Committed.

Having made a shopping trip to Lowe’s and Walgreen’s, I was invested and could not turn back.  I still didn’t have a plan, but I had an objective and supplies.  Yeah, that’s right.  I had the supplies before I knew how I was going to do it.  Should be interesting, no?

The flag has been lighted by two small LED floodlights in the ground at the base of the pole.  They are powered by two photocell units mounted in the ground about 12 feet away.  The setup is simple and foolproof — the connectors are impossible to reverse and there is five times more wire than needed for my application.  Ideal.

I have a flag pole in the front yard and I fly the Stars and Stripes 24/7.  Except on occasions when it is replaced by another flag, the POW/MIA flag flies directly below. 

On certain days the POW/MIA flag is replaced by the Air Force flag — my enlistment and retirement dates and the date of the “birth” of the Air Force.

I’m a technically oriented guy — can’t help but wonder “how did they do that?”  When I go though haunted houses I’m never afraid — I’m too busy figuring out where the strings and switches are, or how the made that goo, goop, or fog.

Thanks for two reminders, via “Combat Handguns” magazine, by the late Jeff Cooper.

The budget should be balanced.  Public debt should be reduced.  The arrogance of officialdom should be tempered, and assistance to foreign lands should be curtailed lest Rome becomes bankrupt.

Cicero, 63BC

Click and read.

I’ve used TurboTax software for longer than I can remember.  It’s the only tax preparation software I have ever used, and I do my own taxes every year.

But no longer.  This year I’ve ordered TaxCut, and not because it’s better.  No, I changed on a matter of principle.

Have I been in a cave?  I was checking to see if I should print a whole sheet of stamps or not and caught the following at postalreporter.com:

On January 18 [2009] prices for Express Mail, Priority Mail, Parcel Select, Parcel Return Service, Global Express Guaranteed, Express Mail International, Priority Mail International, and M-Bags change. As always, we do not impose fuel surcharges, hidden surcharges, or surcharges for residential or Saturday delivery.

I should be doing a dozen different things right now, but those who know me know I type with 2 fingers and if I begin now on this I’ll maybe be done by Christmas.

I have a bit of a rep for over-securing packages, the result of an unshakable expectation that anything I package will be subject to nuclear-explosive delivery into a solid wall.  I expect outer packaging damage, but I will not accept contents spilling out.  So, when it arrives it may look like hell, but it’s all there.

The Retired Enlisted Association’s (TREA) latest update message, received today, contains the following item.  It is based on a December 15th press release by the Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs and is copied here in its entirety, in sections.  

VA Has Been Improperly Recovering Benefits From Widows of Disabled Vets

Source

Interesting comments follow at the bottom, too.

From The Times
December 19, 2008

Boost voluntary work: make it compulsory. We must make people do something for nothing.

Melanie Reid

Head over to Xavier’s place and read the post on Reverting Back to Training.  (And no, it’s not about firearms.)  For that matter, read a few others while you’re there — he’s a good one.

Note toward the end of that post a quote of an idea I’m particularly fond of — been preaching it for decades, myself:

I was at the auto dealership yesterday to check on my friend Floyd and to schedule another oil change and inspection.  Floyd is a service writer there, my service guy.  He’s a truly wonderful person and is good at his job — a nice pairing in any environment.

So there you are, thinking of a cruise to someplace exotic, perhaps romantic.  Wherever it is and whatever it is, it is not where you are now.

You’re looking for a getaway, something that will let you leave your cares behind.  No worries, no details, just leave everything to someone else.  Stop the mail, kennel the dog, have the neighbors watch the house, and just go.

and they have to be dried out periodically for re-use.  Some cannot be used again at all.

Lest you think moisture protection is unimportant, consider this.  A manufacturer who expects the product to be on the shelf for only months puts a moisture absorbing desiccant pack inside the packaging.  The manufacturer spent money on moisture control for only a few months.  Maybe there is a message there, eh?

Yes, armed guards.

Today’s Wall Street Journal has an interesting article (I’d call it disturbing if I were in the habit of taking kids to Chuck E. Cheese’s).  If I hadn’t worked at Disney for a couple of years I’d say it’s hard to believe adults would act that way, but I know better.

Our flag flies at half staff on December 7
in memory and recognition of those who died.

The world of financial geniuses does not exist.  However, I’ve found a whole bunch of nutbrains at Chase and at Citi.  I’m too pissed off to write much about either of them, but I’m paying a bit to be free of each.  Cancelled two credit cards that were with Chase.  Blithering idiots.  And don’t try to hold a conversation with Citi folks unless you’re prepared to decipher heavily accented India-English with loud boiler room noise of like accents in the background.