PSA…

Posted on by September 6, 2024

Dammit… I HATE hackers…

Xxxxxx detected a match to your Social Security Number.

Found: Social Security Number
Potentially Breached Site:  nationalpublicdata.com

Personal information exposed on the dark web does not necessarily mean your info has been used fraudulently. We recommend you take the following proactive steps to prevent any potential risk:

  • Place a fraud alert on your credit file as soon as possible at Experian.com/fraud or by calling 1-888-397-3742.
  • Place a freeze on your credit file at all three credit bureaus—Experian®, TransUnion® & Equifax®.
  • Review your credit report from all three bureaus and report any activity you don’t recognize. Request a copy of your latest credit reports by visiting AnnualCreditReport.com.
  • Review resources available at the Social Security Administration online by visiting SSA.Gov/Fraud.
  • Monitor your credit card and bank accounts for suspicious transactions and notify the financial institution if you notice anything suspicious.

Note: Large data breaches often lead to multiple alerts of exposed personal information, as information is exposed in a variety of combinations.

I have noted ‘fake’ invoices in the last couple of days, usually trying to hit Paypal. But I don’t have any credit card attached to that and the account it is tied to is locked down.

Folks, jumping through the hoops is a PITA and takes about a half hour, but if it saves you from losing $$$ it is well worth it!

One reminder- If you put credit freezes on, you MUST take them off if you are doing something like buying a house or car, or anything requiring credit. Otherwise, nobody can see your credit.

YMMV, IANAL, I didn’t stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night, but I’m also not going to take chances….

Book promo…

Posted on by September 5, 2024

Raconteur Press has another antho out! The Big Ones

Click on the cover for the Amazon link!

The Blurb-

World War II. The Great Patriotic War. The Big One. No matter what the name, the Second World War was a great and terrible conflict that swung frequently on the hinge of fate. This short story collection brings together both acclaimed writers and capable newcomers to explore fresh “what ifs” of humanity’s most expansive conflict. If you’re a fan of World War II and alternate history, prepare to be entertained. It doesn’t end on the deck of a battleship, but rest assured Big Ones is satisfying all the same.

Yes, I have a story in this one! And I’m honored to have been selected.

James Totten has a .99 cent special going for his novel South Korean Blues

The blurb-

North Korea gets real quiet when the Chinese Communist Party Kingpins die in an orbital strike from the US Space Force. South Korea gets presented with a once in a generation oppertunity to reunite Korea with Seoul in charge. Will crossing the DMZ going noth present that much of a problem? What can be done to prevent the NKPA from rushing reinforcements to the DMZ? The NKPA has special forces that can enter the South through invasion tunnels. What about the North Korean leadership and the nucelar weapons? Will the US get directly involved or sit on the sidelines? What in the heck is “Rapid Weseal?” Find the answers to all of these questions and more in this fast paced novel of World War Three becoming a global conflict. 

And last but certainly not least, David Weber and Richard Fox’s Book two in the Ascent to Empire series Rebel

The blurb-

HE NEVER WANTED TO BE A REBEL

The Five Hundred, the elite families who rule the Terran Federation, control its political power and its wealth, and they’ve grown steadily wealthier and more powerful, thanks to the war against the Terran League. War may be hard on the people who get caught in its path, but it’s very good for business, in the short term, and the Five Hundred own the shipyards that build the Navy’s ships. They own virtually all the industry that produces the weapons and matériel the war consumes so voraciously . . . and they’ve made damn sure someone else does the dying.

True, there are a few flies in the Five Hundred’s ointment.

There’s the growing hatred and resentment of the Fringe Worlds, whose children do eighty percent of the dying in the Five Hundred’s war. But the Five Hundred have made sure the Fringe knows what will happen to any system that goes ”out of compliance.”

There are the lunatic conspiracy nuts who insist that the alien Rishathan Sphere is secretly aiding the League’s military, but the Five Hundred have forced them to keep their mouths shut where it matters.

And then there’s Terrence Murphy, a man of honor who loves the Federation, who springs from the Five Hundred, yet knows it for what it is and is determined to speak for its victims. But the five hundred have dispatched ample force to deal with him and his handful of lunatic followers.

Unfortunately, the Fringe has paid enough of its children’s lives, and it no longer cares what may happen if it dares to defy the Five Hundred.

Worse, the lunatic conspiracy nuts were right, and the Rish have planned carefully for the Federation’s destruction.

