Don' t Know How or Why She puts up with Me!

Well, December the 28th has come and gone, and I'm still here in the house with the same lady I married 45 years ago! 'Twas not an auspicious beginning, and all the nay sayers were predicting a very short run from the gate. HAH! Just shows, just how wrong some people can be. Of course the fact that she tried to "off" me twelve hours after the marriage might have been a contributing factor to their observations! Well, that's the story the way "I" tell it. Hers is a slightly different version. But as I am in control of the keyboard, you get my version.

We tied that knot about about 2100 on the 28th and in just about 12 hours later, I had my new bride out in the back yard and was instructing her on the proper way to load, aim, and fire a very nice Hi Standard single action, nine shot revolver. After standing beside her and getting the stance just right, and the noisy end of the gun pointed in the general direction of some old light bulbs placed on the side of a hill about twenty yards away, I said to her,"cock the hammer back till it locks, aim, finger on the trigger and gentle pull till it goes off". All was going according to plan till it got to the "pull the trigger" phase. At that point she turns to me and says, "I can't do this"! Finger is still on the trigger and loud end is now pointed at me when the sear released and a .22 cal slug was on it's way to meet me! Entered right thigh, exited through the knee. I went down just like I had been shot with a cannon! She hollers at me, "Stop doing that, it is not funny"! Well I finally convinced her I wasn't "funnin'" and we called the Local Rescue Squad. Off to the Doctors office for temporary repair and then off in a Navy helo dispatched from NAS Quonset Point to haul my still young Sailor ass off too the Newport Naval Hospital. While there for two weeks I was the center of attention as every single person in the whole place, doctors, nurses, corpsmen, and even patients, and the kitchen workers wanted a look at that guy whose wife initiated divorce proceeding with a gun! Most comments revolved around the theme of "disappointment" after the wedding night!

Okay, that's the story we told everybody, even all four of our kids for years till I finally had to 'fess up and tell what really happened. It's like this. We were out in the back but I was demonstrating my prowess with the aforementioned piece, in the art of "quick draw" and fire at those light bulbs that she was launching into the air for me to hit. As all of you gun nuts might surmise, my actions consisted of grabbing the butt of the gun, ahem---, holding the trigger back as the thumb pulled the hammer back and when the muzzle was aligned with the target, let the hammer slide out from under your thumb. Bang!! Bulb explodes! Hooray, I'm a Wyatt Earp!

Next try, procedure was going along fine till front sight, which I had forgotten to remove, snags on the holster, jerking thumb off hammer with the predictable result. Bullet went in right where I said it did and came out as also described previously, and with the same results. So, after recovery and release from the hospital, I was off too my new duty station up in Maine as a SERE instructor. For some reason they didn't want me any where near a rifle or a machine gun unless it had a BFA attached to the business end!

It has been an absolutely wonderful, loving, on both our parts, and satisfying relationship that produced four of the very best kids anyone could hope for. It had it's trying times, as in me going on various extended "cruises" for 9-12 months at a time, and leaving her in places where she knew no one, on her own, to raise those kids as best she could. As a young "Navy wife" she did it very well, and with outstanding results as far as I can see, for all the twenty years I was in! Living off the base and, "on the local economy" as it was called back then, she became adept at stretching our meager funds to the very limit. She has kept us out of the poor house for all this time together. Now, some of you who know her might understand why it is her vociferously voiced desire for the people who spend our tax dollars to be totally accountable for their actions!!

So Sweetheart, Happy 45th Anniversary and hope to see you for #46!! TIFN

Help! It snowed in my yard and I can't move!! Help!! Help!!

And with that title staring at you, you have some inkling of an idea of what kind of mentality has beseiged the people of this 2nd most corrupt state!

It snowed here a few days ago, anywhere from 2 inches to the 10 inches in the "higher elevations", that would be Foster-Gloster. But because the weather guessers didn't tell us soon enough,(they gave ONLY two days warning), how deep it would be in each individual yard across the state, why, we were totally unprepared for the unorganized chaos, is there any other kind?, that enveloped the whole state of RI. Apparently there was NOT EVEN ONE teleconference between ALL the business owners, The Governor and ALL his various minions, the National Guard, All the police departments, ALL school Superintendants and Principals AND Custodians, and every single plow driver in the state! And because of this gross miscarraige of group communication, every body decided to go home at the same time!! What the hell is going on here? Why didn't someone in authority TEXT ME and tell me just at exactly which minute of the day I was SUPPOSED to start heading home? How the hell am I supposed to be able to make that decision without at least 40 or 50 other PC people to help me with the deliberations? I am at a complete loss here trying to understand how the breakdown in communications was so total and so devastating to the people of RI. I also know that it is going to take many trips to the physche doctor to enable me to get past this latest influx of PTSD into my being! Thats Post Traffic Stress Disorder folks!

So, removing the tongue from the cheek I am here to ask, just when the hell did it happen that the people of this state, and country became such dissolute, lame brained, useless sheep, that have to be led by the nose in order to make a decision or a move on their own? When did they fall into the trap that they MUST have a 'Big Brother" to plan their every move? When was it that thinking for yourself, protecting yourself, fending for yourself, and every OTHER "for yourself" became passe in this culture? Somewhere, sometime in your life, you have to take a little responsibility for your self and your actions and quit pissing and moaning 'cause some one else wasn't there to wipe your nose and ass for you! Do it your own damn self! I tell you folks, I am really and truly fearful for the continued survival of this country and it's denizens. I can see our descendants morphing into H.G.Wells' Eloi and Moreloc's if they don't shitcan this Politically Correct bullshit mindset that has infected this whole population. Keep on leaning so far to the left, and sure enough,you are going to wind up on your ass, flat on your back, with a great big Jackboot grinding you into the dirt!

And BTW, have a MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR and stuff that happy holiday crap where it will never see the light of day again!! TIFN

Democracy, Rise and fall of in America

I read somewhere recently, can’t seem to find it to quote it, about an English Historian from the17th century who was telling of the rise and fall of the various democracies that have arisen in the world and then their fall into just past history. He gave a few reasons of why they collapsed. There were a lot of them that are very recognizable as they are happening again today in this country. The one that finally brought an end to most of them, was when the populace discovered that they could by right of voting, deliver too themselves for personal gain, a piece of the public treasury! This was the final step, or straw as it were that eventually broke the back of these governments.

