I'm Bored...

and I'm 95% freak.

Well I'll be...

Looks like Ol' Jim has taken the blog plunge as well. Who'd a thought eh? I probly haven't done enough to introduce y'all to my oldest brother. I suppose my wife described him best... We were watching Hidalgo the other night... She looked up at me and said, "He reminds me of Jim."

That's pretty much right.

Anyway... I'd appreciate it if gave him a look over at Threeway.

Why does this crap only happen to me?

It's not Halloween... but everyone was trick-or-treatin' just the same. Jeb was out in his Dragon costume... some of you were even lucky enough to get pictures of him... I know I know... He's adorable...

Anyway... Julie went trick-or-treating with him... of course it's not really trick-or-treating at that age... it's showing off the baby, which is why I sent Julie to do it. I stayed home to man the front porch and pass out candy.

So I lit up a stoge, popped open a corona, and set up shop on the front porch. For some reason we had huge numbers of kids come by this year... And it I can assure it was fine time... Well... most of it was...

Everyone who came by commented on the bike. Kids all ooo'd and ahh'd... as did their Dad's... and a couple Mom's too! On guy even asked if it was a Ducati. Of course I quickly said, "Yup.. sure is!"

So like I said, things were goin' along right nice... Until... the three girls come stollin' up...

Now... Understand... These girls were... somewhere between 12 and 14... in costumes that were a mixture of almost to revealing... and blantantly sexy. They were bein' bad... they knew it... and they liked it... It was like watching the 8th grade version of Spring Break.

Anyway... They gratuitously praised the bike... and begged for the obligatory ride... I played it cool though... until one of them pointed at the Corona and said, "How about ya skip the candy and gimmie one of those?"

Feeling oh so uncomfortable I said, "I'm sorry darlin'. Ain't no Corona in the candy bowl."

At this point... she hikes one leg up on to the second step... leans in... close but not to close... and says, "I'll make it worth your while."

I screamed in my head for a few seconds.... praying... begging God to remove me from this horrible situation... wishing I could find a gun to shove in my mouth and end my misery myself... but it was not to be...

Of course I stood up... passed out candy and shoo'd them away as fast as I could. Looking back I wish I'da chased them away with the garden hose.

Help me out here people... Can't I be arrested for just hearing those words from a girl that young?

F**k this...

I'm drinkin'.

Changes...

I like rednecks. I like the girls who know all the words to "She thinks my tractor's sexy". I like guys who've got shotguns and trucks. Ya know what ya get with these folks, and you sure know were you stand with 'em too.

The funny thing is... I've got so many friends that aren't like that.

I mean... I still talk to the guys I went to college and to high school with. These folks are still good friends of mine... and they're all city boys. I can only imagine what they think now.

See, I went to high school at Overton in Nashville. As far as government schools go, at the time, Overton was where the rich kids went, or at least that was the reputation. They even called us tea-sippers.

I wouldn't go that far, but my friends were definately city boys, and still are. At the time, I'm sure they figgered I was too. I've always preferred the country, but Nashville was new and it was fun. I liked the guys so I just sort of rolled with it.

The only time those guys would ever see the other side of me was when I'd head up to JAC's. At the time he was re-buildin' his farmhouse and was good enough to let me come "help" and hang out. I doubt I was much help, but we managed to get a bunch o' work done anyhow.

Either way when I'd come home my friends would often comment that I was different. I never noticed myself, but I guess ya never do. After a week or so things would be back to normal, and I wouldn't hear anything about it until the next time I went.

Looking back on it... I was just bein' me.

Time marches on, as the fella says, and I'm still hearin' the same things from them. Now of course it's always in the context of "New Trailor" vs "Old Trailor"... hrmm... see that's my nickname... Trailor. Y'all didn't know that though eh? Ah well... now ya do.

Anyway, New Trailor is into guns and motorcycles. He has a wood shop, and tools, and laughs at men who don't know how to fix stuff. If you can't change your own oil, "New Trailor" is liable to question your manhood. He listens to country music, and generally finds anything "artsy" repugnant.