And, worst of all, the Five Hundred have fatally underestimated Terrence Murphy.

All three are highly recommended, and very ‘different’ takes on battles… WWII, near future, MilSF.

Sadly…

Posted on by September 4, 2024

He’s NOT wrong…

I truly hate to hear about the number of family restaurants, long time, restaurants, and historic restaurants that are closing their doors…

If you can, support those ‘local’ restaurants that continue to serve up the good, wholesome meals (or at least meals you actually enjoy eating).

It’s past time…

Posted on by September 3, 2024

To drain the DC swamp…

If he is reelected this November, will Donald Trump manage to drain the swamp this time? The swamp-dwellers are saying no.

Ever since he began his first run for president, Trump has famously vowed to drain the swamp, that is, clear out the far-left bureaucracy in Washington that bears so much responsibility for the leftward drift of the nation over the last decade and a half. 

<snip>

According to a new survey, fully 54% of “federal government managers would defy voters to do what they want.” The Napolitan Institute, which states that “we recognize that the only legitimate authority for government comes from the consent of the governed,” and that “our mission is to amplify and magnify the voice of the American people so clearly and powerfully that it becomes the driving, framing and shaping force for the crucial conversations of our nation,” conducted a survey of 500 swamp denizens, aka federal bureaucrats.

Full article, HERE from PJ Media.

I literally don’t have the words for what I want to say, since this is a ‘family’ blog…

Dammit!!!!!

Tar and feathers is sounding better and better, just sayin…

A little humor…

Posted on by September 1, 2024

Sigh…

I tried to catch some fog.  I mist.

·  When chemists die, they barium.

·  Jokes about German sausage are the wurst.

·  A soldier who survived mustard gas and pepper spray is
now a seasoned veteran.

·  I know a guy who’s addicted to brake fluid.  He says he can stop any time.

·  How does Moses make his tea?  Hebrews it.

·  I stayed up all night to see where the sun went.  Then it dawned on me.

·  This girl said she recognized me from the vegetarian club,
but I’d never met herbivore.

·  I’m reading a book about anti-gravity.  I can’t put it down.

·  I did a theatrical performance about puns.  It was a play on words .

·  They told me I had type A blood, but it was a type-O.

·  This dyslexic man walks into a bra .

·  I didn’t like my beard at first. Then it grew on me.

·  A cross-eyed teacher lost her job because she couldn’t control her pupils?

·  When you get a bladder infection, urine trouble.

·  What does a clock do when it’s hungry?  It goes back four seconds..

·  I wondered why the baseball was getting bigger. Then it hit me!

·  Broken pencils are pointless.

·  What do you call a dinosaur with an extensive vocabulary?  A thesaurus.

·  England has no kidney bank, but it does have a Liverpool .

·  I used to be a banker, but then I lost interest.

·  I dropped out of communism class because of lousy Marx.

·  All the toilets in London police stations have been stolen.
Police say they have nothing to go on.

·  I took the job at a bakery because I kneaded dough.

·  Velcro – what a rip off!

·  Cartoonist found dead in home.  Details are sketchy.

+++++++++

My first job was working in an orange juice factory, but I got canned…couldn’t concentrate.

Then I worked in the woods as a lumberjack, but I just couldn’t hack it, so they gave me the ax.

After that I tried to be a tailor, but I just wasn’t suited for it …mainly because it was a so-so job.

Next I tried working in a muffler factory but that was too exhausting.

Then I tried to be a chef — figured it would add a little spice to my life, but I just didn’t have the thyme.

I attempted to be a deli worker, but any way I sliced it, I couldn’t cut the mustard.

My best job was being a musician, but eventually I found I wasn’t noteworthy.

I studied a long time to become a doctor, but I didn’t have any patience.

Next was a job in a shoe factory; I tried but I just didn’t fit in.

I became a professional fisherman, but discovered that I couldn’t live on my net income.

I managed to get a good job working for a pool maintenance company, but the work was just too draining.

So then I got a job in a workout center, but they said I wasn’t fit for the job.

After many years of trying to find steady work I finally got a job as a historian until I realized there was no future in it.

My last job was working at Starbucks, but I had to quit because it was always the same old grind.

I tried self-employment but I couldn’t get along with the boss.