Do you see any parallels in the US here today? Earmarks by the “folks” that guide and make our laws that help only “selected” portions of our population instead of all? All sorts of “benefits” to themselves as our legislators? You know, free healthcare forever paid by you, free mail service paid by you, interest free loans paid by you and the list goes on ad nauseam. These are the people that will eventually be responsible for the end of democracy in the US. All because of their personal greed, although they will ALWAYS espouse to you that the only reason they have come into public life is to look out for YOUR interests! Yeah, right!

According to polls conducted by lots of various entities, most of the people of this country are highly dissatisfied with the performance of the US Congress, Senate and House! The last one I looked at said only about 17% of us were happy with their doings. You can bet they were the recipients of their Congressmen and Senators largesse. So what are the other 83% of us to do in order to fix this mix mash of incompetents, drunks, good ole boy networks, and just plain crooks?

Part of it can be done by dismantling the good ole boy infrastructure. How do you do that you ask? You do it by setting term limits for both houses. Two terms for each person in each house, and then you are out, just like the president! If you don’t have to spend your time kissing ass and sucking up to the committee chairman in order to achieve things, then maybe you could spend all your time building consensus among your cohorts on items of NATIONAL interest, and getting them passed! Four years as a Congressman should suffice, as well as twelve as a Senator!

So you say that in reality there will never be term limits set because the incumbents won’t do it! And you would be absolutely right. They won’t do it with out some sort of coercion. What is it we can use to make them do it? It is really simple. You do not vote for ANY incumbent in the next election. You let them, as well as the aspirants to their office, know in advance that if they do not get the term limits set in the next session of congress, they also will be out on their ass’s in the NEXT election! We just have to get off our lazy ass’s and DO SOMETHING about it! They all believe that once they attain this seat it is theirs by right of possesion for as long as they want it! Well it is time to stand up on our hind legs and let them know differently.

I can hear the argument already that there will be no continuity with people coming and going so fast. Fast? Two, four, or six, or twelve years is fast? Well the type of continuity that we have had for the past forty or fifty years is way overdue for a drastic revamping. I’m not talking about dumping members of only one party either. There is guilt and conspiracy enough in both the parties to go around.

So if you 83% really want to change the stagnated system for the better, this would be a good place for a grass roots type of action to begin. Form local action committees for the express purpose of letting those incumbents and those that want to be, just exactly what we would expect of them solely with regard to the term limits question. This isn’t going to work though if only one or two states follow through. It has to come from a broad spectrum of the people from all across the country. So spread the word as to what we the people want to happen. Personally, I read quite a few blogs that are in turn read by hundreds of thousands if not millions of folks all over America. I am going to forward this little rant to all that I read and hope that they will put it out there for all to see. Then if they really care about their, as well as their children and grandchildren’s future, they will take this to heart and run with it! It can be done and it is in dire need of being done!

Fire in the Wheel Well!! err, On the beach anyway!

Well now, two blogs down from here, I was lamenting about how a lot of our ponds were being overcome with nasty assed bushes. And that this presents a hazard to ALL homeowners out here as there are only a dozen or so fire hydrants on the Island and they are mostly all located in the downtown area.

So last night about nine o'clock all the pagers carried by all firemen and rescue workers blared into action to announce that there was a house on fire over on Coast Guard road. So we rolled every piece of equipment we owned and the first truck was on scene within four minutes of the pagers going off. By the time they got there the place was fully involved as the saying goes. There were flames pouring out of every window in the place. The house is situated on a small semi peninsula and has the Atlantic on one side about 50 yards away, and the New Harbor, (known in recent arrivee's vernacular as, "THE GREAT SALT POND") on the other side about the same distance to the water.

Now even with the the Atlantic to try and empty, which we did try to do for three solid hours of pumping, 'twas all to no avail. The fire just had too much of a head start. So the best we could do was to contain the grass fires that threatened to spread to other houses out there, and watch the place be reduced to a pile of ashes worth exactly nothing. Previous to the fire, it was a brand new two story house worth about three and a half million bucks or so I'm told!! It was within a few days work of being ready to move into. All gone in three or four hours!

It was not owned by any of my family or even close friends, but for some reason, a "frisson" ran through me and it was as if I could feel the incomprehensible loss of all those folks in La La Land at the loss of their homes in the recent fires out there. Having one so close to home happen, it brings home the reality that it CAN happen to you with startling speed! It gives you a whole new perspective on how devastated those folks must have felt at the loss of every damned thing they owned!

It was a beautiful house ,outside as well as inside. My sympathies go out to the Raymond family. They were a long time gas customer of mine and are a very nice family!

I Can"t Stand it Any Longer!

Have you noticed that Mr.& Mrs. DoomandGloom have been noticeably and conspicuiously absent from the airwaves in the last month or two. I refer to Brian Williams(NBC) and Her Doomness Katie Couric (CBS). And also the ABC guy whoever he is. I never watch him. You may have noticed that the War in Iraq has become yesterdays old news now that there are 80 to 90 percent less attacks on Our military, the Iraqi police, and mostly on the citizens themselves. Seems like Al-Queda(sp) is on vacation and has been for a good long time! Every night for the last three or four years all those MSM talking heads who have lead off virtually every evening broadcast with some horrific tale of our guys being torn to shreds by the latest IED blast. Oh my God, our youth, every one of them, to hear those poor mourning, and devastated TH's (Talking Heads) tell it, are going to be killed in the next few months for having the temerity to join our military and doing something that most of them are too chicken shit to do themselves! Remember that big footprint of a foul/fowl they use to emblazon on their shirts? Describes them most accurately.

