What is it about nice people that attract total idiots?Nice people are martyrs. Idiots are evangelists.

SOCK IT TO ME BABY!!!

Wednesday, October 2, 2013

The big fight

And no, I'm not talking about the Government "shutdown'.  I am thoroughly disgusted with the whole thing, though I am delighted by Harry Reid showing his true colors.  "Why would we want to do that? I have 1,100 people at Nellis Air Force base that are sitting home. They have a few problems of their own,"  he says in response to a reporter's question on why he wouldn't even consider a Republican stopgap to fund the NIH through the debacle.  Then later, he makes fun of Republicans saying he doesn't care about kids with cancer.  I'm not saying THAT, Mr. Reid... I AM saying that you've shown that in your mind, a paycheck is JUST as important as a human life.  I'm surprised even a paycheck means that much to you, considering all the fat union kickback checks you get.

I have a few fine liberal friends... one of them in particular posted about how great Obamacare is, even as people see their hours cut, their jobs lost, their premiums and medicines skyrocket, and their quality of care plummet.  Then posts later about how sad and silly John "Boner" is to force this shutdown, never mind that he is doing what he is doing because Reid and Nancy Pelosi eliminated legitimate debate when they passed the damnable thing.  I've heard Rush Limbaugh compare Obama's skirting of the laws of the land by executive proclamation and just plain not enforcing laws he doesn't like as "the kind of lawless behavior that you get in a Banana Republic."  And that's true.  Hopefully one day Pelosi, Reid, et al, will get the banana republic they so desire- because you know what happens to politicians like THEM in banana republics...

No, the fight I'M talking about happened last night on our walk.  It takes a minute to get there, so follow along...

This is our hero desperately dragging me along as he chases a squirrel who crossed the trail ahead of us.  Of course, upon getting there, he checked all the GROUNDHOG holes for his quarry...

Darn near finished on the south walk bridge.  Oh, the guardrails?  They were old ones, used to size up the holes for the bolts when the new one is ready.


Still have a little turtle action in the swamp...

That is what you get when our hero finds a groundhog trail and decides to follow it...

And, now they are paving the path across the bunny field!  "Lest you poor joggers stumble upon a stone", I guess...


Now here's where the fight begins.  In one corner, our hero.  In the other...


Preying Mantis!!!!



I pointed him out to Scrappy, figuring he'd do his usual quick sniff and move on.  No, not this time.  He was scared, and approached cautiously at first, amazed at this moving blade of grass before him.  The mantis tried to avoid the battle..


He circled and circled, looking for an opening...

Eventually he tried to pick the mantis up, but when it wiggled, he'd shake his head and fling it.

Crap!  Where'd it go?

Right there, by Daddy's foot!


After about the fifth fling, the mantis was rapidly losing his zest for the fight.  When he landed in yet another good hiding spot, I decided it was time to break it up, figuring Scrappy'd be happy to return to marmot terrorism...






But, no, it was like pulling him from food getting him to move on!  But the battle for the day was done...


Oh, and we saw another squirrel.


My niece just sent me some old photos that for some odd reason I'm going to share with you.


That's yours truly, way back when, being my cool self...

That's dear old Dad, sans PBR, in his favorite chair (this is the one my sister made him throw out to get a new one... and to piss her off, he got a bright orange one)...

And that is my eldest brother, flanked by my two beautiful nieces.  God, was that really 30 years ago?

15 comments:

  1. Uh... your Nieces... uhm... how do they look today?... They married?... Because... well... never mind.

    ~ D-FensDogg
    'Loyal American Underground'

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    1. I gotcha. Alas, our ships have all sailed...

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  2. There have been a lot of praying mantis sightings here, too. I dig the old pics.

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    1. Yeah, they seem to be the topic for conversation so far..

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  3. I came out of my mother's house today and ten feet away to a deer. Scared the crap out of me! (Well, not literally, because that would be gross) It looked at me, sniffed, and hopped off.

    As for the shutdown... they are all a bunch of idiots. I can think of the best place to start with about 500 layoffs.

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  4. I'm sad that a lot of people are with out employment due to the whole fiasco, but I'm really impressed with the Reps who stood their ground and actually did their job by representing their constituents. I mean that is their JOB after all. To represent the PEOPLE who elected them. When you have a divided country, you're going to have a divided Government, it's just really unfortunate for the Little Guy who will inevitably be screwed no matter what the out come. :/

    We have several Mantids living in our garage. They keep the spiders at bay so I don't mind having them around! Dixie, much like Scrappy, isn't quite sure what to do with them at first lol.

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    1. Problem is, that the true republicans are being bullied into stand on the hard line by the tea party. The majority of the general public republicans (based on the ones I know and general reading/republican TV news casts) believe that there's a balance somewhere that needs to be reached and that the hard line Tea Party Republicans are NOT representing them. But I do agree with your point... in the end, it's the little guy who will wind up getting screwed.

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    2. The problem with that, Juli, is Harry Reid. He will not let any thing that SNIFFS of disagreeing with him be debated. If you are a republican of ANY stripe, there is NO OTHER WAY remaining to fight this battle. Harry would rather let cancer patients die, furloughed workers rot, and veterans be pushed around at their own memorial than talk to the other side.

      A lot of people make a big deal about the intransigence of the Tea Party. Now I'm a bit more moderate myself (hence the "Nixon Republican"), but it is Harry Reid that will NOT allow debate. It is President Obama that WILL NOT SIGN any bill. So then they pick and choose what to shut down, no doubt working with the mainstream news organizations on which targets would make the best sound bites.

      So, who's the bully here?

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  5. The thing I'd like to see make more news are the congressmen/women who are donating their salaries to WWP while the shutdown is going on. I haven't seen much of that in the main stream news.

    We had a praying mantis hanging out on our house not to long ago.

    Elsie

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    1. I know our guy Stutzman said he was going to... Be nice to see Boehner and Cantor do it too, but I'm not that credulous.

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  6. I'm so fed up with our government at this point. I don't support one party over another in general so if I could I'd clean house just like in business if you couldn't get support from your team. So frustrating. I swear this is still not entirely about Obamacare. I think John B. just likes to piss off our president..lol

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    1. Oh, this is SO not about health care...

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    2. It is certainly not all about health care. It is, however, the battleground they've chosen for the fight. I wasn't a big proponent of the fight at first, but with every Harry Reid "Why hould we?" when asked about saving a cancer stricken child, for everytime that Obama perfectly describes the principles of a strike to his adoring fans and says "now that's dumb", For every moment a vet cannot vist his/her own memorial while unions get exempted from this travesty health care bill... I begin to hope the shut down takes up the rest of his misbegotten administration.

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  7. Chris:
    I agree with this whole shutdown thing...because we ALL know the "government" NEVER shuts down...kinda like NYC.
    All that's going on is that NON-essential services are kaput for the time being...and that basically says to ys (the informed) WHERE the government needs to make it's oWN cuts...
    THis administration wants to cause angst to everyone to agrner supprot for THEIR agenda and play on the heartstrings of the populace...we used to call that PROPAGANDA.
    (and so did some people in Europe back in the 1930s)
    I;m just satying...pay attention and watch BOTH hands of all these politicos.
    Very few can (and should) be trusted.
    Love the traveling pics and the days gone by pics...they never get old (unlike us)
    A praying mantis? This late? Great find there.

    Stay safe (and bug-free) up there.

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