"Old Trailor" was a city boy. He played tennis and drums. He listened to Rush and Zeplin. He lusted for Corvettes.

I guess the thing that no one knew at the time was... This stuff ain't new.

Part of the reason I've been quietly bummed for the last few days is the realization that my old friends would much prefer to have "Old Trailor" back instead of "New Trailor"... While my newer friends tend to embrace both... God Bless Ya Shane...

So what to do? Hell if I know... But I've got to figure it out... because Julie and I have to decide where we're gonna live... and well... Friends are incredibily important to us... we don't want to settle down in Nashville... Only to find out that the group of friends who used to love us, now really don't like us that much...

Knoxville sounds better and better...

Holiday Silliness

I expect women to have emotional reactions. I expect women to jump to inconsistant conclusions based on emotional flare-ups rather than reason. So of course I was not suprised to find that Bane was strongly opposed to Halloween.

He's not alone though. Lots of folks in the Church lament our modern holidays. Let's take a second to look at their position shall we? I believe it goes something like this...

Christmas is bad because it's all about phony customs and materialism. This seperates people from the true meaning of Christmas, which is to celebrate the birth of Christ.

Halloween is bad because it's a pagan holiday that celebrates evil. The modern customs
may seem innocent but you cannot seperate it from the dark roots of the holiday.

Sound about right?

Now see how rediculous it sounds when you put it back to back? Either statement sounds fine by itself, but back to back... you have yourself what we in the South call.... a contradiction.

See either materialism masks the original intent of the holiday, or it does not. Why should mask it in the case of Christmas, but then fail to mask it in the case of Halloween? That's just silly.

Millions of children celebrate halloween every year. More money is spent on the holiday than any other save Christmas. Yet, devil worship is not widespread. Why not? Because it's perposterous, that's why not. Think for crying out loud. I can just see some Satanist now...

"Well... I was raised Christian.. but mom and dad took me trick-or-treating... and to a haunted house... and like.. dude.. it was sooo cool. So like.. I got all into like... the occult... and... you know.. stuff... and like.. dude... Here I am today!"

No one in the right mind believes that writing letters to Santa is going to open up a child to Christianity. Neither should we think that trick-or-treating is going to open up a child to Satan.

Colonization

"It is perfectly reasonable to hold to and profess conservative social and economic principals domesticly and just as soon have the rest of the world be a US colony." - JACIII

Well now boys and girls.... that's tough to argue with. Personally I perfer "Free Trade with All, Treaties with None." but in absence of that... I'll gladly take Global Domination. In truth I am not in favor of self-determination for all... I only favor it for those with a demonstrated ability to actually govern themselves.

Let's face it... If your kid has a wreck every week... you don't go get him his license just because he turned 16. He has to prove he can drive first. We've got whole continents that have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are incapable of governing themselves... Africa, and South America.

If I had my way, we end all trade sanctions. We'd end all import and export tarriffs. We'd leave NATO and the UN, and we'd declare every treatie we ever signed null and void. We'd pull all of our boys home and get them real jobs where they actually produce something. Then we'd be cookin'!

Of course... Barring that as a possibility... I'd have no problem with us conquering the world and looting it as we see fit.

Thanks Ladies!

It's occured to me that I really am a lucky man. I mean lets face it... Can any of you think of another blogger with his very own Harem? Anyone?

I really appreciate it kids. Y'all are the best. There's a cool factor here at the old blog that simply isn't matched in many other places. Frankly it's got nothing to do with me. I just sweep up, and try to make y'all feel at home.

I 'preciate it y'all. I really do.

Why South America Sucks

Of course this is where we would normally call up our token liberal, and allow them to bleed all over us about the evils of corporate greed, and the exploitation of labor.

You'll be happy to know that our token liberal is out for his bi-weekly scourging (we're still hoping to beat some sense into him), so instead, you get to hear the real problem.

Listen carefully now... I'm only saying this once... typing.... I mean... dammit you know what I mean...

