Silence is Golden

So they say; I say bullshit.

I haven't posted a lot this week because I'm experiencing another computer meltdown. It looks like I'm going to have to -- once again -- tear it down and rebuild it from the bottom up.

This is compounded by the fact that I am also leaving for my "second vacation" to Vietnam next weekend. I don't really know if I'm going to have time to fix the computer before I leave, so my posts may be sporadic for the next week, and then they will disappear entirely until the first of October.

In the meantime, thanks for reading, and I'll see you all when I get back.

Sara Who?

That's the question on everyone's lips today as Grampaw McCain announces his dark-horse running mate.

Not since Dan Quayle has there been a more unlikely -- and unqualified -- VP candidate. Aside from the fact that the McCain camp wanted a nuclear bomb explosion to defuse that knock-it-out-of-the-park acceptance speech by Obama last night, I gotta ask ... What the fuck is he thinking?????

Two definite possibilies come to my mind. One is that McCain has the "Mondale Syndrome" -- he knows he's going to lose the election and he's making a statement about the Rethug "big tent". Or it's a pathetic attempt to pander to those Clintonistas who are reluctant still to get behind Obama.

Jeez, which could it be?

Okay, trick question: It's obviously the second option, but does he really think that the Female-American Voting Bloc is hung up solely on the gender issue? That they will come over en masse to vote Republican just because there's a woman on the ballot? Despite the fact that the woman in question is rabidly anti-choice?

To tell you the truth, I don't know. A couple of months ago I would have had an answer, but in the face of the cut-off-your-nose-to-spite-your-face PUMA movement in the Democratic Party, I'd have to say all bets are off.

Nevertheless, I kind of feel sorry for Sara Who, since she's kind of a sacrificial lamb in all this, and Grampaw McCain has just thrown away the only argument for electing him over Obama: The Experience Issue.

It's going to be fun watching the Rethugs dance around that whole experience thing... After all, Grampaw will be the oldest president ever inaugurated, and do you really want Sara Who answering that infamous "three a.m. phone call"?

Friday by the Numbers

Total American dead in the Iraq Illegal Occupation: 2500 2513 2532 2540 2546 2558 2571 2585 2597 2605 2619 2641 2710 2737 2758 2788 2809 2826 2865 2888 2906 2959 3006 3018 3025 3067 3087 3118 3132 3151 3166 3189 3210 3233 3245 3266 3299 3316 3337 3358 3387 3409 3444 3504 3519 3546 3577 3592 3611 3631 3683 3705 3725 3738 3760 3780 3795 3823 3830 3838 3845 3866 3875 3881 3886 3891 3896 3908 3921 3932 3943 3952 3960 3974 3987 3992 4004 4032 4036 4102 4113 4118 4134 4143 4145 4150

Total coalition forces dead: 314
Total Iraqi Dead: 700,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2543
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 1990
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 1947
Number of days between Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII: Only 1347

Number of days that the the Vice President has NOT shot a man in the face: 928
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 771

It is still 144 days until the end of the BFEE Maladministration.

BTW, Did I Mention that I Was a POW...?

Jesus, how many times is the SCLM/MSM going to let Grampaw McCain go to the same well before they figure out what he's doing?

· How many houses? Doesn't matter, because I spent 5 1/2 years in one house -- in North Vietnam!

· Cheating on his wife? Doesn't matter, because when I was a POW I wasn't "getting any" at all.

· Keating Five? It was only a little over $100,000 -- chump change, really -- and did I tell you that when I was a POW I had no money at all?

· Healthcare Plan? Did I mention that when I was a "guest" of the North Vietnamese I had no health care at all?

· Playing fast and loose with the so-called Saddleback Forum? Hey, I WAS a POW, you know? Did I forget to mention that?

Give me a fucking break. Yeah, he was a POW. Everybody knows that, but not everybody is willing to cut him as much slack as he's demanding for that 5 1/2 years -- which comes out to something like 13% of his entire life. He shouldn't expect to use his POW experience as a Get Out of Jail Free card for the rest of his life.

I'm getting a little sick and tired of it, and he's politicizing his military service -- prostituting it, really -- just to satisfy his sick and twisted ambition to become president. For him to continue doing this cheapens and demeans the military service of everyone else, and those of us who refuse to use our military service as shields against criticism of our bad behavior are not well served by this sad husk of a former military hero.

