Before I get started, I want to thank you for the nice comments on my last post. They mean a lot to me.
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Our Memorial Day was packed with lots of fun things to do so we had to start the day earlier than Lori and I like to start our days. We dragged ourselves out of bed at 8:00, so we could be at the parade before it started at 9:00. First we stopped at the 7-11 for some much needed coffee and then headed over to the paraded where we met up with Margaret and a couple of her friends.
The parade was typical of probably most small-town-American parades. It started with the local high school band and ended with the fire trucks. Here are some of the pictures I took at the parade.
I got a kick out of this next shot. Click on it to see why. LOL
After the parade, there was a ceremony. It started with the Pledge of Allegiance and National Anthem and a lying of a wreath at the foot of the monument. Of course there were also the speeches.
Then it was off to the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) post for a similar ceremony there, less the speeches, and then free food and drinks in their basement club house.
Here's a video Lori made of the ceremony.
They place is really fixed up nice with a regulation sized bar, fully stocked! Every Friday evening is Happy Hour with $2.00 drinks! Woo Hoo! They also have a large screen TV and a pool table. I know where Lori and I will be Friday's starting in June!
They had quite a spread for everyone. There were hot dogs of course, a six-foot hero and a few other goodies to munch on.
This is a table they have reserved as a remembrance of members that have passed away. There is a plaque on the wall listing their names.
While there, I filled out an application to become a member of the VFW, which they approved it on the spot. I'll be sworn in at the next meeting on June 14th and be walking in next years Memorial Day parade and, I'm sure, a few more parades between then and June 14th. The arrow in the picture points to the large screened TV. Click on the pic and look that the TV to see what they promised me if I joined. ;-)
Our day didn't end there! Later that afternoon Lori and I looked at a house to rent in the town just 15 minutes from me. Now she lives about 1 1/2 hours away. We met the landlord at the house and she gave us a tour. She lives there now, so it has all very good appliances and a newly remodeled kitchen. Lori liked it and agreed to take it. The landlord can't move out for a couple of months, which is exactly what Lori wanted. That gives her and her kids plenty of time to go through their stuff and decide what they will move and what they will toss out.
Then it was back to my house for a BBQ! I cooked marinated steak, mushrooms and onions for the steak, broccoli with cheese sauce and made a salad. It was all very good if I do say so myself.
After Lori cleaned up from dinner, we took a walk. The mosquitoes started coming out, so we cut the walk short. We walked 1 mile. Here's the route we took.
When we got home, we said good night to my son and his girl friend. They went to bed early, because a car was picking them up at 5:00 am to take them to the airport. They were flying to the Dominican Republic for and 8-day vacation. Lori is staying here with me while they're gone, so you know what that means? The Nudist Rules Are in Effect This Week!
Memorial Day, originally called Decoration Day, is a day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation's service. There are many stories as to its actual beginnings, with over two dozen cities and towns laying claim to being the birthplace of Memorial Day, but it is more likely that it had many separate beginnings. It is not important who was the very first, what is important is that Memorial Day was established. Memorial Day is not about division. It is about reconciliation; it is about coming together to honor those who gave their all. Traditional observance of Memorial Day has diminished over the years. Many Americans nowadays have forgotten the meaning and traditions of Memorial Day.
The Flanders poppy has been a part of the Memorial Day ritual since the early 1920s. During the First World War, the red poppies were seen to be among the first living plants that sprouted from the devastation of the battlefields of northern France and Belgium. Soldiers' folklore had it that the poppies were vivid red from having been nurtured in ground drenched with the blood of their comrades. The sight of the poppies on the battlefield at Ypres in 1915 moved Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae to write the poem In Flanders Fields.
In Flanders fields the poppies blow Between the crosses, row on row That mark our place; and in the sky The larks, still bravely singing, fly Scarce heard amid the guns below. We are the Dead. Short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved and were loved, and now we lie In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe: To you from failing hands we throw The torch; be yours to hold it high. If ye break faith with us who die We shall not sleep, though poppies grow In Flanders fields.
In 1915, inspired by this poem, Moina Michael replied with her own poem:
We cherish too, the Poppy red That grows on fields where valor led, It seems to signal to the skies That blood of heroes never dies.
Moina Michael then conceived of an idea to wear red poppies on Memorial Day in honor of those who died serving the nation during war. She was the first to wear one, and sold poppies to her friends and co-workers with the money going to benefit servicemen in need.
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Whether you are for or against the wars we are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, please put those feelings aside this weekend and remember that Memorial Day is a day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation's service. Take a few minutes to reflect on the men and woman that have given their all.
If there is parade near you, please attend and further honor the fallen. And whenever you see someone selling the red poppies, give them a dollar and help a vet! Thank you.
