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- April 16, 2019
- National Healthcare Decisions Day 2019
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Well, here I am blogging about this again. It's time to consider those long term plans for yourself and ensure that everything is in order before health care actions need to be taken.
Yes, final preparations are a maudlin issue and sometimes thoughts of those bring me to tears when I consider the consequences ... but I recognize the need and therefore I continue to bat the topic around.
You need to ensure that you maintain documents like a living will, set power of attorney to someone you trust, make sure your will and last testament are maintained in a current state of your affairs and simply ensure to the best of your ability that you final wishes are carried out in accordance with what YOU want ...
Not some probate judge of other government entity.
Now, having said all this I find that my will has lapsed and I don't have the appropriate documents around anymore either.
So I am going to redouble my efforts toward that end and at least try to practice what I'm preaching.
You don't need an attorney.
You find a boilerplate and modify it to suit your needs then get it notarized with 2 witness to establish a new set of documentation for the inevitable.
Those legal, medical, and financial considerations will require attention and periodic maintenance by all of us who don't want to let everything go to taxes or allow some undesireable not on your radar to receive your funds and/or property.
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- April 15, 2019
- Reflections on human frailty
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As I enter my sixty fourth year I am reminded of my fathers.
Both of my fathers — my biological parent and my step parent who took me in as one of his own unconditionally.
Neither of these men were anything I would consider weak. They were loyal, reliable, and hardworking straight talkers who meant what they said and acted accordingly without a second thought regarding those petty outside opinions which are bound to surface during the course of human interactions and sociality.
They didn't fall into any politically correct trap dominating them with the remote control of those leftist indoctrinated idiots with which we coexist.
They were their "own" men. Not some mindless lemming out to survive by doing what everyone else does regardless of the lack of efficacy or immorality.
Even in the face of the closure of their lives they were satisfied with who they were and accepted their fates with a calm demeanor and steadiness I would be proud to own myself.
Theirs was not the condition of being weak and delicate despite advanced age.
They had various physical infirmities which they kept to themselves without any resulting incapacity or impairment until the very end.
They both maintained a moral fortitude of character we simply don't always encounter on the earth.
On this the commencement of my sixty fourth anniversary of earthly existence I am fortunate to have had both the attention and concern of these two excceptionally fine human beings.
The rest of you should be so lucky.
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- April 14, 2019
- It's my birthday 2019
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- April 13, 2019
- The Katyn Massacre
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As a rule, I try to maintain a domestic spin on this blog. It is my fundamental attitude that it's USA centric because this is where I reside and it is the locus of all that I am and do.
However, as with many other things which exist there are exceptions to the rule and the Katyn Massacre is one of those things my mind views as appropriate toward that end ...
Those atrocities committed by the Stalin regime on the Polish people are at once horrific, genocidal, and I personally feel that those repercussions of such unmitigated inhumanity have never been realized for those who denied the right to be a person to so many in that cruety which was often elemental to the Stalin government.
The Katyn massacre or "Katyn execution by shooting consisted of several mass executions of the Polish military officers and intelligentsia carried out by the NKVD "People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs", aka the Soviet secret police commencing in April and and continuing through May 1940.
These murders happend at several locations however the atrocity is named after the Katyn Forest that location of first discovery of mass graves resulting from a military force.
The massacre was prompted by NKVD chief Lavrentiy Beria who proposed execution of all captive members of the Polish officer corps on March 5, 1940. This was approved by the Politburo of the Communist Party in the Soviet Union from the leader, Joseph Stalin, and the membership.
There were about 22,000 victims executed in the Katyn Forest of Russia as well as the Kalinin and Kharkiv prisons and other places.
The multi-ethnic Polish state resulting in the murder of Ukrainians, Belarusians, and Polish Jews.
Nazi Germany announced the discover of mass graves in the forest in April 1943 and the Red Cross intervention and investigation resulted in Stalin terminating diplomatic relations with it. The USSR said the Nazis did the atrocities, denying them through about 1990 when they were acknowledge and condemned by the Soviet government.
In November 2010, the Russian State Duma approved a declaration blaming Stalin and other Soviet officials for ordering the massacre.
Far too little way too late. This is the worst crimes against humanity ever perpetrated without sufficient consequence for those both instigating and involved in the atrocities.
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- April 11, 2019
- Julian Assange arrested at the Ecuadorian embassy in London
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Since 2012 he was attempting to avoid extradition to Sweden on charges of sexual assault that have since been dropped.
