Reasons to Vote for Democrats: A Comprehensive Guide

I don’t usually do book reviews but I got this one as a Father’s Day gift and was encouraged to blog about. The book is just so spot on that I agreed. The book is Reasons to Vote for Democrats: A Comprehensive Guide.

As I opened the package Jaime watched me closely with a slight smirk mostly hidden. I cautiously turned the book over and read the back cover:

“Thorough.” (Ben Shapiro, New York Times bestselling author of Bullies)

“Michael Knowles perfectly documents what’s inside the minds of Democrats. A real page-turner!” (Michelle Malkin, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Sold Out)

“I read it twice!” (Dennis Prager, New York Times bestselling author of The Ten Commandments)

“Brilliantly argued! You will not find a more enlightened defense of liberalism. Ever.” (Jason Mattera, New York Times bestselling author of Obama Zombies)

“Insightful, yet remarkably easy reading!” (Guy Benson, bestselling author of End of Discussion)

“The most efficient way to learn about the issues that Democrats really care about. This is a must read.” (Katie Pavlich, New York Times bestselling author of Assault and Flattery)

“The reasons to vote for Democrats can be subtle and complex, but Knowles boils them down to their essence.” (Andrew Klavan, New York Times bestselling author of The Great Good Thing)

Okay…. I know of and respect the opinions of some of these people and told Jaime as much. She told me she thought about getting the Audible version but was concerned a lot of the impact of the book would be lost. Her anticipation could barely be contained. I let the pages ripple past my thumb scanning for tables and graphics. There were none.

I burst into laughter and laughed until my stomach hurt and I was wiping tears from my eyes.

It’s a really, really good book. It has 245 pages, an extensive bibliography, and includes chapters on:

  1. Economics
  2. Foreign Policy
  3. Civil Rights
  4. Education
  5. Homeland Security
  6. Energy
  7. Jobs
  8. Crime
  9. Immigration
  10. Values and Principles

Read the reviews on Amazon.

Sleep naked

I’ve said it before and here is someone else piling on:

Whether you are a male or a woman, sleeping in the buff offers both of you some pretty great health benefits.

The article goes on to explain each of the following points:

  1. It Can Boost Your Love Life
  2. Better Sleep Quality
  3. Burns More Calories
  4. It’s Easier and You Save Money
  5. You’ll Always Be Ready To Go
  6. It’s More Comfortable
  7. Benefits Of Skin on Skin Contact
  8. Better Skin
  9. Human Growth Hormone
  10. Temperature Regulation
  11. Benefits for Men
  12. Benefits for Women

Sounds good to me. In fact, I don’t have a problem with extending the nudity to any other time of the day. In general, I think clothes really only serve two purposes:

  1. To protect you from the elements
  2. To prevent your arrest (this can also be considered a special case of purpose 1).

I still think this is cool

The images below are of the field near Boomershoot Mecca. In the first one you can see Mecca on the hill (the shipping container with trees around it).

I have probably seen this sort of thing a hundred times or more but I still think it is cool.
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Something about the water vapor rising from the field is unusual enough to fascinate me.

Wallace Falls revisited

Yesterday Barb and I hiked to Wallace Falls again. The trees are still extremely mossy, the falls are still beautiful (they had more water going over them this time), and I’m pretty sure the last quarter mile or so of the trail has some stairs where there were slippery rocks before. Also last time I said it took about two hours each way. But we were in and out in a little less than three hours this time. And although I was a little bit stiff for a while when we got back I was fine by the evening and today. Last time I was hurting bad enough to take ibuprofen for a few days.

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Daffodils and tulips

Barb and I drove north for the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival today. I had been there once before which was probably 30 or 35 years ago. Barb had never been there.

We saw huge lines for the early exits and took the advice of the website:

Consider taking Exit 230 off I-5, near Burlington and north of Mount Vernon (there’s little traffic north of Exit 226).  Head west, toward Anacortes and at Pulver Road, turn left and stop in Skagit’s Own Fish Market for maps and directions.  Or, stay on Hwy 20 to BEST Rd, turn left, and continue to the roundabout…go east and you’re in the heart of tulip country, with Tulip Town a left hand turn in about a mile and RoozenGaarde a right hand turn a little farther down McLean.

I’ll bet we saved at least an hour of sitting in stop and go traffic. Those lines extended for miles.

We parked on the side a road next to a field of daffodils and walked a couple hundred yards to a field of tulips. There we walked the dirt roads next to the acres and acres of flowers.

The rest of our visit can be best described with pictures.

IMG_7940AdjustedThe daffodils were tall! They came up midway on my thigh.

Measuring success in one metric

For some things, measuring success is pretty obvious, and the metrics are nicely binary. e.g., “Did the boomer go BOOM after you pulled the trigger?”