The real reason these people are poor is because they're stupid and lazy! You want proof? Fine. In a recent study 70% of all parents in Colombia reported that they felt that children did not need discipline.

Ok I take it back... I am gonna type that one more time...

In a resent poll, 70% of the parents questioned said that children do not need discipline.

Do I need to type it a third time? No? Good. As a way of establishing the validity of that poll, let me offer some of Joy's experience down there in what passes for a school.

She is "teaching" a class of four year olds. However, they aren't allowed to discipline these kids at all. The worst of the lot are the twins, children of a cartel family. They're 4, and have never known even the slightest restriction or discipline in their lives. They aren't potty trained. Nothing. They're well dressed little animals.

Dogs raise offspring with better manners.

The school won't discipline the kids, because they are afraid of making the parents mad. Hrm... Sound familiar?

People in south america are poor, because they have no work ethic. They have no ambition. When the left talks of the exploitation of the workers down there... they should perhaps look at the other side of the coin.

Someone is actually trying to give these worthless dogs a chance. Which, judging by their history, is far more than they deserve, and their culture, is far more than they deserve. If anyone is being exploited, its the companies. They'd be better off just burning the money.

You know what you get from "investing" in South America? Its simple. Take a years wages, burn it... then urinate all over the ashes.

These people have gone out of their way to create their very own little hell on earth. Fine. Let them have it.

The problem is, if you look at south america... what you'll see is a perect reflection of the future of America, were it to be turned over to the nutcase left.

John Titor

Back in November of 2000, a fella started posting on various public web forums under the name Time_Travel0. His name was John Titor, and he claimed to be from the year 2036. One of the first things he posted was a set of pictures. These showed his time machine (manufactured by GE!) and several pages of its technical manual.

Now normally we'd all just write this off as a hoax and call it a day. God knows that's what I origininally did. I would ask that you read up a little on this though, and consider that if it is a hoax, it is one of the most elaborate, well executed, and well thought out hoaxs ever, and that alone makes it interesting.

Let me give a brief rundown of what John said we were in for, and why I'm writing about this now. Here are some of John's predictions:

(1) The basics for time travel start at CERN in about a year and end in 2034 with the first "time machine" built by GE. (link added)

(2) There is a civil war in the United States that starts in 2005. That conflict flares up and down for 10 years. In 2015, Russia launches a nuclear strike against the major cities in the United States (which is the "other side" of the civil war from my perspective), China and Europe. The United States counter attacks. The US cities are destroyed along with the AFE (American Federal Empire)...thus we (in the country) won. The European Union and China were also destroyed. Russia is now our largest trading partner and the Capitol of the US was moved to Omaha Nebraska.

John's civil war was between the Rural and the Urban. He was known to say that the whole think kicks off in 2004 with major election unrest. It starts slow and builds to what he calls a WACO type event every month, until finally it escalates to open war all over the country.

This sounds pretty much exactly like what I think will happen... I just don't know if its gonna happen right now.

I urge you to read up on this stuff. Not because I think its all true, but because it makes you think.

If nothing else, even the worlds finest skeptics enjoy the worlds greatest hoax.

Hrmmm

Rhinquist's recent health issues sparks some thought. There are a lot of conservatives out there who are pissed about Bush's liberal ways... This could crystallize things for a them and get them on board for one last Elephant run.

Not me mind you. But I'm sure some.

This next President is going to appoint 2 or 3 new justices. Kerry's nominations would be terrifying.... well... except that I know that those nominations will likely bring about the war that I see as inevitable.

Better now than later I suppose... it's fun to watch when you honestly don't care.

Monday...

I know y'all don't come here to listen to whinin'. That's largely why I haven't posted anything today. I've just been in a bad mood for several days. I don't know what it is. I've just been in one of those funks where it feels like everything is going wrong. Everything is obviously not going wrong. In fact, things are going quite well... but for whatever reason I'm still in this funk.

I'm still pissed about Boston...