Remember what Farnsworth always says: A veteran voting for John McCain is like a chicken voting for Colonel Sanders.

Friday by the Numbers

Total American dead in the Iraq Illegal Occupation: 2500 2513 2532 2540 2546 2558 2571 2585 2597 2605 2619 2641 2710 2737 2758 2788 2809 2826 2865 2888 2906 2959 3006 3018 3025 3067 3087 3118 3132 3151 3166 3189 3210 3233 3245 3266 3299 3316 3337 3358 3387 3409 3444 3504 3519 3546 3577 3592 3611 3631 3683 3705 3725 3738 3760 3780 3795 3823 3830 3838 3845 3866 3875 3881 3886 3891 3896 3908 3921 3932 3943 3952 3960 3974 3987 3992 4004 4032 4036 4102 4113 4118 4134 4143 4145

Total coalition forces dead: 314
Total Iraqi Dead: 700,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2536
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 1983
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 1940
Number of days between Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII: Only 1347

Number of days that the the Vice President has NOT shot a man in the face: 921
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 764

It is still 151 days until the end of the BFEE Maladministration.

Privatizing the VA -- Another McCain "Support the Troops" Idea

I learned today the Grampaw McCain has said he wants to privatize the VA Health Care system. That's a play right out of the neocon "drown it in the bathtub" ideology, and it's one that is opposed by virtually ALL of the veterans' groups in the nation.

So why, in the face of all of the facts militating against him (check the top three anti-McCain sites on my links list) when it comes to his non-existent "support" for America's veterans, is he still claiming that he's the veterans' friend?

How is he getting away with this crap? Well, I think it's because the media is still creaming its shorts over McCain, the way they always have been, and no one wants to step up and ask the hard questions, bring out the inconvenient facts, and show the nation that Grampaw is nothing more than a doddering old fool who should count himself lucky if he wasn't videotaped drooling his gruel down his grizzled chin.

But no, that good ole "leftwing media bias" is at work, and after all, if they were to show Grampaw for the aged and infirm, incipient-senility old timer that he really is, there really wouldn't be much of a contest in the election, and without that all-important horse race, they won't be able to sell advertising.

Follow the money. It was true back in the day, and it's still true now.

Active Military Contributing to ... Obama?

Yes, believe it or not, it is evident from a study by the non-partisan Center for Responsive Politics, a part of Open Secrets, that American troops deployed abroad are giving money to the Obama campaign -- in a ratio of 6:1 -- over the McCain campaign.

Hmmm, could it be that those "troops on the ground" know more about the Iraq War Illegal Occupation than Grampaw McCain?

Trick question: My cats know more about the Iraq Illegal Occupation than McCain. The canned tuna they ate for supper last night knows more. The rock at the end of my driveway... well, you get the idea.

Interestingly enough, the study also shows that Libertarian Ron Paul has gotten contributions in the ratio of 4:1 over McCain.

What this shows is that the popular perception of the political persuasions of our soldiers is wrong. As it pretty much always has been. I was in Vietnam for the 1968 election, and I would guess that the percentage was split pretty much in the same way as the general population in that election, roughly 50-50 Democrat/Republican

A major problem with that analysis, though, is that it doesn't take into account those who voted for Nixon solely because of his infamous "secret plan" to end the war, and these people represented a substantial number of military voters. Had Bobby Kennedy not been shot, had he gotten the 1968 Democratic nomination -- as all indications were that he would have -- then the military would have voted overwhelmingly for him.

After all, no one wanted the war to be over more than we did. And that's what's going on today in our overseas troops. Obviously. Otherwise why would they send so much money to Obama?

A Fellow POW Speaks Out on McCain

The fellow POW is Phillip Butler, former Navy pilot who spent eight years in a North Vietnam prison, and who knew John McCain.

He has an incisive, telling and profoundly moving piece on, of all places, Military.com. Here's an excerpt:

I'm disappointed to see John represent himself politically in ways that are not accurate. He is not a moderate Republican. On some issues he is a maverick. But his voting record is far to the right. I fear for his nominations to our Supreme Court, and the consequent continuing loss of individual freedoms, especially regarding moral and religious issues. John is not a religious person, but he has taken every opportunity to ally himself with some really obnoxious and crazy fundamentalist ministers lately. I was also disappointed to see him cozy up to Bush because I know he hates that man. He disingenuously and famously put his arm around the guy, even after Bush had intensely disrespected him with lies and slander.

