Love is grand.

Friday was a quiet evening waiting for The Claus to pop out.
Saturday was kid’s heaven, followed by an afternoon and evening at Donna’s for Christmas dinner (and Mead!!!).

Today… recovery.

It was the right thing for it’s time… but it was never more than a transitional step toward the US military finally figuring out what other nations already knew…that it doesn’t matter one way or the other.

Whatever rump you range or muff you dive… you follow the rules of conduct and everything will be fine.

Oh… and about the marines, who some suggest are more against this… it really depends on the way it’s presented. If people are asked to confront something that makes them uncomfortable… they will answer to what is familiar and comfortable.

However, if you get a bunch of marines in an assembly and ask them if would be willing to fight next to a soldier that is homosexual who wants to kill the Islamic scum that would cut our throats, enslave our women and bring our nation to it’s knees… then you will hear a rousing yell of affirmation that would rip the roof off.

I bought this shirt from a local Head shop. I walked in and saw this groovy shirt, snatched it up and sauntered proudly to the cashier…one aged person of the long haired variety. As I freed my plastic to purchase my booty, said long hair commented that they are a “cash only” establishment… nodding sagely, I collected my minions and drove to the nearest ATM machine, which was in a corner Walgreens drug store.

After paying the small homage fee for the use of the convenient box, I collected my duckets and migrated back to the home of my soon to be adopted shirt. With a fistful of dollars, I bought the shirt… and as the long haried one was bagging my wares, I commented that it was very convenient to have an ATM a block away as the nearest bank was about a mile distant… to which the unwashed one snarled “Dude, you just paid a fee to get your own money! And you paid it to …A BANK” (said with a snarl best kept for child rapists).

I was in shock at the stupidity of what I had just heard. Here I was…enriching this dirty hippy and helping to put bread on his table and a roof over his deadhead, and he is giving me grief for paying a bank 3 dollars for providing access to my money by installing and maintaining a very expensive piece of telecommunication banking hardware in a local drugstore! That 3 dollar fee put food on the table for that technician who works on that machine which is allowing me to buy this shirt and keep this dirty hippy in business. Look around you, oh dirty hippy… see the houses and the shops and the organic foodstores… and know this… there would be none of these things without “banks!”.

… and I wouldn’t have to have done so if you ponied up a card machine in the first place!!!

Geez…

Well, anyway… I had a great Halloween…

Prince was asked about the song in 1998:

Q: There’s been a discussion going on around the ‘net about what “Starfish and Coffee” means. Can u explain that song? Is it about a mentally challenged girl?

Prince: Let’s say mentally alternative, or “gifted,” shall we?

Here are the lyrics:

It was 7:45 we were all in line
2 greet the teacher Miss Cathleen
First was Kevin, then came Lucy, third in line was me
All of us were ordinary compared to Cynthia Rose
She always stood at the back of the line
A smile beneath her nose
Her favorite number was 20 and every single day
If U asked her what she had 4 breakfast
This is what she’d say
Starfish and coffee
Maple syrup and jam
Butterscotch clouds, a tangerine
And a side order of ham
If U set your mind free, baby
Maybe you’d understand
Starfish and coffee
Maple syrup and jam

Cynthia wore the prettiest dress
With different color socks
Sometimes I wondered if the mates were in her lunchbox
Me and Lucy opened it when Cynthia wasn’t around
Lucy cried, I almost died, U know what we found?

Starfish and coffee
Maple syrup and jam
Butterscotch clouds, a tangerine
And a side order of ham
If U set your mind free, honey
Maybe you’d understand
Starfish and coffee
Maple syrup and jam

Starfish and coffee

Cynthia had a happy face, just like the one she’d draw
On every wall in every school
But it’s all right, it’s 4 a worthy cause
Go on, Cynthia, keep singin’

Starfish and coffee
Maple syrup and jam
Butterscotch clouds, a tangerine
And a side order of ham
If U set your mind free, baby
Maybe you’d understand
Starfish and coffee
Maple syrup and jam

As I got older, I discovered the pleasures of REAL computer gaming…. first in text or ANSI graphics… then with ever smaller and more colorful blocks of pixels. Good stuff… good times.

I was there for the rise of the Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game(MMORPG), playing hours of Ultima Online (Atlantic forever!), Everquest, Anarchy Online, Star Wars Galaxies, Everquest 2, World of Warcraft, City of Heroes, Lord of the Rings Online, Champions Online and finally… Star Trek Online. Over the last 10-12 years, I have been there and done that for both online and single player games.

And consoles! Yep… I had all the stars from the home TV gaming world, from the original  pong to the Wii… ending with the Playstation 3. Cartridges and disks… I have played them all.

And now? I’m done. I think after all these years, I’ve gotten just about all I can out of these experiences.

What started this decline was my house was robbed a couple of years ago. My PS3 was stolen, along with all the games. As I was totaling the value of these for insurance purposes, I actually saw the accumulated bottom line number and was shocked that I had wasted so much money on this hobby. I decided right then to not replace the console and use that money for other more “home improvement” things.