I dont know if it's the pictures they posted of the cops shooting into the Boston crowd from all of 4 feet away... or the witnesses that are swearing the crowds were calm when the cops opened fire...

I don't know... I've got a lot to say... and no one to say it to... and what I have to say... I really wouldn't want anyone to hear anyway... So I'm gonna just shut up now.

Julie's on call tonight.... so I can't even drink it away...

Dammit.

Titans

Given thier struggle with injuries and short-yardage situations... This seems very appropriate. The Inches speach... From Any Given Sunday;

Inches

I don't know what to say really.
Three minutes
to the biggest battle of our professional lives
all comes down to today.
Either we heal as a team or we are going to crumble.
Inch by inch
play by play
till we're finished.

We are in hell right now, gentlemen
believe me
and
we can stay here
and get the shit kicked out of us
or
we can fight our wayback into the light.
We can climb out of hell.
One inch, at a time.

Now I can't do it for you.
I'm too old.
I look around and I see these young faces
and I think
I mean
I made every wrong choice a middle age man could make.
I uh....I pissed away all my money
believe it or not.
I chased off
anyone who has ever loved me.
And lately,
I can't even stand the face I see in the mirror.

You know when you get old in life
things get taken from you.
That's, that's part of life.
But,
you only learn that when you start losing stuff.
You find out that life is just a game of inches.

So is football.
Because in either game
life or football
the margin for error is so small.
I mean
one half step too late or to early
you don't quite make it.
One half second too slow or too fast
and you don't quite catch it.

The inches we need are everywhere around us.
They are in ever break of the game
every minute, every second.
On this team, we fight for that inch
On this team, we tear ourselves, and everyone around us
to pieces for that inch.
We CLAW with our finger nails for that inch.
Cause we know
when we add up all those inches
that's going to make the fucking difference
between WINNING and LOSING
between LIVING and DYING.

I'll tell you this
in any fight
it is the guy who is willing to die
who is going to win that inch.
And I know
if I am going to have any life anymore
it is because, I am still willing to fight, and die for that inch
because that is what LIVING is.
The six inches in front of your face.

Now I can't make you do it.
You gotta look at the guy next to you.
Look into his eyes.
Now I think you are going to see a guy who will go that inch with you.
You are going to see a guywho will sacrifice himself for this team
because he knows when it comes down to it,
you are gonna do the same thing for him.
That's a team, gentlemen
and either we heal now, as a team,
or we will die as individuals.
That's football guys.
That's all it is.
Now, whattaya gonna do?

The Third Saturday in October

Today all over the South, football fans prepare for an annual Religious Rite. Pregame preperation, begun days before is now in full swing. Rocky Top blares, and the Tide Rolls. Feasts that make a November Thursday pale in comparison are consumed. War Paint is painted. War dances danced.

Today... is UT versus Alabama. The Crimson Tide versus the Volunteers.

If that doesn't give you chills... Then I pity you. Maybe soccer is on some other channel.

Churchill vs the Home Grown Democrat

Today I heard a talking head Democrat describe liberalism as "The Politics of Being Nice".

Awww... Well isn't that special.

Zip it Hippie!

Unemployment in France, Germany, and Blessed England is hovering between 8 and 10 percent. While here, its 5.4%. Which of these countries would you like us to emulate again?

Sadly, intentions don't count for a thing. You may mean to help the poor, but if your policies end up causing rampant unemployment then you've screwed them just the same.

The politics of being nice. Have you ever heard such stupidity? What makes it worse is that they actually apply this "thinking" to their lives. They don't like to tell their kids No, so they don't. Because it's not nice. They'll let these kids be run-over, because they wanted to be nice, and let them play in the street.

Its enough to make you wish their parents had had a similar philosophy.

It goes to the core haze that liberals live behind. They ignore the Law of Unintended Consequences, and are regularly bitten on the butt by it. Let me give an example:

The steel workers want tarriffs on cheaper foriegn steel. They want "fairness". The F word... Use the F word around a liberal and watch him jump into action. Sadly that jumping hardly ever involves the nearest bridge. So anyway the liberal of course grants the tarriffs, which raises the price on the foriegn steel. Steel workers are happy. This is all the liberal sees.