Butler also gives lie to McCain's claim that he was tortured for five-and-a-half years. No, it was for only the first two years, since after the death of Ho Chi Minh in September of 1969 the NVA gave up on torture as an instrument of war and instead decided to use the POWs as bargaining chips. This is historical fact, but you wouldn't know it from listening to McCain.

It's one thing when someone like me, an ordinary draftee Vietnam vet, disses McCain. It's something else entirely when the criticism comes from a fellow POW.

Read the full story -- it's well worth it.

The Unthinkable

It has developed over in the UK that after Tony "The Poodle" Blair's surprise conversion to the Roman Catholic church, a survey was done of the Labour Party cabinet members: More than half of them are non-believers!

It shows a major difference between the UK and the US. Pete Stark aside, the vast majority of non-believers in this country are still in the closet and would likely sooner admit to stomping kittens than being even an agnostic, let alone an outright atheist.

But even more startling in the report out of the UK is the fact that Foreign Secretary David Millibrand is on track to become Prime Minister!

The odds of something similar happening here are about the same as an icicle's chances of survival in Furnace Creek.

And that's too bad, because as I've long held, an individual's religion or lack thereof is a deeply personal matter and shouldn't have any effect on his or her eligibility for office ("no religious test"). Yet another example as to why "Old Europe" is so far ahead of us in so many ways.

Welcome to Police State

I used to have a joke sweatshirt that resembled a college logo shirt, with "Police State" as the name of the college. It finally bit the dust and ended up in the rag bin, but I wish I had it now.

Especially when I read stories like this one, wherein an American citizen is detained and hassled by Homeland Security at JFK airport following a trip to Syria.

Every time I plan to go on a trip, I half expect to show up on some "no fly" list and be told I can't go. But until now I didn't give much thought to being hassled on my way back into the country. The closest I came was when we came back from Australia four years ago and I was singled out to step out of line and raise my shirt while I got the wand. After four weeks of eating meat pies and vegemite sandwiches, and guzzling Victoria Bitter... well, let's just say that I heard a tiny voice say, "Look, mommy, that man's smuggling lard!"

I'm going on a return trip to Vietnam next month, on a real vacation this time (unlike 40 years ago), so let's hope that when I come back home, the resident Nazis of Seattle's Homeland Security will give me a pass. I'm afraid that after 32+ straight hours of traveling, I won't be in much of a mood to put up with any bullshit from a low-level federal goon squad.

Which just might cause me to complete vanish. "Disappeared", as Joseph Heller had it in Catch-22.

Especially if I'm wearing my new "Police State" college sweatshirt -- in no time at all I'd be trading it in for a nifty bright orange "Gitmo Tech" jumpsuit.

Saddleback and Politics

I've tried to ignore the Saddleback Inquisition Interrogation, wherein the two presumptive presidential candidates were questioned -- separately -- about a variety of religious topics. Questioned by an evangelical minister, no less.

The whole thing was wrong, it was stupid, and it was unAmerican in a nation founded on religious liberty and the separation of church and state.

I believe that it was also of questionable constitutional legality, since the US Constitution clearly states that "no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States".

If that dog-and-pony show was anything BUT a religious test, I'll eat my shorts. Obama should have refused.

Yeah, right. He really couldn't refuse to go on the show and expect that the Rethugs wouldn't come out with guns blazing about that refusal -- What's he trying to hide? Is he REALLY a Muslim? etc etc etc.

And that's really too bad, since this kind of thing tends to turn into a self-perpetuating cycle, with each repeat becoming a little more religious and a little less secular, until ultimately the fundos will just out-and-out say that it's a religious test instead of fancy-footing their way around it, the way mega-pastor Rick Warren claimed that he supported the idea of separation of church and state.

I just hope that somewhere along the line someone will show some balls and tell the moron-American voting bloc that his or her religious beliefs -- or lack thereof -- are none of our business. But my guess is that the fundos have achieved the perception that they have a lot of electoral power, and no politician will be saying that anytime soon.

