Heh

Further to today’s first post, from Ms. Alexandrova’s other blog…

So THIS is what the end-stages of BDS look like. I've been told there's no cure, and I'm beginning to believe it.

So, Larisa and Fellow Travelers... One hopes your husbands/wives, parents, friends, or *someone* close to you arranges an intervention before you hurt yourselves. Paranoid schizophrenia just ain't fun to watch, in addition to being dangerous to you and those around you.

Get help.

RESPONSE FROM LARISA ALEXANDROVNA
Which part of a trillion dollar money grab - our money - without any oversight whatsoever is part of this paranoid schizophrenia? Do tell us young Buck what the proper reaction to this situation might be, mkay? Insults without addressing anything of substance simply makes you look foolish - and generally, identifies you as an asshole straight away. Welcome to the party by the way. I will let the other voices in my head know we have a new guest;)

Posted by: Buck | September 21, 2008 at 02:30 AM

Hey!  I’m young again!  But I suppose me being an asshole kinda-sorta offsets my new-found youth.  Oh, well.  At least I’m not batshit crazy.  I’ll count my blessings.

The Sunday Funnies

About the following… file under “Stupid Stuff I Thought Was Funny.”  At the time.  Maybe ya hadda be there.  OTOH, what follows could be the result of 12 hours of non-stop football, in various and sundry forms.

I’ve had similar encounters with my printer.

I think I may have hit bottom with these two vids.  But I’m curious… do ya think the Dobie likes Pink Floyd?  Or should we call PeTA?

―:☺:―

File this under “Stupid Stuff That ISN’T Funny:”  “Welcome to the final stages of the coup...”  Yep, I’ve been playing in the mud again.  If you don’t want to get your Sunday-Go-To-Meetin’ clothes dirty… not mention your psyche… here’s about all you need to know:

In 2000, the long fought for and long admired democracy of the United States of America began a slow and steady decline toward fascism - a Bush family tradition - with the installment of a president - a man the citizens overwhelmingly rejected (although the funny math told a still believed myth) - by a few corrupt judges on the US Supreme Court. That coup is now nearly complete and checkmate is all but unavoidable.

[…]

It seems this time around, the Bush family is trying the more subtle approach to open bloodshed:  first create a crisis, then  under the guise of addressing that crisis, overthrow democracy. Yes, it does sound terribly conspiracy-theory-esque when explained just this way. But what else does one call a criminal conspiracy to destroy Congressional powers permanently, alter Judicial powers permanently, and steal public funds?

As I see it now, we have but two options and I have long alluded to hoping against hope that one of these options would not be the only one left to a peaceful people. The first and frankly most preferable option is for Congress to immediately begin impeachment proceedings against the members of this latest Business Plot.

[…]

The other option, the one I have long prayed we would never need to even consider, is a total revolution. But, If Congress won't act in its own self-defense, in the defense of democracy, in defense of us - the people who have elected them to protect us from this very danger - then what is left for us to do? I don't want to see it come down to this, but I fear that it will. Put your party politics aside right now. We are in a crisis so dangerous that should these people succeed in their coup, your party affiliation will no longer matter, your American flag will be a nice collectible item of something that once was, and your version of God will be worshiped in secrecy because your freedoms will be owned by the few.

I left the links in the excerpt intact.  The Beeb link is “old news” and the other link is a compendium of Leftie snit pieces enumerating the countless reasons AlGore won the 2000 presidential election.  About which: the veritable source of Bush Derangement Syndrome.  All that’s missing from the second link is the identification of Patient Zero and the pathology of BDS transmission.  The Left just never got over losing that election and it drives their paranoid ravings to this very day.  The lovely (I’m sure) Ms. Alexandrova probably can’t write her mom without including links such as these.  Yet I digress.

