Who remembers…
And they had camping gear and other stuff too, but I never got any of that… sigh…
There was a competitor too…
I ‘think’ this was probably one of the first attempts at a ‘loyalty’ program by grocery stores and other places.
Oddly, I do remember getting things like hand towels in detergent, and other odd things in some products when we were kids…
Today, it’s all electronic, so kids will never have the ‘joy’ of pasting those things into the books…LOL
Going after ‘Rupert’ once again. This time, he’ll be of age, and I get a shot I will pop him…
Hoping for this… (Not Rupert)
With ‘my’ luck, will end up with this… Again…
No connectivity, so no commenting or posting till I’m back Sunday. Go read the folks on the sidebar, they’re worth the read!
CNN has truly ‘drank the kool aid’…
That a talking head could say this with a straight face is just… beyond me…
On Thursday, CNN host Erin Burnett dismissed Iran’s incessant “death to America” chanting as merely “a thing and a trope.”
Full article, HERE.
Does ANYBODY at CNN have a grip on reality??? Do they not understand what has been happening since 1979? Have they not read the reports of Iranian IEDs being used in Iraq and Afghanistan???
Bueller?
Anyone?
This is just a ‘bit’ over the top…
An Indiana school district is under fire for writing a policy that parents and the ACLU say is a violation of their First Amendment rights and an attempt to shield the board from legitimate criticism.
Full article, HERE.
The whole silencing thing is getting ridiculous. The Perpetually Offended Snowflakes (POS) cannot stand to have their decisions, positions, pronouncements, etc. criticised by the mere peons like us. And Gnu forbid people actually USE fecesbook or anything else, like the twitverse or ??? to organize. By and large, the MSM refuses to cover things like this, where an organization or board is called out, or they ‘slant’ the coverage to make people look like idiots.
Two cases in point- The ‘classic’ is when there is a severe weather event. Who do they put on TV? The erudite clean shaven person? Or the uneducated folks that look like bums off the street, so that the commentator can ‘instruct’ said person on what they ‘should’ have been doing if they had been listening to Station XXXX…
The other currently playing out in Virginia is a true grassroots movement against the dem run state government over gun confiscation among other ‘interesting’ new gun laws. VERY little MSM coverage, and routinely negative. The honest folks there, VCDL have promoted a rally in the state capital on the 20th and I think all but maybe one or two counties have declared themselves sanctuary counties for gun owners (how many of you have seen ANY of that covered).
Granted there are a number of folks that think this is really a bad idea (myself included), because there are sure to be fifth columnists, provocateurs, and probably Antifa and their ilk there just to get on camera and cause trouble. I will predict that the coverage will by OMGELEVENTY>>> GUNS>>>BLOOD IN THE STREEEEEETS… and they will show maybe 1%, if that, of the actual rally that includes the good people trying to do the right thing.
Sigh…
Kicking the soapbox back in the corner.
The muse is riding me like a rented mule… now 68K words into the Mil SF novel.
Which means my brain is mush. So you get this…
Go read the folks on the sidebar while I try to be coherent…
Or a typical day in the Dems/progs/leftist camp, duly supported by the MSM…
The progressives’ reactions to President Trump’s elimination of Qassem Soleimani, Iran’s blood-soaked chief of their foreign adventurism, covered the whole range of clichés we can predict whenever this country acts vigorously to defend its interests and security. Iran, however, is a special case. For forty years, with a few exceptions our leaders have preemptively cringed in the face of Iranian aggression, conjuring up the specter of a widescale war in order to justify inaction. This bad habit has led to appeasing policies that have emboldened the mullahs into ever-increasing aggression in the region from Iraq to Syria to Yemen.
Full article, HERE.
This has gone on for WAY too long… We ‘knew’ the chances of a nuclear war with the USSR, and they knew we were locked and loaded 24/7. They also knew we were tracking their subs and other assets world-wide and that none of them would survive more than three hours if push came to shove.
You may not like what I have to say, but I’m going to say it anyway. Having retired from 20+ years in the US Navy, and another 23 years as a Navy contractor, having walked the walk my adult life, I would say that as you read the above article, please try to understand the centuries old military wisdom, and my background, and the belief that if you must fight, either in self-defense or preemptively in self-defense, whether personally or as a nation, you must win decisively without remorse or you absolutely will lose in the end. The last real ‘win’ we’ve had was WWII, and that took nukes to make happen. Since then? Think Korea. Think Vietnam. Think Afghanistan. Think Iraq. Think of the human sacrifice of our precious youth that was unnecessary because of the lack of a will to win decisively! I believe a large part of this has been due to the ‘perception’ that we were beating up on the little guy and the diplomats ‘controlling’ the interactions. How many of our young people must die, or innocent here at home must die before decisive action is taken? This was the first step, and I for one am sad that they didn’t take out every one of those launchers.
The blood of 176 innocents that died are on Iranian hands because of the Iranians paranoia and SA-15 Gauntlet system in autonomous mode (Iran has 29 such systems). Early photos showed a number of dimpled penetrations indicative of shrapnel in various parts of the skin of the airplane. Those pictures have since disappeared. You can go HERE, and look down through the photos there are a number shrapnel dimples evident. My bet is that the real black box recordings will never see the light of day…
There is no such thing as a proportionate response, only a massively deterrent response irrespective of human life. The only peace that is enduring is the result of deterrence having proven that you will give no quarter to a belligerent and bellicose adversary.