Now, he's up on US federal conspiracy charges related to one of the largest ever leaks of government secrets and the UK will decide whether he is extradited for conspiracy with former US intelligence analyst Bradley Manning to download classified databases.
Normally I'm a straight law and order "you do the crime you do the time" kind of guy.
However, given the pardon the brigand Obama gave to this sick bird Bradley Manning I'm reticent to wish to see Assange prosecuted on those charges Manning escaped ... at the hands of a stupid chief executive the ungrateful wretch had the audacity to bad mouth public and messy afterwards.
Leave it to the United States to cultivate a situation so screwed up as to allow the wrong person to be prosecuted.
Manning is the criminal here. Assange was merely practicing journalism.
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- April 10, 2019
- Siblings Day 2019
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Well, another Siblings Day is upon us and I am taking time to lament the exceedingly distant relationships I have with all of mine.
The day is recognized regionally but not federally and there is a promotional foundation said to be devoted to making the day more of a "mainstream" event.
I have so many coworkers who are close with their siblings and the thought that I have no relationship with mine used to get me down.
Nowadays, it's simply the way things are and I haven't allowed it to faze me for decades.
Regardless, I hope your relationship with your siblings is far better than that nonexistent one I have.
Happy Siblings Day to you.
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- April 9, 2019
- National Former Prisoner of War Recognition Day 2019
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Today is the National Former Prisoner of War Recognition Day and represents those individuals who did battle for their country and were captured and imprisoned.
The National Prisoner of War Museum in the United States is appropriately housed at Andersonville National Historic Site at Andersonville, Georgia. Anyone with a grasp of United States history is aware of the horrors of this place during the Civil War and those atrocities committed therein.
The bottom line regarding former prisoner of wars deserve our utmost appreciation and should be honored as those protectors of The Republic they are.
I have always wondered how my behavior would evolve under circumstances of imprisonment as an enemy combatant during war time. Being the rather non compliant horses ass I was during my military stint otherwise it is likely that I would have found myself executed under such conditions.
I'm not one to take mistreatment laying down.
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- April 8, 2019
- Draw a bird day 2019
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- April 8, 2019
- International Romani Day 2019
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I am not aware of ever meeting a gypsy. All I have seen is photographs and I have always found the distinctive apparel, hairstyles, makeup, and jewelry to be impressive.
There have been anecdotal accounts related to me by various others regarding interactions with gypsies but I don't place a lot of substance to anecdotal evidence being a child of the scientific method I prefer to evaluate the "evidence" for myself.
The gypsies are also known as the Romani who are their people referred to by the name they prefer. Their language is called Romany and I try to differentiate between the two out of cultural respect.
Today was set aside in 1990 at Serock, Poland to celbrate the Romani culture and take note of those issues with which they contend in society.
Gypsy
So I'm back to the velvet underground
Back to the floor that I love
To a room with some lace and paper flowers
Back to the gypsy that I was
To the gypsy that I was
And it all comes down to you
Well, you know that it does, well
Lightning strikes maybe once, maybe twice
Oh and it lights up the night
And you see your gypsy
You see your gypsy
To the gypsy
That remains
Her face says freedom
With a little fear
I have no fear
I have only love
And if I was a child
And the child was enough
Enough for me to love
Enough to love
She is dancing away from you now
She was just a wish
She was just a wish
And her memory is all that is left for you now
You see your gypsy, oh
You see your gypsy
Ooh ooh, oh oh, oh oh oh
Goodness strikes
Maybe once, maybe twice
And it all comes down to you
Ooh oh, and it all comes down to you
Lightning strikes
Maybe once, maybe twice (oh)
I still see your bright eyes, bright eyes
(And it all comes down to you)
Stevie Nicks
© Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd
BMG Rights Management
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- April 7, 2019
- National Beer Day 2019
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Once upon a time I would regularly partake of a brewski. I could down a beer with the best of them after leaving active duty in 1979.
Nowadays I don't imbibe much to speak of. I will have a beer if it is offered socially but the end of my drug culture days pretty much marked the end of my beer drinking as well.
National Beer Day is celebrated in the United States every year on April 7.
This is the day that the Cullen–Harrison Act which legalized the sale in the United States of beer with an alcohol content of 3.2% was enacted after having been signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt on March 22, 1933.