So what is going on Mr. and Mrs Doomness? Why aren't you on the air now that the "surge" is doing exactly what The "most dishonorable" Gen. Patreaus said he hoped to accomplish with it? Where are your lead stories telling the people of this country about all the good things going on over there now? Why are you NOT now linking up with one of the only honest reporters over there to cover his story about the Christian church in Dora, a suburb of Baghdad? That church just recently reopened after the Al-Queda crew had been run out of town, after killing most of the Christians and a good part of the Sunni and Shiites also? Why don't you tell of people of the neighborhood, all Iraqi's who are asking publicly for their previous neighbors to please come home!! "We are holding your homes in trust waiting for you to come home and claim them". These people, all denominations went before cameras located INSIDE this Christian church and are deliberately letting their faces be shown. Something they would never have done a few months ago. How come you have nothing to say about the fact that some of the American soldiers that sat through a full two hour Catholic Mass with those Shiite's, and Sunni people have been thanked a thousand times for getting rid of Saddam and the Al-Q hoodlums. This is a BIG story that has been covered in most of the European press, but seems to have been totally missed by you and your compatriots in mis-information! NOT ONE WORD by you folks! Try hooking up with this link if you are at all interested in performing truly unbiased news stories not colored by your own heartfelt desire for this country to slip sideways and hard too the left and into a socialist state.
Micheal Yon : Online Magazine.com

Then back here on the home front, we have the Dumocrats trying to pull the wool over the eyes of the American Public by AGAIN putting forth a bill that would in effect stop all funding for the war effort. This, to make all you folks blindly following the "Axis of Evil" in our congress, Clinton, Pelosi, Kennedy, Murtha, Reid, et al, believe that they are going to stop this war by hook or by crook. Well it is the Crook part that won out. In a little secret caucus that they had, they figured out where they could "steal" the money needed to continue the fighting by taking from pete to pay paul. This was all on the sly so that all the "sheep" out there in heartland America wouldn't be aware of what was going on. You would be lead to believe they were living up to their claims before the last election to "STOP THIS UNLAWFUL WAR" But there is at least one honorable man in DC and that would be Mr. Gates of the DOD. I believe he made known to the "Axis" powers in a rather forceful manner yesterday that he was not going to let them gut programs that are deemed essential to the security of the US without a fight in order to deceive the American public. When he told them that he would be sure and let the American public know just where the money was coming from to continue the fight after they had so loudly told the people they would stop the war, the vote in the Senate failed to pass the proposed bill! Again!! The perfidy of these people is just unbelievable! When Gates told them that if the bill passed, he was going to have to start laying off thousands of civilian DOD workers just before Christmas to "find" this money to continue the fight with, that announcement caused the dumocrats to go into full "Cover Our Asses" mode! So here I am wondering just what spin the dumocrats are going to come up with in order to cover their asses in this little fiasco. OBTW, Have you seen any of this on the MSM? NO, and you won't either. You have to go the Blogosphere to get real answers. Try this link for starters: "http://www.pajamasmedia.com">www.pajamasmedia.com. Just highlight the link, right click, press copy, then go to Google or whatever and paste it in the search bar. I'm not smart enough to embed these links into this post.Or maybe this one:IBDeditorials.com. Once you get to this one, Scroll down to the Editorial called, "Progress, Progress, and more Progress" You will be amazed. BTW, this site puts up editorials from the left and the right so everyone can find one to their own liking.

Does anybody out there care about this anymore?

Fire Water!

Have you noticed that ALL the ponds on the Island are slowly being infiltrated by swamp willows and Phragmities?(sp). Over the past 35 years, since I got out of the Navy and returned too the Island, and traveled ALL the roads every day in the pursuit of making a living, I have watched as virtually every single pond has lost a lot of their open water! Just take a ride around the Island and you'll see what I mean.

SO what you may ask. And my answer is, as we have only a limited amount of fire hydrants, and they are all located in the downtown area, what are the people in the outlying places going to use for a firefighting supply when their house catches on fire? That 5000gal tank truck is going to run out pretty fast in a fast burning house. And how far will he have to go to find a pond that can be accessed by the truck to get a refill? Almost all of them are surrounded by a ring of bushes, poison ivy, briar's, and vines, that make it virtually impossible to get to, especially with a fire truck!

The ever-so-vigilant, and in their own minds, knowledgeable biologists, sitting behind their desks in Providence, have MANDATED that there must be a minimum 50 foot buffer around each and every pond on the Island. Why? Why to contain all that runoff from rain running downhill and into the pond carrying all that dastardly dirt and deiterus (sp) and contaminating the water! Jeez, all the time I lived here as a kid and for the past two or three hundred years before that when all the land was cleared and farmed right down to the waters edge, there was no contamination of the water! Oh yeah, I forgot, there were not so many people putting artificial fertilizer on their fields and lawns. Duh--- Just how many are doing that right now at a level that would contaminate a pond I wonder?

Rob Lewis and myself used to have a wonderful little pond that abutted both our properties, and was home to all sorts of wild life. There used to be two different kinds of frogs in it as well as turtles, musk rats, ducks, small fish, and innumerable birds around it. In the 70's we saw what was happening to it and made application to the infamous DEM to clear out all the swamp willows that were overtaking it and driving it into oblivion. Well those people in their infinite wisdom denied the application because they said we would be "hindering" the natural transformation of the area from free running stream and pond, to an open and viable grassland environment! Well it has been well and truly "hindered" as of now. It is nothing more than a sluggish pitiful stream of water, running through an impenetrable forest of phragmities, swamp willows and briar's that is home to nothing more than millions of mosquito's with no natural predators to restrict their "unhindered" growth! This, the treatment of a man who was more concerned with the environment, and who has done more to preserve it, than three quarters of those folks just protecting their unneeded jobs.

So where does this leave us? I think that it is time for the Town Council and the Fire Department to get together and demand that these bureaucrats step out of the way and let us open up access to these ponds and keep them clear of the invasive growth that is slowly killing all of them and depriving the Island home owners of a ready supply of fire fighting water! Just look around you and try and determine just where the BIFD would lay their hoses in order to fight a fire in your home! Good luck to most of you the way it stands now! So if you are a home owner and you are in a place that needs a pond opened up, or cleaned out, write a letter to the TC demanding that they do something to give a modicum of protection to YOUR two or three million dollar home!!TIFN

Imminent loss of marker

If you go down the neck past the Beachead Rest. on the right you will come across a stone marker that refers to old BI history. Well I just happened to notice today that there is a pretty good sized washout hole passing directly under the middle of the marker base! If someone doesn't get it taken care of fairly soon, after a few more good rain storms, it will probably crack in half and dump the stone down on the rock pile in front of it! Guess I'll call the Town Hall and see if anyone gives a damn

Also, have you noticed the proliferation of access points to the beach this year? Seems like people just climbed over the dunes where ever they damned well pleased with NO REGARD as to the damage they were doing to our last bastion from the sea. Right past the monument referred too above, is a nice big one! It will most likely get washed out right back to the edge of the road during the next good Northeaster we get! It beats the hell out of me why the town cannot designate a FEW places for access and then make it stick!! They do this in almost every other beach community I have looked at. Are we so afraid of hurting a day-trippers feelings that we can't assess a fine for non-compliance of the rules! And the people who buy and own houses here are not much better! You'd think that as they profess that this is the place they would most like to be because of it's natural beauty etc.,they would be more conscious of what they are helping to contribute too! LOSS OF THE FREAKING DUNES!! Then comes the water. We may soon have two Block Islands if we subscribe to Oracle ALgore's discription of the immenient demise of us all due to drowning!