When for another walk today. The program the VA gives me has me walking every other day in the beginning and then progress from there. Today I walked for about 40 minutes through the park and marina down by the bay and back home through the neighborhood for a total of 1 1/2 miles. I live on the south shore of Long Island and try to take advantage of living near the water as much as possible.
The day was a beautiful day, sunny and in the mid-70s. The temperature the next few days is supposed to climb in to the 80s, so I'm not sure if I'll do much walking. There will be an ozone alert and stressing my unfit body this early in the program isn't smart.
I was drafted into the army on May 6, 1968 and sent to Fort Jackson in South Carolina for basic training and Advanced Individual Training (AIT). Both assignments trained me for an 11B MOS as an infantryman and service in Vietnam. I got to basic training about a week after arriving at Fort Jackson. The first week at Fort Jackson was spent at the Reception Center.
The first week of basic was spent mostly being harassed while waiting for the rest of the troops to arrive. I have a lot of stories about my time in basic, but I'm not ready to tell them all in this short HNT post. I promise that someday I'll write another chapter about basic training for my Vietnam Story blog.
So as to give this post a reason for me making it, here are some of the pictures I scanned from my yearbook.
The is SSG Temple, the lead drill sargeant assigned to our platoon. What a prick! He was a real redneck from the back woods of Tennessee and hated yankees. Since most of us were from the northern states, he gave us shit for almost the entire time we were in basic. He was the most despised drill sargeant we had.
To give you an idea what a prick he was, one Sunday him and the corporal got drunk and thought it would be funny to "really" harass the troops. Sundays was always our day to rest, so that especially made the harassment suck even more than usual.
The battalion commander just happened to come to our company area and saw what was going on. Both NCOs were court marshaled and busted down a rank. Luckily, I was assigned to the motor pool that day as a truck driver, so I missed it, but I was told all about it when I got back.
This is SGT Krietz and the most liked of all the NCOs commanding us. Just look at him, can you blame us for liking the guy?
Who does he remind you of? You'll know if you ever watched the Andy Griffith Show or Mayberry RFD. Yep, the spitting image of Deputy Barney Fife the bumbling dope of a deputy of Sheriff Taylor.
But Sgt Kreitz was far from a bumbling dope. Like almost all drill instructors, he had served at least one tour in Vietnam and was an excellent trainer.
Here are some pics of all of the troops in Company A, Sixth Battalion, Second Brigade and a few other guys I hung out with from other platoons. I'm in there somewhere. See if you can find me. Click on the pic to make it larger if you have trouble.
Couldn't find me? No biggie. Here's a close up of Private BTExpress. Look at those fucking elephant ears!
Happy HNT Soldier!
Ya know what I was just thinking? I wonder how many of the young men you see above, never made it back alive from Vietnam, I wonder?
Four weeks ago I went to my first weight loss meeting at the VA Hospital. Lori thinks I'm the prefect weight and size, but the doctors and I disagree. I figure I have to loose something like 70-80 pounds.
I've made significant changes in my diet; e.g., lower fat and calories and higher in fiber. I've also started eating a morning meal and drinking milk with my meals too. I know I need to do better, but this old dog is not so easy to retrain.
I was on Weight Watchers years ago and dropped about 50 pounds. The key to my weight loss then, was my running everyday. I was doing about 5 miles a day until my feet went. Then the weight slowly started creeping back on until now, I'm the previously mentioned 70-80 pounds over weight.
I know I'm in no shape to start running right now, so the plan is to walk. The VA program has laid out a 12 week walking plan which I started today. In the beginning, I go out walking every other day and work up from there. Today I followed this route in my neighborhood.
I looked on the Internet and found this web site. Among other things, it allows you to trace your route on a map and lets you save it for your records. It also calculates how fast you walked, or ran if your running, and the distance of the route you mark on a map. It calculated that today, I walked 1.6 miles @ 2.2 miles per hour. Not bad for my first day. :-D
Think you pay a lot for gas? Perhaps you'd prefer to live in Venezuela. Note: All prices in USA dollars.
Netherlands Amsterdam $6.48 Norway Oslo $6.27 Italy Milan $5.96 Denmark Copenhagen $5.93 Belgium Brussels $5.91 Sweden Stockholm $5.80 United Kingdom London $5.79 Germany Frankfurt $5.57 France Paris $5.54 Portugal Lisbon $5.35 Hungary Budapest $4.94 Luxembourg $4.82 Croatia Zagreb $4.81 Ireland Dublin $4.78 Switzerland Geneva $4.74 Spain Madrid $4.55 Japan Tokyo $4.24 Czech Republic Prague $4.19 Romania Bucharest $4.09 Andorra $4.08 Estonia Tallinn $3.62 Bulgaria Sofia $3.52 Brazil Brasilia $3.12 Cuba Havana $3.03 Taiwan Taipei $2.84 Lebanon Beirut $2.63 South Africa Johannesburg $2.62 Nicaragua Managua $2.61 Panama Panama City $2.19 Russia Moscow $2.10 Puerto Rico San Juan $1.74 Saudi Arabia Riyadh $0.91 Kuwait Kuwait City $0.78 Egypt Cairo $0.65 Nigeria Lagos $0.38 Venezuela Caracas $0.12
This morning I was rudely awakened by a phone call at the ungodly hour of 8:45 AM! Everyone knows not to call me before 11:00 AT THE EARLIEST! It all worked out for the best though. I got to watch the "Charmed Ones" and their boobage for the next 70 minutes and then the Rachael Ray Show.