Here’s a sampling of what the Fellow Travelers have to say about Ms. Alexandrova’s deranged ravings:

MoniqueF

We should have taken the streets a long time ago -not that we did not protest this administration but obviously nothing has come out of them. Bush is getting away with crimes, abuse of power all wrapped with such audacity that yes, considering that Congress has be so complaisant and God knows what else this administration 's October surprise(s) will be, it is time for a revolution. As long as Bush is in power our ride is not over.
Posted 12:01 AM on 09/21/2008

missjabez

I am ready and willing to "take it to the streets", particularly if the election is stolen from Obama. We Americans have tolerated enough.
Posted 10:28 PM on 09/20/2008

insanityfollows

When people don't watch the news, don't study history, etc... and gets apathetic, humanity finds itself in these pinches. People think it can't happen now or here. It can. Lipstick on a pig and all of that. When you really start looking at it it's a little scary.
Posted 09:29 PM on 09/20/2008

It’s never been more appropriate to say this:  “You can’t make this stuff up.”  Simply appalling.  I'm as serious as the proverbial heart attack when I say this:  Ms. Alexandrova is in need of an intervention.  "Normal" people, however you define the term, don't think like this... let alone make their rantings and ravings public in such an embarrassing manner.  One hopes that her "significant other" (I don't know, nor do I care, about her personal relationship status), her parents, or a concerned friend steps up and gets her the professional help she needs.  Paranoid schizophrenia, aside from being an ugly thing to observe, is dangerous to the person so afflicted and to those around them.  The woman needs help.

―:☺:―

I’ve been remiss in not telling ya that SN2 has resumed posting on his blog after a two-weeks-shy-of-a-year hiatus.  It’s good to see him back. 

So.  Can the world possibly stand three Pennington men blogging?  Which, of course, is a rhetorical question if there ever was one.

Yesterday's Rainbow...

...is Today's Pic(s).  Two of 13 shots taken around 1800 hrs. last evening, right out my back door.

Happiness Is...

Happy Hour will be VERY good this evening, Gentle Reader. And for a couple of weeks to come, as well.

Just Frickin' SICK

Liberal discourse:

Now, I want to be clear and speak directly to those of you who LOVED that Palin interview. You're an idiot. I mean that. This is not one of those cases where we're going to agree to disagree. This isn't one of those situations where we debate it passionately and then walk away thinking that the other guy is wrong but argued well. I'm not going to think of you as a thoughtful but misguided person with different ideas who still really cares about the country and the world. No, sorry, not this time. This time, if you watched those interview excerpts and weren't scared out of your freakin' mind, then you're mentally ill, mentally disabled, or mentally disturbed. What you are NOT is responsible, informed, curious, thoughtful, mature, educated, empathetic, or remotely serious. I mean it.

Comment upon said Liberal discourse:

 

bunnydeni71 
Okay, so it was a bit raw for Michael to say! But, the fact of the matter stands.... I am scared out of my mind also!!!!!!!!! She is not only not ready to lead a nation, but if I hear one more time about "Todd" I'm gonna screammmmmmmmmmmmmm:) GO OBAMA
 Posted 01:59 PM on 09/18/2008

-hockeymom_huh 
Amen!
Posted 01:47 PM on 09/18/2008

-matzoid 
Michael! I love you! (Though MY wife would NOT be cool with that!)
God, I've been waiting to hear someone speak those words to me. I have made the same decision about a week or two ago. (Yes, I was still trying to have the "reasoned debate" with these cretins.) But it finally hit me just as you said. It is NOT a matter of reasoned debate. It is not a matter of just disagreement. These people are idiots and reasoned debate only elevates them to as level far above where they deserve to be. 
Its like arguing whether the moon is made of green cheese. Or with a creationist.
Why is everyone else so afraid to say the obvious. I was getting so discouraged by the American populace that I was about to put a bumper sticker on my car that says;
A M E R I C A D E S E R V E S
< < < < < < < * > > > > > > >
J O H N M c C A I N
Posted 12:20 PM on 09/18/2008

There are 27…count ‘em… 27 frickin’ pages of comments to this despicable article at The Huffington Post.  I could only stomach the first page; I didn’t dive any deeper.  I feel like I need a shower, as it is.