Book promo…

Posted on by August 31, 2024

First up is Peter Nealan with a new series, Edge of the Imperium, Spheres of Influence

As always, click on the cover for the Amazon link!

The blurb-

A“Peacekeeping”Mission That Might Be Anything But

Lieutenant Bannon and his phalanx of Corvanite warriors have already seen some of the worst that the irregular war between the reptilian otuchans and the human latecomers can offer.

Or so they think.

First Sergeant Draven, trying to hold his company of Zolarian citizen soldiers together, has been on the desolate planet of Zhogalgan longer than Bannon. He’s seen even more.

Yet while they are both there as peacekeepers, they are not there to help each other.

Spheres of influence and empires clash, on a dry, harsh world that might become the flashpoint in an interstellar war!

Next is Pam Uphoff with a new story in her Chronicles of the Fall series, Best Enemies

The blurb-

Hayden Jaeger, youngest son of the Chairman of the Council and Ambrose Vinogradov, the youngest son of the Founder, were thrown together by random chance as they were assigned to be dorm mate at the University. It was not an instant friendship.

300 years before the fall of the Troystvennyy Soyuz, the foundations of a secret society are about to be laid down . . .

Last but not least, Raconteur Press is out with a new anthology, Steam Rising

The blurb-

Steampunk. It’s not just a genre, it is science fiction in its purest form. In this collection, you will read of the ways that technology could both help and harm mankind. Steam power took a special kind of bravery to use and master, and the people who live in a steam-powered world adjust to that need: engineers, inventors, tinkerers and experimentalists of every kind and every manner imaginable.

Within, you will meet clockmakers and war-widows, steamship captains and airship pilots; you will see wailing engines race and clanking automata strut. Hurry on! The engineer is feeding the coal, and says she’s raring to go.

See that red lever over there? Grip ‘er tight, and heave forward the throttle…

Labor Day…

Posted on by August 30, 2024

Weekend…

Observed the first Monday in September, Labor Day is an annual celebration of the social and economic achievements of American workers. The holiday is rooted in the late nineteenth century, when labor activists pushed for a federal holiday to recognize the many contributions workers have made to America’s strength, prosperity, and well-being.

Before it was a federal holiday, Labor Day was recognized by labor activists and individual states. After municipal ordinances were passed in 1885 and 1886, a movement developed to secure state legislation. New York was the first state to introduce a bill, but Oregon was the first to pass a law recognizing Labor Day, on February 21, 1887. During 1887, four more states – Colorado, Massachusetts, New Jersey and New York – passed laws creating a Labor Day holiday. By the end of the decade Connecticut, Nebraska and Pennsylvania had followed suit. By 1894, 23 more states had adopted the holiday, and on June 28, 1894, Congress passed an act making the first Monday in September of each year a legal holiday.

It’s now a three day holiday, and at least in Texas, also the start of Dove season…

When I was a kid, we started school after Labor Day and usually ended in late May (weather dependent). Now days… sigh…

And hopefully, we’ll start seeing ‘some’ break in the weather, because I know ‘we’ could use one! Multiple days over 100 degrees are not fun.

So, enjoy your long weekend, and the cookout you’ve got planned!!!

If…

Posted on by August 29, 2024

Got this from ‘various’ mil and R&D sources…

I was in charge of DOD for a day, Georgia Tech would NEVER get a government contract again, and would have to pay back ALL the $$ sent them!!!

Dr. Emmanouil “Manos” Antonakakis runs a Georgia Tech cybersecurity lab and has attracted millions of dollars in the last few years from the US government for Department of Defense research projects like “Rhamnousia: Attributing Cyber Actors Through Tensor Decomposition and Novel Data Acquisition.”

The government yesterday sued Georgia Tech in federal court, singling out Antonakakis and claiming that neither he nor Georgia Tech followed basic (and required) security protocols for years, knew they were not in compliance with such protocols, and then submitted invoices for their DoD projects anyway. (Read the complaint.) The government claims this is fraud:

Full article, HERE from Ars Technica.

For my ‘sins’ for over a dozen years, I worked with a number of UARCs and FFRDCs (list HERE of DOD S&T organizations) on various R&D programs for the Navy. All of them had stringent security requirements, and they were routinely ‘checked’ by our security folks for compliance.

EVERY organization I worked with was subject to hacking attempts almost daily by Russian/Chinese/Iranian government organs, and HUMINT intrusions by ‘students’…

So the best bet is that anything Georgia Tech was working on was/is compromised and probably has been since day two of it’s existence.

