nonetheless a good read. A lot of it centered on rights. It will make you think, even if you don't agree with all the viewpoints. I like that about these guys. They had good discourse and no vitriol (but then again, it's early-no libs worked up yet).

How do you determine your rights? What makes a right, or a choice, or an agreement? How do you determine whether you spell it God or G-d or Yahweh or Yhwh? Is it A right to spell the name of the Almighty? Is it right to spell the name of the Almighy?

We only have rights because we accept a higher authority to give us the rights and thus protect us while we excersize them. It only stands to reason that if we grant someone else authority to protect us, that we not mock them while doing so. That's called respect. If you have no respect, you have no patriotism. Liberals expect the right to allow filth to protrude past their tonsils, yet they mock the very ones protecting the right to do so. That's not excersizing rights. It's throwing a tantrum because mom only gave you one cookie instead of 12. It's just a selfish demand.

Where's the respect? Most people excersizing their rights use a little respect. Liberals don't use respect, well only half of it. They demand it, but rarely give it. Maybe to a fellow lib, but that's about it.

Remember when President Bush gave the state of the union when the slain soldier's mother was there? That was one of the most stirring speeches he's given. Did Teddy & Hillary give the prez respect? No, they just squirmed and made faces. Just like little kids.

Liberals have the right to say they're patriotic, whether they are or not. Hillary has the right to say she supports the troops even though she doesn't seem to. Kerry has the right to say he spent Christmas in Cambodia, whether he did or not. Teddy has the right to hold the fifth in his hand instead of pouring it out a shot at a time. It's up to everyone else to decide whether to believe them or excersize the right to question their honesty.

When liberals claim they're being patriotic, I usually assume they're lying because I don't believe they are patriotic. They're good at excersizing their rights, but they're not patriotic.

I say that because they try to destroy any "rights" they don't want me to have. They want the right to speak freely, yet Fox News isn't allowed to question their double standards. They want the right to have bodyguards with heavy weaponry but more and more citizens aren't allowed to have guns. They want to be chauffered around in armored tanklike vehicles large enough to carry the armed bodyguards, but I'm not supposed to have an SUV. They demand to be able to preach their leftist hate, but I'm not allowed to love the sinner, yet hate the sin.

Remember how quickly flying US flags became popular right after the 9/11 attacks? It was a simple physical gesture that could be made to show your support for your nation in a time of crisis. That's patriotism. Then did you notice how quickly the liberals started attacking the mere appearance of flags? That showed me that they not only don't have any patriotism but they actually hate it. And anything that remotely resembles it. Even lapel pins with flags were no-no's.

So, if someone asks you if you're questioning their patriotism, tell them yes. If they don't ask for an explanation as to why you might believe otherwise and start into a tirade, then you can probably bet patriotism doesn't rank high on their personal list. Liberals want to look patriotic, not BE patriotic.

I thank God above that I was allowed to be born into a nation of patriots, to parents that taught me respect and gratitude. There was an old saying I haven't heard in a long time...

America...love it or leave it. That's your right.

Don't forget to write...

While I haven't written a lot lately, it doesn't mean a lot's not going on. Still swamped at work.

Yesterday, I came in to see a bunch of emails where one of my company salesman's laptop was stolen. Wonderful. At least we're not a top secret government research facility. I'd have to activate the special erase command like they did in Silent Thunder. Yeah, right.

Anyway, I wondered how it got stolen. We've had them stolen by breaking windows in cars, windows in the office, stolen off the receiving dock and a few others. How did this one get stolen, you ask?

Out of his friggin luggage. Who in their right mind goes on a plane ride and puts their laptop in the suitcase? Laptop computers do pass some abuse testing, but not the how far can I fling this suitcase across the tarmac by a 300 lb ex-football player test. Jeez, use your brains, people.

I'm a simple person. I don't ask for much, but I do ask that you take care of the equipment assigned to you.

I vote for taking it out of his pay, but we'll give him another one. Matter of fact, he's already called me and sent me email demanding that this replacement be a new one with specific pieces of software on it. I'm thinking he should be thankful I'm not in charge of his reparations. He'd be getting a buggy win98 laptop with a worn out battery in it.