I really DO try and understand these folks… but I’m rapidly coming to the point where I wish… fervently… that some of their darkest fantasies would come true.  You know… things like the gulag, the black helicopters, and all that other paranoid bullshit.  Because these people are seriously frickin’ disturbed.  Deranged.  And completely devoid of respect for others and, by inference, themselves.  But then again, perhaps the only thing they need is to be taught some manners… with a pop right in the mouth, repeated as necessary.  On the other hand, you’d probably have to beat them to death, by the look of it.

What the HELL is going on in this country?

(h/t: Rachel Lucas)

Of Limited Interest...

... I know.  But some just might be interested.  I got this lil love note from the Dee-troit Red Wings org today... you know, the current owners of The World's MOST Famous Sports Trophy.  Here's a screen-shot:

And you can see the video here.  Yeah, it's an ad.  But it's a good great ad!  With some of the best "made for teevee" rock 'n' roll I've ever heard. 

"Heeey-Ayyyy... HOCKEYTOWN!"  Oh my... Soon, Gentle Reader... soon.

Random Notes... Again

I’m a fairly conservative kinda guy in my habits (OK… my politics, too) in that once I make a choice I tend to stay with it.  That’s true where cars are concerned (The Green Hornet and I celebrate our eighth year together next month), soft drinks (Dr. Pepper.  And ONLY Dr. Pepper.), jeans (Levi 501s)… the list goes on and on.  The same thing is more or less true about ‘pooters, too.  I’ve been a PC-guy since Day One and a Gateway customer for the last 15 years or so.  I’ve been pretty loyal to Firefox for the last four years (beginning with v. 1.0), as well.  But Firefox has been acting a bit…ummm… willful of late, if not downright petulant.  She refuses to run videos, and a re-start may or may not rectify the problem.  But the final foot-stomping, tizzy-throwing, rage-against-MY-machine episode came yesterday when she locked up on me not once but four times.  Enough, already.  I threw the bitch out.

Buh-bye, Firefox.  Hello Chrome.  And so far… so good.  “Developing,” as it’s said. 

(Oh… in case you’re wondering… Chrome has a real-time spell-check function, too.  Important, that.)

―:☺:―

I’ve been meaning to mention this for quite some time now, but the subject never seems to make the cut.  Have you noticed our industrial chemists are doing wonderful things with scents, of late?  The product that immediately comes to mind is liquid soap.  I have a bottle of Softsoap “Elements” in Pink Grapefruit on my kitchen counter and I swear to The Deity At Hand that the soap smells exactly like cutting into a Texas Ruby Red.  Washing my hands with this soap almost always makes me hungry.  In the kitchen. It’s quite a different story in the bathroom… where I have a bottle of Dial’s “Yogurt” Vanilla and Honey mixture on the sink.   That blend smells for all the world like a piña colada.  Seriously.  It never fails… I wash my hands and I see myself back in The Caymans, on the beach, drink in hand, soaking up sun…  Amazing stuff, this scented soap.  Cheap Thrills ‘R’ Us, I suppose.

And please… no wise-ass metrosexual remarks (I'm kidding!).  Guys like pleasant aromas, too.  But what I really want is a soap that smells like Shell Super-M or Castrol R-30*.  That would be really cool… as in “race day!”