In other things the metrics are either much harder to measure, or there are “good” reasons that the people measuring success don’t want a good metric; it would show they are failing miserably. Or, worse, they are no longer needed to “do the job.” Pick just about any political appointee and the example writes itself.

Anyway, the reason I ask is that I am, among other things, a teacher. Yeah, I know, taking one for the team here guys, leave me alone about that, will ‘ya? So in preparing for an upcoming interview, I started to think about what sorts of things I can ask them – that’s always a “fun” place for the interview to go, because it can’t be any trivia you can just read off the school web-site, but it also cannot be something that exposes glaring problems or hypocrisy in their system, because after they uncomfortably give you a non-answer you’ll not be offered a job. So it’s a balancing act.

So this question popped into my head, and I thought I’d bounce it off ya’ll to see what sort of trouble I might get myself into, but also maybe find some good follow-ups. I’ve got what I think it’s a pretty good measure of success, but it would likely open a huge can of zombie attack worms the size of anacondas, which I don’t want to deal with just yet. So, the question is: Continue reading

Quote of the day—Arthur

[Arthur suddenly laughs uproariously]

Gloria: What’s so funny now?

Arthur: Sometimes I just think funny things.

Arthur
1981
Played by Dudley Moore in the movie Arthur.
[Today I was reminded of this by co-worker Josh when he burst into laughter.

Barb does this too, perhaps even more frequently than Josh. And they, unlike Arthur, are not drunk when this happen.

They both spontaneously, without any apparent external input, burst into laughter.

I like that.—Joe]

Overheard

From this morning:

Barb: I’m lollygagging.

Joe: I don’t understand why you would want to gag lollies.

<silence>

<more silence>

<still more silence>

Barb: I love you anyway.

I presume she was using a more modern definition of lollygag than that at the beginning of the 20th Century. I suppose I should confirm that.

How times change

I was doing some reorganizing and throwing away of old things on my library shelves and ran across a “men’s magazine”, Cheri (caution explicit photos), from October 1983. I don’t know why I still had it. I never subscribed to it. It was a favorite of a friend of my ex-wife and I. But we lost contact with him in about 1979 or 1980.

I was about to toss it in the recycling when I noticed something on the cover:

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A sex and gun club in Hawaii? That’s odd. For one, I wasn’t into guns then. And two, were guns that less frowned upon that a magazine of that genre would, let along a club, risk combining the two subjects? And three, I never could, and still don’t, see a connection between sex and guns. They just don’t mix for me.

I scanned in the first two pages of the article (probably NSFW) and put them here and here.

In the second page of the article you will find they say that all calibers greater than .22 LR are banned in the state. Even though they still suffer under extremely repressive gun laws it seems as if Hawaii’s gun owners made progress in some areas over the last 33+ years.

I wondered if the magazine was still in existence and found the link to their website. I discovered their current content is all hard core. I remember our friend saying he liked the magazine because it was not as explicit as many other magazines and it featured women who looked more real than those in the better known magazines. Looking at my sample it appears to be a notch less explicit than Playboy magazine was at the time.

Times change in many ways.

Achievement unlocked

Last Monday I made another donation to what is now called Bloodworks Northwest (formally Puget Sound Blood Center). My online account with them goes back to 12/17/1998. It was my 80th pint on record with them. Ten gallons:

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I knew it was going to be my 10th gallon and Barb wanted to celebrate. I raised an eyebrow. She elaborated, “There should be a parade or something.”

Whatever.

“I’ll blog about it”, I told her.

I have speculated before that perhaps I had donated close to a couple gallons to the Red Cross as well. I found an old Red Cross donor card:

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Two units are indicated on the front and eight on the back for a total of 10 units or one gallon and two pints. I was pretty sure this wasn’t all. So I went looking online. I created an account with my birthday and what I figured was the last zip code they had for me. Bingo! They said I had donated 13 units (about 1.5 gallons):

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I looked through the donation history but they only went back to April 2, 2002.

My first donation was in the mid 70’s when I was in college. I think I participated in more than one blood drive at college and donated when I worked at Boeing and Teltone in the late 70’s. I’m sure I donated at blood drives while at Data I/O in the early 80’s. I know I donated during Operation Desert Storm (early 1991) because I remember standing in line for a couple hours. And so… I don’t really know how many gallons I have donated but it is probably over 12 and perhaps close to 15.

When I was probably about 10 years old my Uncle Alden had stomach ulcer which he didn’t know about. He got very ill before his family insisted he see a doctor. An ambulance took him to the hospital (only getting up the snow covered driveway to the county road with help from either Uncle Jack or cousin Alan with the Jeep pickup). He needed several pints of blood and Dad and some of the neighbors went into town to donate in his name. Dad saw one of the neighbors there, (I’m not sure of his name, it could have been Walt Eberhart) but Dad reported back that over the years the neighbor had donated 10 gallons. This impressed Dad as well as the rest of our family.