I would think that the TC could spend a few bucks for some well placed and excecuted signage that would lay out the access routes to the beach, and the penalties imposed for willful disregard of the same! In the places where you have to pass thru the dunes, those roll-up wooden slats held together with rope would go far toward keeping the people ON the path to righteousness! And they could be taken up in the winter if need be. I guess TIFN!

Rock Castles on the beach 

Castles in the sky

Fruits on BI-

NO! Not that kind! This has no relation to the last post.

This time I'm talking about the kind that grow on trees. This has been one exceptional year for all kinds of fruit trees. I have two different kinds of plumb trees and they put out bumper crops this summer. Also the peach tree that usually only has a few small and diseased looking examples, has been loaded with peaches as big as any you could buy at the store! And they tasted even better.

After riding all over the Island on my little "Mope-a-dope" (moped)and partaking of at least one apple from all those hanging over the road, and some in peoples back yard, it has to be noted that they are generally, much larger than usual, sweeter, even the ones supposed to NOT be, and with far less surface blemishes than most other years!

So why is that happening this time? I haven't seen anyone out spraying or pruning them. I'm thinking it has to do with the dry summer we have had and not much else! Anybody else got an idea or two?

Windpower Redux

I under stand from this weeks BIT, that there was a poll out there waiting to be taken regarding how local folks felt about the possibility of quite a few windmills mushrooming offshore between here and Montauk. I don't have the paper in front of me, but as I recall, 216 is the number of respondents participating in the survey. Out of that number, 74 were dead set against the possibility. I would venture to say that that particular group were the ones with the deepest pockets to whom(?) a $800-900 a month electric bill is chump change. I would further suggest that they are the ones who rail against ruining their "view-sheds". Now there is a yuppie word that I heartily detest!
The rest of we "poorer denizens" of BI would welcome a less greedy grab into our more shallow pockets at he expense of having to see a few (score?)WECS off to the southwest of the Island.

It has continued to amaze me that the majority of the people of this town, and the US as a whole, cannot see or WILL NOT see the writing on the wall as regards use of the good old fossil fuel for electricity. I am heartened to note that there are folks out there who continue to look for new ways of generating electricity. How about the one by a scientist trying to develop a way of delivering radioisotopes to cancer cells in order to save his wife's life, and accidentally separated ordinary sea water into it's two main component parts, Hydrogen and Oxygen? Then he funneled the resultant gas to a small Stirling steam engine and made it run and produce that greatest in demand of commodities, electricity!! The story is out there on the Internet with pictures and text. I wonder just which of the big oil companies have already bought the rights to that invention that we'll never see in production!!

So don't let anyone tell you that wind power is just a fad that will soon fade away. Not anytime soon! I have had a WECS, Wind Energy Conversion System, sitting in my yard and running virtually continuously for the last 26 YEARS! There have been short down times because of maintenance and blade replacement(2), and one major PREVENTATIVE event where it was sent back to the manufacturer for a good overhaul. In that time, it has generated according to my meter in the cellar, over 320 some K's of electricity! We have used most of that right here on the premises. We have NOT been attentive to the strict conservation of the juice, because it was being made far faster than we could use it! Even using all the electric appliances we had on particularly windy days. The excess went back into the grid to be used by others. BIPCO pays us a rather minuscule amount for what we put back, and then charges other users, and myself the exorbitant rates to buy it back when the wind, she no blow eh? Translate that 320+ K figure into dollars at the rates over the last 26 years and you can see where wind power is an absolutely viable commodity, as the people of Scandinavia and the Low countries of Europe have discovered a long time ago. They are so far ahead of us as to make our efforts to catch up look pitifully and painfully inadequate to say the least.

So come on all ye who are sick and tired of, and becoming more unable to pay the high rates for juice, break out your computers, typewriters?, pens, and pencils, and draft a letter of recommendation to the Town Council to go forward as fast as is possible with the implementation of the wave generators and the installation of as many WECS as possible! Get rid of the WECS ordinance as it is presently written because it benefits NO ONE except those aforementioned deep pocketed people who really don't give one good shit about YOU, or me!!!

It's Not about Marriage

I got this from a friend in New Mexico and it expresses my sentiments totally. I also don't CARE about your sexuality or lack thereof, but please do not shove it in my face! As I said, I don't care! Enjoy the read. The author, Dave Stoddard, is retired U.S. Border Patrol. He lives in SE ARizona.

Ordinarily I write about border related issues. But late last year I wrote a satiric article about Arizona's Representative Jim Kolbe and I included a letter I had written to him in which I claimed that I wanted to marry my horse.

You would not believe the hate mail generated. It came from all over the world, so I am sure it struck a homosexual nerve. This article should really fire them up.

I could not care less what two consenting adults do behind closed doors. It simply does not concern me. But, keep it off my T.V., out of my schools, away from my family and out of my face. Keep it to yourself. I don't want to know about it.

It seems that in every direction you look today the homosexual agenda is plastered everywhere promoted by the courts, the National Education Association, the ACLU, sundry special interest groups and even some apostate churches.I am sick of it. It is not normal. It is a perversion, an aberration, a deviancy and it is repugnant. It is a behavior that is dangerous and simply out of sync with natural and spiritual values.

Yet, if you are repulsed by homosexual behavior, (Notice I haven't mentioned homosexuals. The few homosexuals I have known were and are amiable, pleasant and even likeable), but, their behavior is simply appalling.

A phobia is defined as an "unreasonable fear". You can have an unreasonable fear of practically anything and many people have phobias. Yet, if you are disgusted by homosexual behavior you are "homophobic". How so? Not only are you homophobic you are a bigot. Why? Since homosexuality is a behavior there is no way to look at someone and determine he or she is homosexual. It has to be communicated by word, action or clothing. The orientation must be communicated, confessed or flaunted. How can that be bigotry? It is not likely that a homo will suddenly appear and terrorize anyone. Again I ask, "Why is failure to embrace homosexual behavior a phobia?" Let's not equate disgust, aversion, and repulsion with unreasonable fear.