Too bad. And that's probably one (among many) reasons why I've resisted the call whenever anyone has suggested that I run for office. I don't suffer fools gladly.

The Meaning of "Separation of Church and State"

Every once in a while, I run across something that captures the essence of an idea which I hold dearly.

The concept of Separation of Church and State is one of those concepts or ideas, and it was with great pleasure that I read an editorial on the Michigan Messenger website by Ed Brayton.

Brayton lays out succinctly and logically the fallacies behind the neocon Religious Right's interpretation of the First Amendment, and goes into the thinking of the "Founders" and their concept of that Wall of Separation.

Go read the article, The Meaning of Separation of Church and State, for yourself, and then you might want to bookmark it for future reference, the next time some fundo religious crazy starts spouting that garbage about the Wall not being mentioned in the Constitution.

Friday by the Numbers

Total American dead in the Iraq Illegal Occupation: 2500 2513 2532 2540 2546 2558 2571 2585 2597 2605 2619 2641 2710 2737 2758 2788 2809 2826 2865 2888 2906 2959 3006 3018 3025 3067 3087 3118 3132 3151 3166 3189 3210 3233 3245 3266 3299 3316 3337 3358 3387 3409 3444 3504 3519 3546 3577 3592 3611 3631 3683 3705 3725 3738 3760 3780 3795 3823 3830 3838 3845 3866 3875 3881 3886 3891 3896 3908 3921 3932 3943 3952 3960 3974 3987 3992 4004 4032 4036 4102 4113 4118 4134 4143

Total coalition forces dead: 314
Total Iraqi Dead: 700,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2529
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 1976
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 1933
Number of days between Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII: Only 1347

Number of days that the the Vice President has NOT shot a man in the face: 914
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 757

It is still 158 days until the end of the BFEE Maladministration.

The Newest Member of the Farnsworth Clan

Presenting my great-granddaughter, Alianna Catalina Avalos-Bazan, born August 1, 2008

Bush Twins in Uniform Watch -- Dead Horse Edition

Okay, I'm willing to man up on this whole issue and admit, despite all of my efforts, and the efforts of The Yellow Elephant, it appears that the Bush Twins will escape unscathed and not have to go and fight their father's war.

Too bad, since today marks the 1507-day countdown since the spoiled Bush brats graduated college and still have managed not to join up. Now it appears it isn't going to happen, so it is with some regret that I am forced to cancel the weekly watch.

But here's a link to my original post -- which just happened to be the very first post on this blog, all the way back in June of 2005. I'm actually going to miss being snarky about the twins, but all good things eventually come to an end.

Oh, and Jenna and Not-Jenna? It's still not too late. You can still join the military. Now they're taking convicted felons up to the age of 43 or so, so you two shouldn't have a problem getting in.

And, as I've said weekly, it's not like you'd really have to do anything. Just look at your dad for an example...

...and Speaking of Lies

I see that our old buddy, Jerome "The Liar" Corsi is at it again. Not content to rest on his laurels after successfully sliming John Kerry four years ago with that scurrilous piece of garbage entitled Unfit to Command, chock full of lies that it was, Corsi has just come out with a companion attack piece on (who else?) Barack Obama.

His new attack is called Obama Nation (i.e., "abomination" -- a little too cutesy-pie for the content, but what do I know?) and, if that's possible, it appears to be worse even than his skewering of Kerry.

Over at AlterNet there's a lengthy review of Corsi's new tome, and, unlike what you'll no doubt see in the MSM/SCLM, this review actually calls Corsi to task for his lies and misrepresentations.

Example:

Corsi writes of Obama campaign blogger Sam Graham-Felsen, "After leaving Harvard, Graham-Felsen published an article in an avowedly socialist magazine" [Page 148]. Corsi goes on to assert that "Writing in Socialist Viewpoint in the May/June 2006 issue, Graham-Felsen discussed a trip to Paris in which he participated in leftist street riots that involved a controversial employment law designed to facilitate the ability of French companies to fire workers under twenty-six years old."
In fact, the article Corsi presents as having been "published in an avowedly socialist magazine" was actually published in April 2006 in The Nation, and reprinted by the Socialist Viewpoint. This is clearly indicated on the Socialist Viewpoint website for which Corsi provides the link. The same Graham-Felsen article was also reprinted at CBSNews.com. The May/June 2006 issue of Socialist Viewpoint also reprinted articles from the February 27, 2006, edition of Detroit Free Press, and from the March 29, 2006, edition of London's The Guardian.