Egos… Gah!!!

How many remember…

Posted on by August 28, 2024

Hollywood Squares?

My mother and grandmother ‘loved’ watching that show and laughing at the nonsensical answers usually given by Paul Lynde. Here is a bit of Lynde’s version of humor in response to Peter Marshall, the show’s host.

Peter Marshall: “Eddie Fisher recently said, ‘I am sorry. I am sorry for them both.’ Who was he referring to?”

Paul Lynde: “His fans.”

Marshall: “According to Tony Randall, ‘Every woman I’ve been intimate with in my life has been…’ what?”

Lynde: “Bitterly disappointed.”

Marshall: “Paul, how many fingers in the girl scout salute?”

Lynde: “Gee, I don’t remember. The last time I saw it was when I didn’t buy their cookies.”

Marshall: “Paul, does Ann Landers think there is anything wrong with you if you do your housework in the nude?”

Lynde: “No, but I have to be terribly careful when I do my ironing.”

Marshall: “Paul, any good sailor knows that when a man falls off a ship you yell ‘Man overboard!’ What should you shout if a woman falls overboard?”

Lynde: “Full speed ahead!”

Marshall: “What are ‘dual-purpose cattle’ good for that other cattle aren’t?”

Lynde: “They give milk… and cookies, but I don’t recommend the cookies.”

Marshall: “Paul, why do Hell’s Angels wear leather?”

Lynde: “Because chiffon wrinkles too easily.”

Marshall: “According to the IRS, out of every 10 Americans audited, how many end up paying more taxes?”

Lynde: “11.”

Marshall: “What’s the one thing you should never do in bed?”

Lynde: “Point and laugh!”

Marshall: “In ‘The Wizard Of Oz’, the Tin Man wanted a heart, and the Lion wanted courage. What did the Straw Man want?”

Lynde: “He wanted the Tin Man to notice him.”

Marshall: “In the Shakespearean play ‘King Lear,’ King Lear had three of them – Goneril, Cordelia, and Regan? Who were they?”

Lynde: “King Lear had Goneril?”

Marshall: “Paul, everyone knows the first verse: What shall we do with the drunken sailor? / What shall we do with the drunken sailor? / What shall we do with the drunken sailor? / Early in the morning? But what is the first line of the next verse?”

Lynde : [singing] “Put him in bed with Elizabeth Taylor / Put him in bed with Elizabeth Taylor / Put him in bed with Elizabeth Taylor / Early in the morning.” [audience laughs] “How disgusting… that poor sailor!”

Marshall: “True or false, Paul Revere had 16 children?”

Lynde: “From ONE midnight ride?”

Marshall: “Back in the 1870s, Emile Berliner invented something, and without it, I wouldn’t be able to do my job. What was it?”

Lynde: “Let’s see… toupees? Facelifts? Contact lenses?”

Marshall: “Now cut that out!”

Lynde: “Makeup? Capped teeth? Loud sports jackets?”

You don’t see that kind of humor anymore… for better or worse…

Cleaning up…

Posted on by August 27, 2024

Texas has been cleaning the ‘voter roles’ since 2021…

Purging voter registration rolls should not be controversial. The process is part of ensuring the integrity of the vote, making sure that ineligible voters are not allowed a ballot.

But for some Democrats looking to make an issue of purging people from the voter rolls, it’s a racist attempt to deny people of color the right to vote.

Do states purge some eligible voters from the rolls inadvertently or by mistake? No doubt the answer to that question is yes. Perhaps someone who moved forgot to change their address. Perhaps they didn’t notice the postcard that came in the mail reminding them to register with their new address.

The fact is that the overwhelming number of people who are purged from voter rolls were either dead or moved without telling the local registrar. 

Full article, HERE from PJ Media.

So, over ONE MILLION ‘voters’ removed in three years. Interesting, to put it mildly!

So far, almost 2000 illegal voters (with voting history) have been sent to the AG, pending charges.

And of course the left is whining about the AG following up on election integrity issues dating back to 2022 HERE, including one democratic operative in Frio County who was investigated and found to have not just one phone and computer, but over 40 of each!

Makes one wonder ‘why’ that person needed all those phones and computers… Of course the MSM is NOT covering that part of the story.

So maybe, just maybe, Texas will have a pretty fair election come November. I hope…