What he does not see is that every manufacturing company in the country is now paying higher prices for steel. He doesn't see the higher prices this causes on all products produced with steel. Liberals will never understand that someone always has to pay. That someone by the way, is always you and me. You know they'll never understand... because if they did, they'd stop being liberals!

You want to help the poor? Bring in more business. As competition for the labor force increases, so will the wages. This is why Taco Bell pays 7 bucks an hour in Nashville, while manufacturing jobs in WV pay minimum wage.

We should round up all the liberals, and limit their discourse in national politics to idealic outcomes. We should use them to seek out noble goals, then we should go find conservatives to actually find a way to reach those goals.

Remember what Churchhill said about the politics of being nice?

"If you're 20 years old and you're not a liberal, you have no heart. If you're 40 years old and you're not a conservative, you have no mind."

Amen, and Amen.

Pie Wagons

As if I wasn't pissed off enough, now this.

Jack-Booted Thugs

The thing about non-lethal weapons, is they are only non-lethal when used as directed. Folks in Boston found out this week that when used improperly, they are plenty lethal. I can't even begin to express how furious I am about this.

We're talking about a projectile that's designed to strike a target, and then shatter and soak the target with pepper-spray. All well and good, but can someone explain to me how this ended up hitting a girl in eye?

Oh.. I know... it was an accident. Just like all those cops who "accidently" shoot themselves while cleaning their guns. Funny... I've never heard of anyone but cops falling victim to these accidents.

We hear the Boston Chief of Police claiming that the department will take full responsibility for this. Oh really? By "taking full responsibility" I'm sure what he really means is Plan A. Which is this "We're going to release all sorts of slander about the young woman we killed. We're going to exajurate the crowd's behavior and the urgency of the situation. Then we're going to pretend to investigate, while we give the murderer a few months paid vacation." Plan A is the hunker-down until the media finds something else to talk about plan.

The only thing more predictable than what is going to happen, is what is not going to happen. No charges will be brought against this woman's killer... Not murder and not manslaughter.

See when a citizen accidently kills someone, they go to jail for a long long time. When a cop does it, he gets a paid vacation.

Huntin' Boots

For me, this topic begins and ends with the name Itasca. That's what I have, that's what I wear, that's what I love. Of course if you're a girl looking for a hiking boot this probably isn't for you, but, they make stuff that you might want to check out.

Now I should note that through all of the adventures you've read about hear, and many many others Julie and I were both wearing Hi-Tec boots. Julie's had a longer break-in than she wanted, but she ended up liking them. Recently we retired both pair and moved on. I got my beloved Itasca hunting boots, and Julie got a pair of Herman Commanders that I admit I sometimes lust for.

My boots are waterproof and have 2400 grams of thinsulate. No, that's not overkill. I don't believe in cold feet. I can still wear them in the summer, and do... but like I said... I do find myself lusting after Julie's Commanders.

If I were in Minnesota though... I hear Rocky makes a heated boot.

Boots

I firmly believe that the instinctive love of boots comes with the testicles. I'm not drawing any conclusions here from Vox's love of italian shoes either. That's up to you.

For now, lets talk western...

My favorite pair were given to me by Dad. Tony Lamas... I know there are those of you out there that swear by Dan Post but ol' Tony does me just fine. Comfortable as can be.

I hate to admit it, but the best boot I've ever bought for myself was made up in Canada of all places. Worse yet, it even has a damned froggy named; Boulet. I know... I know... I worry about myself sometimes...

Anyway if you have a problem with western boots ridin' up your heel you might give them a shot. They're damned fine boots, and they're made with a sort of cup that holds your heel real well. I love mine.

Uncle L.B. (Luther Burke) had a pair custom made for his feet. Fella down in Texas done it. That's the way to do it boys, if ya have the time and money that is.