I received an email from one fellow who actually believed that I wanted to marry my horse. He chastised me and stated that I couldn't morally engage in bestiality because animals can't give consent. However, all humans can give consent, even children. Wrong, moron! Pedophilia is not just morally wrong, it is a crime, and it is sickening and disgusting.

Another individual pointed out to me that homosexuality exists in the animal kingdom and that it is natural and therefore normal and acceptable. He used, as an example, two male penguins in a New York zoo that fell in love and hatched out an egg. (As I remember, some dude used this event to write a children's book touting the homosexual lifestyle). Wrong Twinkletoes! It is the male penguin who spends weeks in the Antarctic cold hatching the chick while the mother forages for food. When the mother returns, the baby penguin is already hatched and then the father walks to the ocean to feed. It is the male penguin's job to hatch the egg. Nothing homo about that.

Then I was told about the phenomenon of bulls mounting one another as evidence of "gayness" in animals. Wrong, Donkey Breath! Nothing unnatural about that either. Cattle can't tell by sight which is the opposite sex. They are not bright enough to see a difference. Bulls are stimulated to mating behavior by pheromones. Cows in heat emit an odor that drives the bull crazy. The same is true with most mammals. Simply because a pen full of young bulls engage in mounting behavior does not mean they are homosexual bulls. It does mean that there is at least one cow close by who is in heat.

Then another told me about love. Love between humans is beautiful, natural and to be celebrated. This includes homosexual love. Wrong, Rump Ranger! Unnatural sex between humans is lust. There is huge difference between love and lust. It is so easy to get confused when values are blurred by predators and perverts preying on emotionally disturbed and vulnerable individuals. Many are damaged for a lifetime.

Then I had an example of fish that change gender. It is true that there are fish species that will literally change gender when confined in a small pool where there are none of the opposite sex. This is a mechanism provided by nature to preserve the fish specie in pools of water that have become isolated. These fish actually change their sex and they reproduce. They do this without hormone injections and surgery. It has nothing to do with "gender identity disorder".

There is not one example of true homosexuality in the animal kingdom despite what the liberal media is telling you. But somehow, if you do not accept, endorse, and applaud homosexual behavior, you are excoriated as some kind of bigoted, homophobic Neanderthal.

It has become an issue of civil rights. They want a "civil right" to expose hetero-Americans and children to immoral, unnatural and dangerous behavior. A homosexual has every civil right I do. So, it is not about civil rights. It is not about diversity and tolerance. That is unless diversity and tolerance means that we sacrifice our convictions and beliefs on the altar of political correctness and accept homosexuality as equal to heterosexuality and not at all unnatural or immoral. To homos we must endorse it, applaud it, accept it and we cannot teach our children that it is wrong or we are bigoted homophobes and people to be scorned and ridiculed.

Recently the House of Representatives passed HR-1592, the so called "Hate Crimes Legislation". It is currently being considered and strengthened in the Senate. Senator Kennedy, as expected, has some amendments. Soon it may be against the law to write what I have written here. It might even become illegal to voice Christian beliefs, since the Christian God has stated that homosexuality is an abomination.
President Bush has indicated that he will not sign the legislation. If he follows through and vetoes the Hate Crimes Bill, what about the next President?
Massachusetts has already legalized same sex marriage. Immediately hundreds of homos flocked to Massachusetts to get married. Then many of them went back to their home states and filed for divorce hoping that other states would recognize a same sex marriage from another state thereby legitimizing same sex marriages. If it were solely about marriage, why don't they just stay married and be happy?
It's not about marriage. It is not about civil rights, diversity or any related thing. It is about recognition, validation, acceptance, legitimizing and embracing homosexuality and eliminating existing values and mores. Homosexuals want to feel good about themselves. They want to be celebrated and applauded based on a behavior. They can't feel good about themselves until they leave that behavior. It is not genetic. If there were a genetic factor, it would have been eliminated from the gene pool many generations ago. It is not a hormonal imbalance, (unless hormones are being injected).
Homosexuality is a spiritual disease. It can be cured spiritually and there are many former homosexuals attesting to this fact.

Amen Brothers and Sisters, TIFN!!!

Superman

If you are looking for something to read for a few minutes, go over to the right side of this page and scroll down till you get to the 'links' part and click on Michael Yon's online magazine. Then read the newest dispatch called "superman". This guy has been there in Iraq for most of two years or more. If you want to know what is really happening over there, read some of his previous dispatches. He tells it like it IS and not just gloss and bullshit like the MSM. They tell us every day how many of our kids are being killed over there and we need to get the hell out of there! Funny but you don't hear very much about the 6000 teen age drivers that get killed here in the US every damned month!! I wonder just what their frame of reference might be for that statistic? Another two 16 year old girls killed in a smashup, ho hum, four die in an IED explosion in Iraq, Holy shit! the Army, Navy, Marines, all the military is destroying our nations youth!!! Katy Couric needs to get a dose of reality shoved down her throat!! TIFN

Inside tour of the hotel

As I obviously haven't figured out how to get the writing on the right photo, at the period at the end of each short blurb, apply it to the preceding photo! There, that ought to confuse the hell out of you! It did to me!!Bowling alley will be up here!! Thats it for this one.
Master bedroom, all are about the same except for size. All have big closets and two windows, so lots of light!.
Downstairs full bath.
Guess where?.
Standing in stove "slot" looking into living room.
Rest of livingroom and front door facing Old Town Road
Looking back at slider and into kitchen.
Standing inside slider looking into part of dining/living room.
This is a view with the siding being installed after the "scup way" was built on.

Outside Views of the Hotel being set in place

The roof is unfolded here and the gable ends being installed. The nummbers didn't wind up on each pic, but you get the idea. Now that Sam got me on the right track, I'll do an inside tour in the next post. Then after a week or so I'm going to take both posts down as they do use up a lot of space!
4
#3
#2
This was the first box set in place

Disapperance!

Been gone for a while as I am spending quite a lot of time in that HOTEL out in front of my house!! The sheet rocking and taping of the joints where the boxes came together is all done and awaiting the paint. The floors on both levels now have their covering installed. It looks like oak flooring but is a composite material that just snaps together like a puzzle. It sits on top of a layer of some sort of foam and this gives the floor a bit of resilience so that it doesn't feel like cement! Door thresholds are all in except for two on main floor. Home made out of 3/4 inch red oak, screwed and plugged and four coated with poly-U.

