The Feeling is Gone....

What ever happened to people recognizing the basic feelings and thought behind holidays? In the past people recognized holidays for what they were. They also enjoyed them because of the family traditions involved with each individual holiday. It seems nowadays everyone has become jaded to the meanings, and selfish in the celebration of such things.

The majority of people look at holidays like Veterans Day, Labor Day, and Memorial Day especially, as nothing more than a day off of work. "It's a Federal Holiday, I get it off, and you have to pay me." Granted, as a kid I viewed those holidays as nothing more than a day out of school. But as I've aged, I've learned to respect the reasons behind them. Being proud of the people who have served and are still serving in the military, being happy to live in a country where you can choose your vocation, and extremely proud of those who gave everything for this country.

And then there are the more traditional holidays. Like Easter, and Christmas. I'm not a religious man, but I feel these holidays transcend religion. Yes, they are based in religious theology, but they are more than that. Most people these days view them as a time to receive. Easter = Candy. Christmas = Toys, and shiny stuff. Whatever happened to enjoying being around people you care about? Why don't we enjoy the gift because someone cared enough to give it to us? If I opened every gift tomorrow, and all I got was nothing but underwear and socks, I would be grateful. Because then I would know, that no matter what, my family loved me, cared for me, and knew me well enough to know that I hate doing laundry, and therefore those things were needed. But that's beside the point.

The point is: spend the holidays the right way. Not basking in the fact that you have the day off, but enjoying the hours with family, friends, or loved ones.


I'm done.

Goodnight/Good Morning/Go Away....

-B-

“Just because nobody complains doesn't mean all parachutes are perfect.”
-- Benny Hill

Searching for the Silver Lining....

DISCLAIMER: This post will be vague on certain things, because certain family oriented stuff is exactly that. It stays in-house. And everything turned out OK in the end, so it's not a big issue anymore anyways.

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As some of you may know, Thanksgiving was an interesting day for me. I say interesting, because although it wasn't any fun as it played out, I don't think it was 100% negative.

First off, before anyone starts getting thoughts of bashing my head in, I will say that there was absolutely nothing positive about what happened. In fact, I wish it hadn't. But... it did.

Anyways, let me get to the point.

Thanksgiving at my folks house has always been an event to enjoy. Mostly it has always been sitting around the table and cracking jokes. And if you know my family, you know once one of us gets on a roll, everyone else feeds off it, and it all becomes a race to see who can pop off the best joke. The joke that makes Dad either tell us to knock it off, or makes him choke on his Kool-Aid from laughing. And it's always been a wonderful time. Mom drags out the fancy plates, and the fancy glasses (that I really don't think were originally intended to serve water or Kool-Aid,) and we actually practice our manners at the table. It's actually one of the few times any of us have sat at that table and asked someone to pass something, instead of just reaching to the other end of the table and taking it.

This year was a little different. While I did enjoy my nephew-guided tour of his Grandpa's barn, stables, chicken coops, barn, tractors, chicken coops, stables, barn, trucks, and tractors(we did several laps, and in no particular order,) the Incident was always on my mind. But it wasn't until a couple weeks later that I finally found the silver lining to that horribly dark cloud.

You see, I finally realized what happened that day. An unfortunate situation arose, and the family banded together. We've always been the kind of family where we all kind of do our own thing. But on that day, it seemed that all the gears aligned. And knowing that, no matter what, when the stuff hits the fan, your family is going to be there...

That's something to be truly thankful for.

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I'm done for tonight, today, whatever....

-B-

"An escalator can never break, it can only become stairs. You should never see an 'ESCALATOR TEMPORARILY OUT OF ORDER' sign, just 'ESCALATOR TEMPORARILY STAIRS--SORRY FOR THE CONVENIENCE.'" -- Mitch Hedberg

Blue....

Azure, Bleu, Blau, or whatever. Basically, I'm referring to the color blue. Though I do want to mention that the word for light blue in Deutsch(german) is Hellblau. I guess I just thought it was funny because it had hell in it. Anyhow, let's get on with this...

Blue. It's always been a color associated with: cool, calm, relief and safety. And it's also been a sign of royalty, or a connection to royalty. It's the one color that isn't created naturally in anything and has to be produced. In the old days it took a lot of money to generate it, so actually having blue-dyed clothing signified a sort of wealth. Usually only the creme de la creme, or big dogs/royal families, had this money, hence the name Royal Blue.

Nowadays, we can create any color we want. All we have to do is head down to the local Home Depot, and they can mix all kinds of different colors and flavors to exactly what we want. But from what I've seen lately, everything is "Earth Tones"; browns, drab greens, and shades of tan. Like people are thinking: "if my house is brown and earthy, people will think I care about the environment."

Random Tangent Alert!

Then there are people who build their houses to look like Adobe* homes, but are just wood and styrofoam. I hate those people. They see the style as chic, and mimic it poorly. They want the popular look, but with the "regular house" cost. And now there is the style of Faux-dobe, which I feel is an insult to the whole adobe home history. Yes, it was cheaper to build, but the energy costs to maintain it are about the same. And will it last 10-15 generations? No.

Anyhow, back to my original topic. Blue. Cool, comforting, and it instills a sense of calm.

Which is why I'm glad my local Wal-Mart re-stocked it's shelves with the little toilet pucks. Just don't buy the 2000 Flushes ones, because it's a crock, they don't last anywhere near that long.


My toilet water is blue again, and I am happy.

Yes, all of this was written just so I could brag about having blue toilet water. And I'm not ashamed of it. If you have a problem with it, I have a space reserved for your lips, and I think you might know where it is.

Goodnight / Good morning / whatever....

-B-

"Young men want to be faithful, and are not; old men want to be faithless, and cannot.” -- Oscar Wilde