There are a lot more examples showing that all of the lies are easily refutable by the slightest amount of research.

Do yourself a favor and read it. And you might also want to commit some of the major ones to memory, for the next time that idiot rightwing brother-in-law of yours starts to get a little too cocky about Obama.

Fighting Fire with Fire

I've always said that the Dems tend to show up at a gunfight with a butter knife, and that's why we've lost so many elections.

Over at Monkey Muck, I stumbled on the following letter, with the intent being email guerilla warfare, to fuck up the right the way they always do us. I'm not, of course, advocating that anyone actually do this (nudge-nudge, wink-wink), but Monkey von Monkerstein's advice is to spam the world with scurrilous lies about Grampaw Mac the way the wingnuttery spams the Internets with all of those false claims about Obama.

Here's the suggested text of the letter:

Wow.
This is amazing!
Did you know that when John McCain was a POW in Vietnam he spilled his guts under pressure? He claims that when asked to give the names of the men in his squadron he gave the Commies the names of the Green Bay Packers. But recently he said it was the Pittsburgh Steelers. Which is it? The Packers or the Steelers?
Or is this bigger than they will admit?
Sources in the military intelligence community say this could be a case of brainwashing. They claim that McCain could have been brainwashed into being a spy for the Vietnamese and their pals the Commies in Red China and that he'll deliver then all our state secrets as soon as he's sworn in. Think about it. It all makes sense. His backers in business and industry are already doing big business in China and they are now dependant on the Chinese government to keep their cost of doing business low and to supply them with a steady stream of workers. Big business then turns around and gives money to McCain. When, or should I say if, he takes the oath of office he'll be doing it on a Bible that's been made in China and then the floodgates will open and the Chinese will have free reign over not just our businesses but also our military, the CIA, the FBI, and everything else.
Spread the word that if we all want to keep America free we need to vote for Barack Obama and not for the tool of the Communists, John McCain.

As The Monkey says, cut and paste it, and then "send this out to anybody and everybody and if you get it in your inbox then forward it along again. Let's see how far this will go and if the corporate media picks it up."

Hmmmmm..... In the words of all those classic movies, "It's crazy, but ... it just might work!"

GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY!!!!!

Or so screamed all of the headlines this week when the verdict came down on Salim Hamdan, the driver/chauffeur for Osama Bin Laden. (Remember him? Tall skinny Arab dude, hooked up to a dialysis machine? Used to make videotapes? Masterminded the 9-11 attacks? Yeah, that guy.)

You would think that Hamdan was found guilty of any variety and number of crimes against humanity, what with all that breathless reporting on the guilty verdict, not only from the usual suspects (Faux News) but from the MSM/SCLM as well.

But what was poor Salim actually found guilty of? Apparently it's a crime to be Salim Hamdan, a chauffeur for the forgotten leader of The Terra (how could we have a War on Terra^tm without him?), since that's about all they could finally gin up out of all of those charges to convict him on.

So, bottom line, Hamdan is hardly the criminal terrorist mastermind/murderer/etc. that the Bush-Cheney Assholes of Evil coalition tried to make him out to be, is he now?

In fact, Salim was sentenced to about five-and-a-half years in prison for being...well, for being Salim Hamdan, with -- and this is the good part -- credit for time served!

Which means that Salim will be getting could have gotten out of Gitmo in just a few months. But, silly boy, don't count your yogurt before it's fermented. The BFEE says that it will keep Hamdan under lock and key regardless, long past his release date, essentially forever, since it would send "the wrong message" to the "terrorists" to release him when his sentence has been served...

And what message would that be? Well, it's like I said a long time ago. Baby Doc said "'they' hate us for our freedoms", and then he began immediately to dismantle those freedoms, apparently under the theory that if we no longer have our freedoms, "they" won't hate us and the War on Terra^tm will be over.

Hmmmm..... Now that sounds an awful lot like "appeasement" to me.