All the doors and room baseboards are trimmed and waiting paint. No cellar stairs from the inside yet. All the exterior covering is sitting on the stringers! Up stairs bathroom is awaiting it's finish till the rest of house is complete. Bottom floor one is getting it's tile put down as I write this. Electric service entrance and meter receptacle are ready and waiting for the wires from the pole and the meter.

As you can see driving by, the corner boards and trim are in the process of installation as well as the Hardi-board siding. It is going kind of slow, but with all the starts and stops to take care of "other" business interests, it continues apace. That stuff is pretty amazing. It is made out of cement and some sort of fiber that gives it strength and flexibility. It is cut when necessary, from the back side and the cutting tool of choice looks and acts just like a pair of metal cutting "nibbler" shears! It cuts a pretty darn straight line too, as long as your hand is fairly steady! Supposed to last forever but who knows, haven't met anyone who has been around for that long yet, although I'm trying.

All the plumbing materials are in the basement and are crawling around on the floor sorting themselves out and lining themselves up so that all we have to do is to apply a little glue and some strategically placed hangars, and viola! Water! Now I do understand that water and electricity don't mix well, so we are doing our best to keep them separated and in their respective conduits.

Having worked with Bob Rose on a house or two after I had retired from the Navy, and having done some remodeling on my house, I thought I knew about how long it would take to finish the "putting together" of this modular house. NOT SO! It took those house setter guys just six hours to place the thing on the foundation, a few more to screw it together, and then they were gone! From the rate of progress that we are advancing, it will probably be another few weeks before we are done!! Then there is the landscaping to be done and in which I am having NO PART! Shovels and rakes don't fit my hand too good anymore.

Kirk invites anyone interested to stop by for a tour of the hotel if you are so inclined. Been about a hundred so far! TIFN

Pelosi's Peccadillio

"The Nancy" told us all during the last election process that she was going to "clean up" the congress and stop all these "earmarks" during the first 100 hours of her reign. Well that actually happened, but it only lasted for four months! Her fellow crooks in congress led by big John Murtha just had the word put out to the troops that it was ok to go back to "porking", just don't add it to the pending bills till just before they are to come up for debate in the House and Senate! Then there is only ONE HOUR allowed to discuss the bill before the vote! Not enough time to discredit the flagrant ones before the vote MUST be taken according to the house rules! So all her name calling of the folks on the other side of the isle is just that, blathering! She has shown her true colors AGAIN, by allowing this, nay encouraging this ability of her cohorts to stick their hands in your pockets and just TAKE whatever amount of money they feel entitled too on that particular day! Her "stripe" is no different that the rest of the crooks in Congress, R or D! So I say again, at the next election and the two following that, DO NOT RE-ELECT ANY INCUMBENT!! That place needs a through house cleaning. Right on down too the office personnel who run the place day to day. Comments anyone??

Is Something amiss-ing at the Town Hall?

So, what is happening at the Town Hall these days? Things were rolling right along and looking good. But in the last few weeks, things have come to a standstill as far as I can see. I heard today that the clerk of the works has departed for points far to the west, Hawaii, for the next two years. Is that to be taken as an indication that the process down there will be ongoing for another two years also?

What is going on? Has the contractor left the job? Why? Non-payment from the Town? I have no idea and am just asking. There is something seriously amiss with the whole job so the little birdies have been whispering to me. How come, through out the whole construction phase there has been no public fiscal accounting of the expenditures for the job? Why was there no bond posted for the job, and why only for THIS particular endeavor. Who is counting the chickens at night and making sure they are roosting where they are supposed to be?

I think that with all the fiscal responsibility that the present Town Council has shown, that it might behoove them to demand a full and accurate accounting of where things stand money wise with this project and with the school project. As in with numbers on a piece of paper, NOT delivered orally! How come,if there large deficits in the funds to pay for completion of the new Hall, why were they not put into the last financial Town Meeting warrant so they could be paid. I'm told those deficits run to upwards of $800,000.00! Could this be true?

It is time for the Council to DEMAND answers and solutions to all these un-requited problems. It appears to me, as an outsider looking in, that there is a large dose of mis-management, or should I say NO management going on down there! Is it time for a new hand on the reins? This horse appears to have the bit in it's teeth, and is headed wherever it damned well pleases!

There now, is THIS better than bitching about hats, entitlements, and all that kind of stuff. Let's hear from all you concerned people out there. No Nasty name calling though. Be civil! TIFN

Uncouth Youth

I went out to breakfast this morning up at the 1661 Inn. It is of course Mothers Day and the in-house mother had been invited out to eat by the newest mother in the family, her husband, and their daughter. So off we go to the best place on the Island for a quiet breakfast, in a very nice location and with Old Island ambiance.

When we entered the building through the lobby, my attention was immediately drawn to FOUR (4) different YOUNG men in the dining room and at the buffet table. The reason for the attraction? All four of them were seated at four different tables with their significant others, and each one of them was wearing a HAT! At the table! In a dining room! In someone Else's "house"! Has this society finally gone over the edge and begun it's slow slide to oblivion?

The blatant disregard for the MOST BASIC rules of etiquette are routinely ignored by the group of people of my children's generation and the upcoming one. The wearing of a hat indoors was and is a huge no-no to my generation. This was drilled into me by my mother and father and then for another 20 years by the US Navy. To my way of thinking, it is as big a slap in the face, as would be a punch by a prize-fighter, to the person who owns and maintains the building you have entered.

There are places where it is acceptable to wear a hat, Wal-Mart, grocery stores, garages, etc. But I have a hard time restraining myself from hat removal when I first enter these places.

I think it is the epitome of dis-courteousness, and a direct reflection of your lack of any basic social graces, apparently NOT instilled in you as a child, if you are an offender. It just shows how much you disrespect the abode and the people who inhabit that abode you have entered. You might as well spit on the floor as you enter, it couldn't be any more uncouth!

Well as good as the breakfast was, and as good as was the company, I was just put off by having to see on three sides of me, this piss poor behavior by these four ignorant people! I would dearly love to have told each of them off, but in a rare moment of restraint, and not desirous of creating a riot in Steve and Rita's wonderful setting, I held my tongue, albeit with a big pair of pliers, and weighted down with a cement block!

I am sure that Arnold Toynbee would agree that we have made at least the first step on the slippery slope to dis-integration! And all because some folks are to dumb to come in from the rain! TIFN.