First up is James Young’s prequel to An Unproven Concept, it is the first in the Spartan Trilogy- Aries’ Red Sky
As always, click the cover for the Amazon link!
The blurb-
For over seven hundred years, the Spartan Republic’s citizens have known one truth: Terra is coming. Descendants of exiles who dared to defy an emperor, the star nation’s 70 billion citizens spent the centuries training, arming…and waiting.
In 3035, Leftenant Ian Campbell, Spartan Defense Forces (SDF), discovers a strange anomaly on his corvette’s sensors…and realizes the wait is over. The Spartans must convince the Terrans of the cost of subduing their nation. If they succeed, the Republic survives. If not, the SDF will be forced to paint the stars red with their enemies’ blood.
The Confederation of Man was born in the terror of the Harran Empire’s death throes. Like a phoenix rising from the ashes, Humanity now spreads from its cradle on Earth to hundreds of stars across the Milky Way, and seeks out new worlds to add.
Captain Marcy Cochran was hoping to find a habitable planet; she didn’t expect the system to already have hostile humans. Now a captive, Cochran must contend with a crew proving to be as dangerous as their enemies, and prevent what has started out as a misunderstanding from becoming a full-fledged interstellar war. For Terran law is quite clear: All humanity will answer to the Confederation. For the Spartans, that makes the government on Earth no different than the empire it supplanted…and they would rather die on their feet than subjugate themselves once more.
Aries’ Red Sky is the newest novel in James Young’s Vergassy Chronicles universe. A prequel to An Unproven Concept, it is the first in the Spartan Trilogy. If you like space opera, high body counts, and capital ship battles on a galactic scale, pick up an author who has been recommended by Amazing Stories, Pop Cults, and The Midwest Book Review.
Next up is Elizabeth Bruner’s new series, Blood of the Fae– Calling the Blood
The blurb-
After centuries of warfare, the Fae were banished from the human world, taking most of the magic with them.
Not all of them made it through the gates to the fairy lands. And not all of the magic is gone. A group of warriors vowed to protect humanity from the remaining fae and so they have over the centuries.
Christopher Chevalier, a descendent of one of those warriors, has spent his life studying combat and magic to fight the fae. When he comes across humans acting like fae, using magic he’s never heard about, he has to swallow his pride and ask for help from Listrial, the Fairy Queen and one of the fae who got trapped in the human world.
Dan Ben-David just wants his refrigerator to work consistently. When it reveals another world, one he forgot he’d lived in, he finds more questions than answers about his past.
Winifred Andersdotter wanted nothing more than a nice evening out with her boyfriend. When they’re set upon by thugs who’d taken exception to her boyfriends red cap, they fight back and everything begins to change.
Next is Karl Gallagher’s first foray into fantasy- The Lost War
The blurb-
It was supposed to be a weekend of costumed fun. Instead these medieval historical reenactors are flung into a wilderness by magic they don’t understand. They must struggle to survive and deal with monsters who consider them prey . . . or worse.
***
“Karl Gallagher’s first production, the Torchship Trilogy, was good enough so that I read and reread it. He has now turned his hand from science fiction to fantasy.”
– Professor David D. Friedman, Professor, Santa Clara University, author of The Machinery of Freedom and Salamander
– Also known as Duke Cariadoc of the Bow, KSCA, OL, OP, founder of the Pennsic War.
And last but not least, Tom Rogneby is putting Escort Duty up on sale for .99!
The blurb-
A princess in a high tower
A holy promise fulfilled
A hidden gift uncovered
A nation caught by surprise
These and other stories are waiting in “Escort Duty.”
Strap on your sword, march to the sound of the guns, and enjoy these tales from the author of “Via Serica.”
Yesterday I lost a good friend.
Author, veteran, shooter, pilot, husband, father. JD Kinman died suddenly yesterday morning. JD was an Air Force veteran, one of my original alpha readers, and I was proud to be his on both the novels he wrote. He was putting the finishing touches on the third novel in his series and building his dream house in the hangar where he kept his airplanes when he died.
JD love to tell stories, shoot guns, poke fun at himself, and eat BBQ. We had collaborated a bit on my novel Twilight, where I ‘borrowed’ a couple of his characters, and he was going to use John Cronin in his third novel. Sadly, I won’t ever get the chance to drive over to the airport and pick him up after he flew in and go eat BBQ again.
JD didn’t want a funeral or flowers, he wanted to be cremated and people to celebrate his life.
Rest in peace my friend. You will be missed.
Rest in peace.
Texas style!
$85,000!!!
Set up as a VERY large smoker, with the firebox on the left, also has option for propane. And if you guessed it’s made from a 500gal propane tank, you would be correct.
And a setup for two LARGE boiler pots… Also propane…
Why did it cost so much??? Continue reading
Comeback of the year???
FOX NEWS CHRIS WALLACE:
“Some analysts suggest that the impeachment of President Trump has emboldened enemies like Iran and North Korea – is this president is more vulnerable because of the impeachment effort?”
POMPEO:
“You should ask Mr. Soleimani.”
Teh stoopid is strong with the dems and the media, but I repeat myself, on this one…
Obungler didn’t tell anybody about taking out bin Laden until after the fact. war Powers Act the US operates under DOES give the president latitude to protect US interests without Congress permission, or prior notification. He only has to notify them within 48 hours, and is limited to 60 days without congressional authorization.