What does this button do?

Wow, I can't believe so much time passed since I last posted. I've been really busy at work and just didn't notice. Uh huh.

For instance, don't use ACT!2006 software. Not on a valuable network pc anyway. I'm trying to phase it out here because I want to use an integrated product in my CRM system. Not a big deal. The old act, which Symantec unloaded on Sage, worked fine. But now, it manages to hose up anything with a SQL tag, target, code or similar bit in it. Jeez, then it won't uninstall.

Helpful hint: Don't try to uninstall 2nd time, it only gets worse. Now, none of my sql things work. DB connections to software, tools such as enterprise mgr, etc doesn't work at all. So far after 3 days of searching, I haven't figured out what it screwed up so badly.

One of my users in the shop decided he was going to use the pay yahoo service for listening to music he uploads or buys from, I'm not sure, since I don't use it. Well, it stopped working and he proceeds to take it out on me. Sent me a nasty email accusing me of not liking blue collar workers. Sheesh, I had a blue polo shirt on that particular day too.

The HR mgr's pc decided to take a dump on my day too. It was having print problems for a long time and I hadn't put my finger on the source yet, but decided that I'd need to just wipe it and reinstall everything to eliminate the time wastage. Well, the reformat resulted in a dead hard drive. Winders wouldn't even mark bad sectors it just quit and said it couldn't finish the format. What a lame OS.

Let's top that with the phone system makes everyone's day so pleasant. Not that it pipes in callers from everywhere, just that it ruthlessly does exactly what you program it to do. I wish they'd make up my mind.

Anyway, it's snowing like crazy and I probably should go contribute my share to slow traffic. Idiots forget how to drive in every time it starts falling. I still want a half track to commute to and from work. Gas mileage? I don't need no stinkin gas mileage.

Have a great day!

The 2006 election campaign has started...

The democrats haven't been known lately as the party of ideas, even if they claim it. They usually hear something and just repeat it. I guess the thing to remember is somebody had to say it the first time in order for the dunderheads to repeat it so much.

But I must give them credit for their recent efforts at electioneering. If you can't get your candidate elected on his own credit or worthiness, what's the next best thing to do? That's right, destroy your opponents credit and worthiness. It's kinda like the little stupid argument you used to use as a kid....I know you are but what am I?

Let's face it. The democrats are in trouble. They've lost way too many seats in both houses of congress and need it back badly. They're not in control and they're like a child in the grocery store checkout that was just told no, he can't have all that candy. Waaaaaaaaaaa.

So, what I'm talking about is the current state of affairs with the democrats who are crying in the checkout lane trying to use those cries to destroy their opponents.

I'm talking about the war in Iraq. (God bless those guys. God bless our government for trying to install some civility in an uncivil part of the world.)

The democrats think you're stupid enough to believe them when they say they were tricked into voting for the war in Iraq. But be careful. What they're not telling you is they're the stupid ones. All they're really mad about is the fact that millions of tax dollars are being spent on a republican program, not a democrat one. They don't care one inkling about the citizens of Iraq, the armed forces we have there trying to install peace, nor the citizens of this country who happen to believe this is the right thing to do.

"There's no weapons of mass destruction", they whine. Silly me. Whatever made me think that? Even if you disagree with what I've typed you have to admit that the democratic party is really trying to pull the wool over your eyes with this approach.

They've given up on trying to get you to just vote for them because they're the better party. Hey, I used to be a democrat, but thanks to Howard Metzenbaum and John Glenn's shinannigans, I converted several years ago. I found out they really aren't out for me, just my tax revenue so they can spend it on stupid projects like funding art exihibits that offend virtually everyone on the planet.

I'm sure Hillary has a pee soaked picture hanging in her dining room this very instant. Bet it smells wonderful too.

So, if you wonder what's up with all this complaining, they're just warming up for the 2006 election cycle.

Don't vote for them. It only encourages more stupidity.