Another Momentous Day

This is an update to the first post of the year where I mentioned that Kirk's old house was coming down. Well it was a three week process to demolish the old place and it sure turned out to be a hard job. After all the furniture and good stuff was removed to a storage place the demo began. All the sheet rock, insulation, floor tiles, roof shingles, and all the other toxic stuff was yanked out and put in a 30 yard dump truck and hauled off to the Johnston landfill. Then we just knocked it down with a backhoe and released all of it's stored up energy into the atmosphere so as to do our part in living up to Algore's dire predictions. I fully expect to go to purgatory for doing it, and catching hell here, for so speaking about it!

So then began the process of readying the old hole in the ground for the new house. First step was to add four feet to the width of it and then to get the new sills down and all leveled up. That process was culminated two days ago. So there it sits, waiting patiently for it's new occupant!

And so today, at 4 this afternoon, the first of the four parts of the house rolled off the boat and down to the beach to await it's other companions. They will be coming, one a day, for the next three days. On Monday morning next, the process of piling them up on the foundation begins. By the end of that day, the newest domicile on BI will be up and ready for some siding and trim. All that is to happen as soon as possible in order to make it nice and watertight! Then it's time to move inside and finish off the sheet-rocking, electrical and plumbing hookups and put down the flooring. Finish that and move back in all the good stuff and then it will be time for Kirk and those two sweet little grandchildren of mine to return to the premises, and block from my view,ALL THOSE DAMN CARS GOING UP AND DOWN THE ROAD!!! TIFN

A Little Red Pig

About a week ago one of my kids called me on the cell phone and announced to me that there was a baby red pig in the field down by the new gas building! So off I go to capture the little booger before he gets in the road and run over. All this time I'm wondering how in hell a baby pig managed to get down there without someone, previous owner? missing him/her.

Around the corner I go and there he is, standing stock still in the field with blood just pouring out of him as the ground all around was a bright red! I was amazed that he was still standing up seeing all the redness totally surrounding him! Moving up close, I discovered that this was no ordinary pig. This was a ceramic pig! Probably not going to be much good for barbecuing!

Apparently someone parked this little previously pink colored porker on the grass there and proceeded to empty a spray can of red paint on him. Ergo, all the 'blood' I saw covering him and the ground around him.

So my quest is to find out, "Does anyone want this little hardened piece of pork back at their domicile?" And what I'd really like to know is,"why was he placed there in particular to receive his new skin color"? Was this intended as some sort of voodoo talisman relating to my size as compared to this fellow when he grew up? Geez Chubby, I think some one is after all of we folks of "larger girth"! Come on now someone, 'fess up'. You can leave your answer anonymously, or leave us a nom-de -plume so we can do some detective work. Right now he is sitting on my kitchen table keeping an eye on all the stuff that goes in my garbage can! TIFN

"No Grapes" of Wrath

This post is in response to some of the comments posted on the previous one. It was totally my fault that some of the comments put up there were allowed to stay. I like to provoke controversy and exchange of ideas, but things went awry and off thread for no apparent reason. I usually check the comments every three or four days but didn't do that soon enough on the last one. When I finally did it was to late as the damage has been done.From now on I will pay closer attention.

And now too our "anonymous" grapeless poster.I believe he is the same person I have previously called the "cyber sniper". I call him that because he never has a good word to say about any of the comments made on these posts and is particularly inimical in his regard for me. Which, in and of itself is fine. The thing I find most revolting about him is his cowardly way of hiding behind his anonymity and then shouting his degrading comments about others at the top of his voice! He obviously believes himself to be at the top of the food (thought process)chain when it comes to his critiques of the others who post here. Do we, the uncouth, unread masses believe this. Hell no! Here I revert to my 20 years of Navy language training. This guy is the most chicken s**t, cowardly, backstabbing, lowlife SOB I have run across in many a year! And I do believe I know who he is!

So mr. Sniper, If you can't stand some of the members of the School Committee, and other various board members, why don't you come to the meetings and try to discredit them in full public view instead of hiding behind a tree and throwing verbal slings and arrows? Come out from your closet of anonymity and cast them from in the clear where we will come to know you for the incompetent asshole that you are. Come to the next School Committee meeting and I'm sure the Superintendent would be glad to clear up, errr-- shred your idiotic ravings to the masses. Or you could just disappear from these pages and leave the rhetorical conversations to the more enlightened of us, not that I consider myself one of THOSE!

A Needful Organisation

Is there out here on our little Island a, "people friendly" group that is in need of a few bucks? I know there are lots of organisations that are always needing money for one thing or another. I am looking for one along the lines of the Mary D fund. One that will take what ever money they make and use it for the people that are in dire need. This could also include individuals who have the need. Now why do I ask this you may inquire? Well basically I, 'yam wot I yam, a HAM"! My wife and I, as well as a few others with a musical bent, have been talking for the last couple of years about getting together and putting on a strictly country /western show of songs no newer than 40 years old!! Hell I can't even figure out what these new guys are talking about! But them "ole fellers" knew what to talk about, you know, the guy that ran off with your girlfriend, wife, horse, truck, dog!! What ever!

So we thought it would be fun to do this, and to make some money for needy others at the same time. So if you have any ideas for recipients etc. post them here and if you are of the musical bent and would like to get up there in front of all your friends and make a fool/ass of yourselves like we do on regular occasions, just sign up. WE thought we would try to keep it to ten to twelve singers,or groups, so that each could give full voice to four or five songs in each of a couple of sets. If you don't care to leave your name here, you can email me at elittle@verizon.net, or use that other thing called a telephone. If we get enough interest, maybe we will try to do it this summer when there are lots of folks with deep pockets around. Ukelele's welcome! TIFN

Re: Feeding the mind......

The reason I tried to get as many comments as possible about eating in the classrooms of the school you attended was this. After having been associated with the BI School in my very MINOR capacity as the steering wheel for the cleaning and maintenance crew, I noticed events that have not yet ceased to amaze and confuse me. To wit; the carrying out of food of all descriptions, from the cafeteria and into the classrooms!!

After watching this for a few months, I finally asked, "what's the deal with this practice"? I was told that it had been allowed to happen, kind of by acts of omission. There are some children that because of monetary constraints weren't getting to eat breakfast before coming to school. There is a State mandate that says that if you accept money from the state for your school, you must provide a nutritious breakfast for those children, a mandate that I am in FULL ACCORD with! Over time more and more children began eating there and paying for it out of Mommy and Daddy's pocket. It became more expedient for the 'rents to send the kids to school with a couple of bucks than a lunch bucket, and that is also just fine with me. Where it becomes a problem is when the food leaves the confines of the Cafeteria! This is because when they, as well as others came as "late arrivals", they couldn't finish eating before it was time for class, they were allowed to carry it to their classrooms to finish.