Since then, I’ve picked up a few games, but none of them have really entertained me beyond the first few days. After the initial “cool” factor… they all became more like work than play… and as my play time is limited, I tended to look for other quick bits of distraction.

The final nail in the coffin for my Gaming Identity was a quote by Edward “Bill Adama” James Olmos, who commented about how we are a reflection of what we choose to do… if we read histories, we are historians… if we work on our houses, we are carpenters/electrician/plumbers etc… gardeners… and he left that if we play games in front of a TV for hours…well, we are THAT. Wow.

At this stage of my life, with the commitments to family and career and house… I cannot see devoting my time to so unproductive a hobby. And that really is the point, isn’t it? Hobbies are great. Every man needs a hobby. But, as far as hobbies go… I would consider computer gaming to be the least productive outside the event of entertainment itself.

As I get older, and I start to look at time as a more limited commodity, I cannot help but feel that even my entertainment time needs to be productive in some way… be it the creation of something useful or pleasing to the eye… or making my home a more fit place to dwell in… or activities to improve my mind and body.

What really seals the deal … suppose if, like the property value stolen… I could somehow reclaim the time spent on 10 years gaming to then spend on either the equivalent reimbursement of previous entertainment…or something else, like lessons or carpentry or some there more productive hobby… what would I do? There really is not question, for me…

I wouldn’t be gaming.

IMO, it is not even defensible by the left that Barry’s entire Ivory Tower view is anything other than a fraud and suicidal. The academia mind-set of world affairs is WRONG. It ignores first principles…which is not harmony and social “progress”. It is national defense which allows all the virtues of an enlightened society. That “enlightenment” doesn’t create the foreign policies. It is teh security of a strong foreign policy that allows the luxury of academic fancies.

This is all quite mad even in Obama’s terms. He sends 30,000 troops to fight terror overseas, yet if any terrorists come to attack us here, they are magically transformed from enemy into defendant.

The logic is perverse. If we find Abdulmutallab in an al-Qaeda training camp in Yemen, where he is merely preparing for a terror attack, we snuff him out with a Predator — no judge, no jury, no qualms. But if we catch him in the United States in the very act of mass murder, he instantly acquires protection not just from execution by drone but even from interrogation.

The president said that this incident highlights “the nature of those who threaten our homeland.” But the president is constantly denying the nature of those who threaten our homeland. On Tuesday, he referred five times to Abdulmutallab (and his terrorist ilk) as “extremist(s).”

A man who shoots abortion doctors is an extremist. An eco-fanatic who torches logging sites is an extremist. Abdulmutallab is not one of these. He is a jihadist. And unlike the guys who shoot abortion doctors, jihadists have cells all over the world; they blow up trains in London, nightclubs in Bali and airplanes over Detroit (if they can); and are openly pledged to war on America.

Hollywood churned out dozens of in-the-trenches, pro-America extravaganzas such as Wake Island and Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo while World War II was being fought.

But the portrayal of the U.S. military during its current engagements has been more subdued and even critical.

Game makers have stepped into the breach. And they’re making huge bucks crafting patriotic entertainment pieces for which the movie industry used to be famous.

Most notable of the new virtual epics is Modern Warfare 2 and its predecessor, both from California-based publisher Activision Blizzard Inc.

Activision’s top executive made it clear where the company stands when he announced an endowment to help military veterans find jobs.

“Business leaders have an opportunity to … reverse an alarming trend of not recognizing the sacrifices made by the men and women of our military service,” CEO Robert Kotick said.

Ah… the good old days.

"I want my two dollars!"

The days when creepy dead kids would float  outside your window, whispering to you to open it and invite them in.

Back then, you were pretty damn sure that seriously f*cked up sh*t would go down if you opened that window. Hell, I had nightmares about that evil kid, and every scratch sound from my window kept me up at night. In those day vamps were things to be terrified of. They would murder you… and becoming one meant the REAL you… your mind and soul… would be destroyed and replaced by an evil spirit that would likely kill everyone you loved. Your mom, your wife… your kids.(even babies)

Now we have euro-trash metrosexuals AT BEST… and sparkly emo angst-wussies at the bottom of the genre barrel. And they are being sold as the thing we all aspire to. Now, I’m not a stick-in-the-mud.(how many hyphens can I put in this post? I-Don’t-know!!!) I totally dug Interview with the Vampire and The Vampire Lestat, even if both of them made me long for the taste of a fresh taco, what with all the Sausage Lover’s Pizza Anne was selling me.

But, enough is enough. We NEED the return of the Vampire as The Thing To Drive A POINTED STICK INTO! We need Sarah Michelle Gellar in all her golden glory, using her awesome slayer powers of shapely splendor to drive a few stakes into the hearts of the entire cast of Vampire Diaries… and set fire to Edward and his band of fruit f*ckers.

I *heart* Penny Arcade.

And now… cry for the lost vampires of old.