―:☺:―

Today’s Random Bit On Aging, or… “The mirror is not your friend.”  I dunno how it happens for everyone else in this boat, but the physical fact of aging, as manifested by my visage, kinda snuck up on me and smacked me right in the face… literally, suddenly, and without warning.  It happened one morning a few years back (let’s say six, for argument’s sake) as I was shaving.  Growing old is a subtle thing where one’s appearance is concerned.  Change takes place oh-so-slowly and your face might possibly be the thing that is most familiar to you, as you see yourself every day.  But we either don’t notice subtle change, or we’re in denial… one or the other.  In my case it was a failure to notice.  I didn’t really notice my hair line was receding, nor did I notice those “character lines” as they developed.  Until that morning.  At which time it dawned on me:  “Damn, Bud… you’re frickin’ OLD!”  There was a jangling disconnect between my mental self-image and the reality staring back at me from inside the mirror.  Some way, somehow, the human brain gets an image imprinted on it and that image stays in place, regardless of the reality of the situation.  I was apparently stuck somewhere around age 40 and never moved forward. 

And that’s how it was with me.  I was well and truly shocked.  But I got over it.

―:☺:―

Fascinating historical trivia... in today's Guardian (UK).  An interview with the guy who designed the “set” where the famous “Kitchen Debate” took place, in Moscow, in 1959.  Excerpt:

In 1959, Richard Nixon and Nikita Khrushchev made a rare public appearance together at Moscow's newest landmark: the American National Exhibition. A few days before the opening, the two men strolled through the pavilions, bickering flirtatiously for the press, and pretending to admire US handiwork. When they entered the re-creation of a Long Island kitchen, however, the tone changed. Khrushchev averred that Russian kitchens were longer-lasting than American ones and that, in any case, he doubted the average US worker could afford what was on display. Nixon said they certainly could, and what became known as the Kitchen Debate gathered steam until the US vice-president thundered: "You must not be afraid of ideas!" Infuriatingly, the Russian president smiled and said: "That's what we're telling you - don't be afraid of ideas."

The man responsible for the kitchen and everything else on show that day was Jack Masey, now 84 and sitting in the office of his design firm in Manhattan. On the table in front of him are papers relating to what he calls "the whole shebang" - the two decades he spent working for the US Information Agency, which sounds like a branch of the CIA but, Masey assures me, is not. At the height of the cold war, it was Masey's job to attend world fairs and deliver an idea of America that outshone the idea of the Soviet Union - not through missiles, but through hairstyles, kitchen units, car designs and, at one point, a mechanical talking chicken.

The concept of the world fair, the expo, seems quaint today. But in the 1950s, it was a chance to show people things they hadn't already seen, things that were exciting and new, even if it was at heart a big, colourful piece of propaganda. Russia's reciprocal exhibition in New York focused on Sputnik, heavy farming equipment and a big statue of Lenin; some of what Masey and his team came up with for the Russians - Pepsi, Ford cars, Levi jeans, Disney films - are still basic units of Americanism today.

You may think it strange, Gentle Reader, but I remember the Kitchen Debate.  I was 14 at the time and believe me, the event was news.  Big news.  Why, you ask?  Because of this, in part… from the linked article, again:

Nearly 3 million Russians saw the show. They mobbed the guides for details about their lives, their incomes, their marriages. They tested the United States' idyllic view of itself. "Provocateurs in the audience would shout out, 'What about the negro problem? We understand that in the US there's no medical care? When you retire, there's no social security?' The guides would say, 'That's an interesting question, we can't pretend that we've solved it all, but we're trying.'" Likewise, when the Soviets came to America, Walter Winchell wrote a stinging piece in the New York Times along the lines of "wonderful fashions, what about the labour camps?"

The Cold War, and all that.  We Americans saw “cultural exchange” as a way of thawing out the Cold War, of humanizing each camp to the other.  Too bad that didn’t really work… the Cold War lasted another 20+ years.  And it looks like it might be re-igniting as we speak.  If a Cold War can “re-ignite”… contradiction in terms that it is.  I digress, as usual.  The article is a fascinating peek into the mind of the guy who led the cultural-exchange charge, and it’s pretty cool that Mr. Masey is able to tell his tale.  Talking chickens and all.

Related:  American Art in the Cold War.  

* Shell Super-M is a castor-based (bean) oil used in racing motorcycles... specifically two-stroke race bikes.  It smells wonderful!