Enter now the fact that a lot of this food sits in the classroom from early AM till at least noon and even till dismissal time at 1421 hours. Many times during the day, small to large bits of this food get dropped on the floor to be ground into it and the spaces between the flooring. There it sits, becoming the incubation nurseries for who knows what kind of little germies!

One day while discussing with a School Committee member the possible different floor covering options to be used on the elementary room floors, I asked that we consider reverting to carpets as had been done in the past. Immediately came the reply about the fact that there were a lot of children that had allergies and that the carpets "MIGHT POSSIBLY" exacerbate the problem. That particular problem can be seen as a non-starter as hospitals routinely have carpets installed and the allergy problem mitigated by the types on carpets installed! And riding atop that small hitch was the problem of food being constantly dropped and ridden into the carpet and all the associated ills(no pun intended) that go with those occurrences.

My come back too that was to obliquely make a comment about NOT eating in the classroom. Apparently it wasn't heard or was silently dismissed out of hand.

So after doing a few days of searching through all the maintenance magazines that the school regularly receives, and doing a lot of hours of on-line searching and reading, I personally came to the conviction that a carpet was the only way to go to rectify all the ills connected with the conditions of the rooms as presently constituted. In this vein, I have written a short discourse to be presented to the School Committee on the reasons why I, as the Steering Wheel, recommend the switch back to a high end carpet, and how we as the, "implementers of cleanliness" would go about maintaining that level of spotlessness!

Referring back to the top of the rant, parents have got to take back some of the responsibilities of raising their children. That would include making sure they are adequately fed before school if they are financially able, and if they are not,
getting them to the school early enough for them to consume the food in the cafeteria! The food ALL OVER the building has to stop! Besides being unsanitary, it makes the place look like a shit-house as food is ROUTINELY dropped all over the place! TIFN

Boneless Wonders

After reading quite a few blog sites this AM I came across one that discovered that Grandma Pelosi and her lapdog Reid have come up with another way to to speak out of both sides of their mouths at the same time. I had always thought that was a physical impossibility.
We hear every day from them that they don't support the war in Iraq and WON'T send in more troops. So when it comes right down to the part where it says in the Constitution that," Congress shall vote to fund or not, any wars",(wording is not exact, but the gist is there), they are just to GD chicken shit to actually vote for their convictions! So what do they do? They decide to introduce a NON_BINDING resolution regarding sending more troops! And this will do what? Oh yeah, if things turn out bad in Iraq in the next two years, it will perfectly position them for the '08 Prez run by saying look how GWB F***** up THAT idea of more troops on the ground. Conversely, if things turn out well, why then you will hear loud and continuous bloviating about how they NEVER did cut funding for the war and were the greatest supporters of the "absolutely needed conflict in order to establish democracy in the middle east".
You would think that their mouths as well as their brains would HURT after all the doublespeak emanating from them. Let's see, did I not hear grandma P speaking about a Congress filled with "Transparency and Bi-partisanship"? Well it sure is transparent in some respects! Bi-Partisan? It appears to be well and truly on it's way down the tubes also. Wait and see I guess! TIFN
PS Don't forget the previous post. I need lots more input of any kind! Thanks
PPS: Go over to the right side of this page and click on Michael Yon Online Mag. Then navigate around so that you read the three section,"Walking the Line" post in order. This will give you a sense of what's going on "over there"!

Feeding the mind, as well as the body

I'm about to use this blog spot to run a poll. One of the duties of the job at the school is to find better ways of keeping the place clean and neat, and in the greatest shape possible necessary for the filling of the young occupants minds. Along these lines I would like to pose this question to readers of all ages. When you respond, if you do, add the decade that you were in school please. This applies to all readers from wherever you went to school, not just BI. The question is:

Were you allowed to take and consume any food what-so-ever into a classroom? Or were you required to eat it in a cafeteria or a room designated just for that purpose?

I'm going to leave it at this point for right now. After a couple of weeks, I'll come back and tell you why I ran this post. TIFN

What's happening in '07

Well for starters, this is the second anniversary of my attempt at blogging.

It was,4 days ago, the 45th year anniversary of attempting to make a marriage work.

In about two to three weeks there will be the addition of grandchild number six! Of all the events that will happen this year, this is the most anticipated!

With regard to my third attempt at running away from permanent retirement, the job at the BI School is coming along nicely albeit slowly. Lots of niggling things need fixing but because of time and money constraints they move at a laggardly pace.

The miniscule part of my life now that is called Littlefield and Sons Ltd., has updated it's bookkeeping system from one called Real World that has served us well for about 26 years to a new one from Quicken. So you will see a different kind of invoice in the mail if you are one of our most valued customers. And BTW, thanks too all who have sent cards and gifts over the years!

As a part of keeping up with the times, in the near future there will be a new LPG delivery truck cruising the highways and byways of the Island. I wanted it to be painted orange and black but was vetoed by the whole clan!

Model plane building and flying has slowed to a virtually non-existent pace as involvement with other things vie for the time. As in, spent 1/2 the day Sunday running sheets of old paper through a blender with lots of water and turning it into raw pulp to make more paper! That was a granddaughter project she received for X-mas. Whew, glad that is over! Lots of time and labor involved for not much return.

Have been informed by the parents of the soon to be New Granddaughter, (Ha HA, I know what her name will be!), that she, the baby, wishes for Mama-san and myself to be available for consulting, hugging, kissing, etc. when she is old enough for such things. So within the parameters of trying to remaining a viable entity when she comes of that age, we have been asked to do all we can to make that possible. That would include trying to reduce the body mass from huge to something approaching svelte! So in the interests of same, please, "Do Not Feed The Dieters!".

And the last but significant event to happen around here will be the demise of the over two hundred year old house of Kirk's out front. The old place has really begun to show its age even with the not so recent rehabs. So it will shortly be coming down to be replaced by a modular that will look virtually the same on the outside, but with a drastically modified interior floor plan.

That's it for now. From all of us to all of you readers, the extended family wishes each of you a very happy and prosperous new year. Will expect you all back here in 365 days for the 3rd anniversary of the blogging experience. TIFN