Oh, and that verdict and sentencing came from the military tribunal which was deliberately constituted to sidestep and bypass all of those pesky constitutional issues surrounding our precious Gitmo "detainees". But the officers on that panel, when they first joined the military, took an oath to "preserve and defend the constitution from all enemies, foreign AND DOMESTIC".

It's encouraging that those guys are still taking that oath seriously; it's alarming that the military seems to be the only federal institution that still believes in the Constitution.

Friday by the Numbers

Total American dead in the Iraq Illegal Occupation: 2500 2513 2532 2540 2546 2558 2571 2585 2597 2605 2619 2641 2710 2737 2758 2788 2809 2826 2865 2888 2906 2959 3006 3018 3025 3067 3087 3118 3132 3151 3166 3189 3210 3233 3245 3266 3299 3316 3337 3358 3387 3409 3444 3504 3519 3546 3577 3592 3611 3631 3683 3705 3725 3738 3760 3780 3795 3823 3830 3838 3845 3866 3875 3881 3886 3891 3896 3908 3921 3932 3943 3952 3960 3974 3987 3992 4004 4032 4036 4102 4113 4118 4134

Total coalition forces dead: 314
Total Iraqi Dead: 700,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2522
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 1969
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 1926
Number of days between Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII: Only 1347

Number of days that the the Vice President has NOT shot a man in the face: 907
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 750

It is still 165 days until the end of the BFEE Maladministration.

We'll Always Have Paris

For those who have been living under a rock the past few days (like me) and haven't seen the Paris Hilton campaign ad:

And you know the funniest thing about it (maybe aside from the references to "that wrinkly white-haired dude")?

That Paris Hilton has a better energy program than Grampaw McCain.

A Dubious Milestone

Today is the seventh anniversary of that fateful day when Der Monkey Fuehrer was personally handed that now-infamous "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US" memo.

It's just too fucking bad that there weren't any adults in charge seven years ago. If there had been, maybe we would have avoided those 4134 needless deaths in Iraq.

I'm of the opinion that had the true 43rd President been in charge in August 2001, he would have done something about that memo.

But then I'm also of the opinion that if the true 43rd President had been in office, there never would have been a 9-11 to begin with.

But that's just me.

Obama Attack Watch

As expected, the rightwing smear machine is in full court press. The latest attack is a viral email that accuses Obama of removing the American flag from the tail of his campaign plane and replacing it with -- shock -- his own logo!

Here's the full text of the email:

Subject: A Disgrace
I just looked this up on Snopes; it is true.
Obama Removes American Flag From His Plane
Barack Obama recently finished a $500,000 total overhaul of his 757. And as part of the new design, he decided to remove the American flag from the tail...
What American running for President of the United States would remove the symbol of his country? And worse, he replaced the flag with it with a symbol of himself...
Please forward this on if you're not ashamed of your country or it's [sic] flag & think this is a disgrace!

If my correspondent had only taken the time to actually READ the Snopes article, he would have seen that the American flag on the tail of the leased plane is a registered trademark of North American Air, that there is an American flag on the plane, next to its registration number, and that refurbishing/repainting a campaign plane is normal in politics these days.

But, as usual, facts mean nothing to these people.

Why I continue to get these is another story, but I'm willing to let my correspondents think that I welcome them. In point of fact, I do welcome them. If it weren't for my political troglodyte friends, I wouldn't know about them.

We're Back!

And none the worse for wear, I might add. We saw plenty of bears, HUGE ravens, and especially a lot of bald eagles, but didn't fall victim to any of them.

It was our first trip to Alaska, and I was not surprised by the clean air and the clear water.

I was surprised by the large number of float planes that had a habit of taking off right outside our window, starting at 6:00 AM and continuing just long enough to prevent us from getting any more sleep.

Alaskans are a special breed of people, I've learned. When we arrived, my son's boss took the day off and the three of us drove up in the mountains where we drank beer and shot pistols. I had the opportunity to shoot a fifty caliber handgun, and it was not only huge and heavy (I had to steady it with both hands), but it also kicked like a Missouri mule.

Hmmm, guns and alcohol, I can hear you say. There's no way this is going to end well.

Well, you would be wrong. Like I said, Alaskans are a special breed, and I guess they know what they're doing, since we all came back down the mountain with our skins unmarred and our body parts attached.

So I am still tired from the trip, but glad to be back. More tomorrow after I've had some rest.