At some point it became my goal to donate 10 gallons.

Achievement unlocked.

I think I’ll keep her

Barb and I went out for dinner for Valentines Day and, among other things, we happened to discuss the possibility I would visit Idaho soon to visit family and do some Boomershoot prep. She reminded me I needed to count how many wooden stakes we have for mounting the targets on. For some reason Barb just loves pounding stakes into the ground (I kid) and she was, as usual, thinking months ahead. She suggested that after dinner we stop by Lowe’s on the way home and pick up whatever stakes they have and then once I know how many we have left over from last year I can pick up the balance in a week or three. Valentines celebration and she is thinking of Boomershoot? This one is a keeper.

Lowe’s in Bellevue had two boxes of eight bundles (25 stakes per bundle) and one stray bundle. I left the one stray for someone else, purchased the two boxes, and now I have this in the back of my vehicle:

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As usual (see here, here, here, here, and here), I was prepared with a vampire comment if they asked why I was buying so many stakes. I was disappointed. The guy didn’t seem very bright (Barb commented too) and needed help counting the bundles. I don’t think it occurred to him that 400 stakes was a large quantity. Oh well. Maybe next time.

Barb also made a trip to Costco this week and asked if I wanted her to buy some more of the secret Boomerite ingredient. Sure!

When she brought it into the house she told me she was ready with an answer if they asked what she was going to do with 21 pounds of <redacted>. They didn’t ask. Maybe if she had purchased some anti-freeze at the same time she would have gotten a reaction.

Last night she told me, “I’m just going to keep bugging you until you send an email to the boy scout guy about supplying food at lunch time.” I replied, “I already did that last night. I haven’t got an answer back yet though. Thanks for reminding me.”

Then later last night she showed me the menu for the caterer of the Saturday dinner and asked that I discuss the options with her and make a final decision (we agreed upon roast beef, baked potatoes, fresh fruit, spinach salad, and carrot cake).

This morning she told she realized it was over two months away but she was thinking about what food to bring to the hotel for our personal meals.

She’s got Boomershoot on the brain. No more than I do when we are a couple weeks out, but she, as usual, is planning months ahead.

I think I’ll keep her.

Snowmageddon

A week ago on Sunday afternoon (the 5th) it started snowing in the Seattle area. The higher elevations (300 – 500 feet) in particular usually get a dusting of snow one or more times each winter. But it only rarely accumulates more than an inch or two and only lasts a few hours or maybe a couple of days.

It turns out I had just started testing the webcam I plan to install at the Boomershoot shooting line and I captured some of the snow accumulation and melting. Click on the images to see a higher resolution version with the timestamp visible in the upper right hand corner:

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Monday morning the higher elevation Bellevue residents (where I live) had more than a dusting. Barb measured 10.5” of the white stuff:

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Flash sale on Insights Training

Essentially all my self-defense training has been from Insights. I highly recommend them. And now is your opportunity to get a significant discount on top notch training:

48 hours of savings on all classes!

It’s a Flash Sale! From 8am Monday the 6th through 8am Wednesday the 8th, use code “FEB2017” to get 15% off all classes.

I put my most of my family through and taken them myself (sometimes multiple times) Pepper Spray Seminar, Unarmed Self Defense, and Defensive Folding Knife. I’ve also taken Handgun Retention & Disarming, General Defensive Handgun, Intensive Handgun Skills, Low Light Handgun Skills, Low Light Handgun Skills, General Defensive Rifle, and Tactical First Aid.

The quilt story

Last July Robert Avrech posted a picture of a comforter designed as a U.S. flag and expressed his desire to have one:

A few years ago, Karen and I came across this comforter designed by Timothy Oulton. “I want it,” I said. Karen looked at the price tag and said, “We’ll just have to settle for a photo.”

Sister-in-law Julie makes quilts (over 600 so far) so I asked her to make one for me. We agreed on the price and I offered to give it to Robert. He readily accepted. It took a few months for the flag quilt to get to the head of the queue but I was able to pick it up the last time I was in Idaho and ship it to Robert.

Why? Because he is a Hollywood screenwriter and producer who is a strong supporter of the Second Amendment. I’m not sure I would have the courage to risk my livelihood by being so outspoken behind enemy lines, I wanted to let him know that his efforts are appreciated, and give him a small reward for his courage and support of our specific enumerated right to keep and bear arms.

Today he posted pictures of and thanks for the quit (go to the bottom of the post).

Snow clues

As I posted earlier, on Saturday Kim and I installed most of the hardware for a permanent Internet access point and weather station at the Boomershoot shooting line. I went back on Sunday to fix the wiring that jostled loose and verify the solar panel was charging the battery.