This led to the Eighteenth Amendment which established prohibition being repealed on December 5, 1933, with ratification of the Twenty-first Amendment to the U.S. Constitution which ended prohibition.
April 6, the day prior to National Beer Day, is commonly referred to as New Beer's Eve.
National Beer Day was first created in 2009 by one Justin Smith of Richmond, Virginia who was instigated by a friend of his and the whole mess centers around a social media campaign and ending up being recognized by Virginia politicians and pretty much unofficial recognition by the rest of us.
As for me ... I can't say I won't ever down another one it's just not that frequent indulgence it once was.
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- April 6, 2019
- National Tartan Day 2019
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Saturday April 6 is National Tartan Day in the United States. Clothing featuring tartan plaid is often worn by Scottish Americans taking part in National Tartan Day.
While I don't consider myself Scottish American, but am of Scottish extraction on my mother's side of the family.
Locally there is a big annual celebrtation called Tartan Day South. The have events which run the full gamut of traditional highland games of strength, bag pipes, celtic festival activities, food, and fun.
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- April 5, 2019
- Pursuing the Kinder and Gentler
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Vicious. This is how I always characterized myself. Pursuant of the fray, scrappy all the way — and ready to beat your ass at a moment's notice.
I was as contrary as contrary could be in the name of argumentativeness and making some vague point even I couldn't recall oftentimes later.
All that played well when I was a young man. Now that I'm older I have to take a more tolerant attitude lest I get my old decrepit butt kicked regularly. You see, we can't joke about certain things at different junctures in our existence and I definitely feel that my badass phase ended some time ago.
So now I'm this 'keep to myself' introvert with a gregarious streak and I can hold down a conversation regarding most topics without losing my cool or actually exposing my innermost attitudes because I have years of practice.
These gloaming years have imparted a certain acceptance for some things while leaving me adamantly opposed to a lot of new others which I consider immoral or counterintuitive or even criminal ... democrats.
Yet I am left with the distinct feeling that were a life and death conflict to ensue that I still might prevail. Being highly practiced at headshots taken from 300 feet has left a tinge of confidence which won't leave willingly.
For I am a white man. Not privileged. Just opinionated. My opine comes with a fully loaded .357 magnum at the ready and as long as you maintain your space I'll maintain mine and leave you alone.
Tread lightly around the US Constitution, save your thralling acumen regarding the inevitability of the new world order ... and most definitely keep your sharia to yourself.
You cannot fool me and the United Nations will never rule me. Neither will the likes of the European Union, anyone in Brussels nor anyone named Rothschild. I prefer to refrain from becoming a fool's fool like the pawns of George Soros, nazi pawn and the enemy of the United States of America.
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- April 4, 2019
- How do I love thee
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That intense feeling of deep affection known as love has eluded me by and large throughout my lifetime.
Though I haven't really pursued it; those times I did engage it were fraught with misgivings and regrets and simple longing to be free of the tentacles of some equally misguided female.
Then there are other situations where I was left with nothing but regrets for not having pursued what was definitely there.
And always, there is that company with which I end up and far too many simply are less than suitable as well.
All I ever wanted was someone I could talk to that attempted some level of understanding and by and large what I got was "do you dig where I'm coming from ?" ...
So I am content to puruse those entertainment choices with the significant others in my life and forget the notion of soulmates, sharing my life with another, or even anything far from those various indulgences I handle with remuneration.
It's a life and I'm satisfied with how things have turned out regardless. Far better to be alone than entwine with someone less than adequate in the scheme of personality, intellect, and comportment.
Sonnet 43
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day’s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
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- April 3, 2019
- National Burrito Day 2019
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The first Thursday in April gives us National Burrito Day.
I have a real penchant for eating burritos.
Even though I had to give up going to the local Taco Bell because of their rude ass bitch employee I still partake at the other establishments nearby.
Taco Bell just "thinks" it's the only show in town.
So my tortillas rolled around a filling, typically of beans or ground or shredded beef with guac and various other condiment items now typically come from either Salsarita's or La Fogata as they are particularly close ...
And both provide highly satisfactory replacements for what used to be my beef burrito supreme fix.
So in 2019 April 4 is National Burrito Day.
I hope you'll partake of a serving at your favorite establishment serving such fare and if it's Taco Bell I hope you avoid the rude cow of an employee at 2353 Augusta Road in West Columbia SC.
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