I ain't that particular on skins. Leather is good enough for me. Sure enough eel and lizard are pretty as they can be... and God knows I love the idea of wearin' a damned snake on my feet... Gator would be awesome for certain football weekends too...

What do y'all wear?

Now huntin' and killin' boots are another matter... We'll deal with them directly, on another thread.

From the Comments

Res Ispa bloviates: Although I venture that things whould be different if Dr. Who was makeing 40 grand as a manager at wal mart and you where staying at home.

Actually DrWho is making less than 40 grand per year now. We're doing just fine on that one income thanks. This idea that you can't live on a single income is simply untrue. We've been doing it for going on two years now.

Nate-Mail

One of my more attractive readers sounds emails:

I may be arguing out of ignorance here, so maybe you can set me straight if I'm wrong.
It seems to me that the people of the South had to know that slavery was wrong. That morally and ethically you should not own another human being. I realize that it was a very profitable enterprise, but after the war it didn't matter anyway. Would it have not made more sense to willingly abolish slavery? I believe that Lincoln's issue was with power, not slavery, but abolishing it would have made his reasoning for the war illegitimate. It would have saved thousands of lives (they killed their own family members for Pete's sake), and dollars in the long run. I don't know how far Lincoln's quest would have gone if he couldn't use slavery as his driving force.

You're looking at the past through today-colored glasses. But lets start at the begining. Did the Yankee traders who sold the slaves to southerners know that slavery was immoral? Every single slave boat sailed out of New York Harbor. Virtually every slave that came to America came here via New York City. The traders were without quesiton the worst of the worst. They didn't see blacks as humans at all. They saw them as sophisticated monkies. Darwin wrote a book to that effect.

Now, the folks in the South were around these folks every day. They grew to know them, and grew to respect them a great deal. 80% of the abolishonist organizations were based in the South and run by Southerners. The trouble is the differing viewpoints of how to solve the problem.

The yankees didn't know crap about the problem itself. They just thought, "Slavery bad. Must stop". They didn't care about the repercussions of ending a practice like that so suddenly. They didn't think at all. Which is typical of them then, and today. They didn't think about the fact that you'd be turning thousands of people loose into society who had no means of supporting themselves, and no way of even knowing how to go about it. They wouldn't care anyway. Wasn't their problem.

The Yankees looked down and saw a wounded leg. Southerners wanted to treat the leg and let it heal. The yankees didn't want to wait. They cut the leg off, and in typical yankee fashion, they then blamed the bleeding on everyone else.

Today it seems impossible to own a slave, and to really care about that slave as a human being. It was demonstrated that this was in fact the norm in the South. Slaves were taught to read and write. And think of this... If you saw something as an animal... Why would you teach that animal about Christ? Yet that is exactly what the Southrons did. One of the great shocks the Yankee soldiers had to come to grips with, was the fact that blacks were a moral race. The average yankee thought blacks were animals. That's what they were told to expect. This shock explains why so many slaves ended up raped when they turned down the yankee advances.

Slavery was dying in the South because of basic economics. Machines were doing the work cheaper and faster than men could, and it was cheaper to pay a man wages than it was to give him shelter and healthcare and food 24 hours per day.

When the newly "Freed" slaves went North they found they had to live in far worse conditions, and work far greater hours, and they weren't fed or cared for nearly as well.

In short, their standard of living dropped considerably. Ahhh... You were 18 hours a day and live in a shack with 20 other people. I live in a house with my family, and work 12 hours a day. You work in a factor... I work in a field. Who's more free?

As for abolishing slavery out-right... Virginia was the first state in the Union to out-law the slave trade. They did it well before the war. After the war, Jeff Davis is quoted as saying, "We should've freed them all before the war started." He meant it in terms of the PR battle though. The English wanted to side with us, but didn't want to be seen as supporting slavery, and they knew thats how it would be painted. Same with France, who agreed to break the yankee blockades, then backed out at the last minute. Pricks.

If we'd abolished slavery out-right it would've exposed Lincoln for the fraud he was and taken away the biggest propaganda tool in the history of the world.