The path we had made was compact enough that I didn’t have to use snowshoes. I broke through maybe a half dozen times, but it was pretty easy walking considering the conditions. I have some more pictures which give some clues as to above average snow accumulation we have this year:

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I did have to run back to the car just as I had almost arrived at the solar panel. A large pickup with a very large trailer filled with hay came down the road and couldn’t get past the narrow spot in the road my car had created. I backed down the hill to the driveway for the first house and got off the road far enough that the pickup could get by.

I found it interesting all the frost that had formed in the previous 17 hours:

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The weather station was almost cartoon like with all the frost.

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Both wind speed and direction sensors were non-functional because of all the frost.

This was the first time in many years when I went to Idaho and didn’t visit Mecca. Check out the bank of snow behind my car (Mecca is in the background).

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Here is a close up of Mecca taken with my 300 mm lens then cropped to the interesting part. In the lower right corner is a picnic table.

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This was the view from niece Lisa’s bedroom window.

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Notice the depth of snow on the roof and on the deck?

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The roads weren’t too bad, but before next winter I’m going to get some new tires for the snow. My current set has seen three winters now and they were having difficulty in the soft snow in the driveway to Doug and Julie’s place.

No such thing as “too sweet”

Barb makes an absolutely amazing caramel sauce for special occasions which she puts on ice cream. There was some left over from a couple days ago and she put it on a Rice Krispy treat. She reported, “I think my eyes rolled back in my head”.

Okay, I need to try this:

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Yup. Those are awesome!

Happy 2017

Well, in spite of the election, everyone reading this made it to 2017. Let’s hope it keeps getting better, and the only melt-downs are leftie brains exploding as The Donald’s supporters can’t help but get tired from all the winning. Clean the guns, keep the powder dry, get some sleep, hug the kids, eat right, read a good book, walk the dog, plant a seed, support your friends, say something nice to the spouse/SO, and don’t take any BS.

Happy New YEAR!

Don’t get on the crazy train

Tamara says:

here’s a puzzler:

It’s a cardinal sin in the progressive weltanschauung to deny someone the validity of their own narrative.

Unless their narrative is “I’m doing this for Islam and the caliph!”

It’s not really a puzzler. Let me explain in a roundabout way.

I received an email a few weeks ago which said in part:

Standard progressive technique against non-progressives is the “basket of deplorables” attack: accuse them of *-ism and watch them wilt as they do a mad scramble trying to show they are actually good people.  What the victims of those attacks don’t realize is that the attack has no connection to fact, and denials aren’t helpful because it isn’t about evidence or truth.  Harry Reid knew this well and used it against Romney, as did many others.

My reply, in part, was:

The psychology of the progressives is that of a personality disorder. If you were to read the book Stop Walking on Eggshells I would bet you would see, as I do, amazing parallels between Borderline Personality Disorder and the political left in this country. I don’t have the book in front of me right now but here are some things that I remember:

  • It is always your fault when something goes wrong.
  • They create or maneuver things such that you are put in “can’t win” situations.
  • They are at high risk of hurting themselves (riots damaging their own neighborhoods is my analog of this) if they get mad at you.
  • They constantly start fights over nothing.
  • The attempted use of facts will result in accusations of “You always have to get your way”, “You need to compromise.”, or increase the verbal and/or physical abuse.
  • There is no successful treatment.
  • The best you can hope for is to expend less energy/time dealing with them without complying with their crazy demands (or as Barb says, “Getting on their crazy train.”)

The basics of how you deal with them, as individuals, is to tell them you aren’t going to tolerate their misbehavior. They will go ballistic at this, after all, it is all your fault, not theirs. They have done nothing wrong. Then ignore them, walk away, or otherwise disengage and do your own thing when they inevitably misbehave. You must not give in to their misbehavior. They will only encourage them to misbehave more.

I just wish there was a way to divorce ourselves from the political left. I’m tired of the constant abuse and crazy talk.

Back to Tamara’s puzzlement.

These people are nuts. Barb and I have both had decades of experience attempting to deal with people like this and spent time talking to counselors getting help dealing with personality disordered people. Several times a week during the first year or so we were together one of us would tell a story and ask, “Why did they do this?” It took a while but it finally reached the point where the other person would say, “Don’t try to make sense of it. You will go crazy if you try.” That shortened to, “You are trying to get on crazy train with them.”

We mostly have the stories out of our system and it is now rare for one of us to tell one. And if one does come out the response is just, “Don’t get on the crazy train.”

And that is what our response to these sort of puzzlements should be. Give them “that look” and tell the sane people attempting to appease or understand the progressives, “Don’t get on the crazy train.”