Rachael's show started and I knew it looked familiar, it was the show Lori and I saw at the end of March. I quickly jumped out of bed to get an old VCR tape to record the show. That wasn't as simple as that seems, because I haven't used the VCR in years. I managed to locate a blank tape and loaded it into the VCR in the living room. Pressed record and away it went.
I retired back to my warm, cozy bed to watch the show, looking to see if one of the cameras got a shot of us. If you remember, we didn't get a seat in the audience. They put us up in the balcony with the director and sound guy.
Forty-four minutes into the show and just before they broke for a commercial, I saw our group! For all of about one second. I can't be sure, because we flashed by so quickly, but it looked like it caught everyone but me. I was blocked by a light hanging from the rafters. I decided to check the tape after the show was over to see if I was on TV or I really was blocked by the light.
I rewound the tape, pressed play and saw nothing but a black screen. HOLY CRAP! I screwed it up and had the VCR recording the wrong input. Not to be out smarted by a VCR, I decided to give it another try at 3:00 this afternoon when the show replays on a different channel.
I programmed the VCR correctly THIS TIME and set it to record the show automatically from 3 to 4. I tried a practice record just to be sure I get a copy of the show this time and it worked.
So, if you have a chance, check out the Rachael Ray show this afternoon about 44 minutes into the show and you will catch a fleeting glimpse of us up in the balcony, Lori anyway. But don't blink or you'll miss us.
I searched high and low, far and wide for just the right video tribute for you all you mother's out there. So here it is, a MADtv Darlene MCBride - Mother's Day Special. Enjoy!
Lori went up to Connecticut today to spend the weekend with her brother. She goes up there three times a year for very large antique fair in Brimfield, Massachusetts. For lack of a better word, it's a massive yard sale. It's three days of walking and walking and walking and walking. I went with her last year once, but I was worn out half way through the first day. This time I decided not to go.
Ya know what that means? It means I will be alone this weekend. :-( No snuggling and no breakfast in bed each morning. :-(
You'd have thought I'd have learned by now that when Lori is around, to pay attention where her and her camera is, or at least keep my my eyes open when I'm in a state of undress, right? But nooooooooooo................, not me.
Oh well. I suppose I do get some good HNT photos out of it, right?
.....so ain't gotten time to rite a post about evrythang. I'll fill y'all in ASAP. In the means time, here's something to tyed y'all over. Happy possum hunting!
Top Ten Things Only Women Understand
10. Why it's good to have five pairs of black shoes.
9. The difference between cream, ivory, and off white.
8. Crying can be fun.
7. Fat clothes.
6. A salad, diet drink, and a hot fudge sundae make a balanced lunch.
5. Discovering a designer dress on the clearance rack can be considered a peak life experience.
4. The inaccuracy of every bathroom scale ever made.
3. A good man might be hard to find, but a good hairdresser is next to impossible.
2. Why a phone call between two women never lasts under ten minutes.
Today is the 39th anniversary of the day our Uncle Sam drafted me into the good old United States Army. If your interested reading about that fateful day, and my little adventures in Vietnam, check out my Vietnam stories blog.
Eight years ago, San Francisco sex toy and education shop, Good Vibrations , declared May to be "Masturbation Month." I made a post about it once, but can’t find it now. I found something here, written in 1999, which explains the origin of Nation Masturbation Month.
To bring to bring attention to what it calls one of the most common and least talked-about human activities. "Most Americans masturbate and yet there continues to be a lot of shame and guilt around masturbation," Weide said. "We wanted to do something that would affirm masturbation as a central part of sexuality that is natural, that is healthy, that is positive. We thought that if Hallmark (a greeting cards firm) can create holidays, we can too," she added. As part of its celebration, the store voiced its support for Sherri Williams, lead plaintiff against the state of Alabama for its efforts to prevent the sale and distribution of sex toys. Williams is the owner of two Alabama sex toy shops. A U.S. Federal Court judge struck down the state ban on the sale of such products, but the state's attorney general filed an appeal last week.
How do like that girls? They are trying to ban sex toys! Now if that isn't a good enough reason to join in, then I don't know what is.
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I also learned that May 7th has been declared National Masturbation Day, so if you don't feel like celebrating every day this month, like I will be doing, at least mark your calendars and join the celebration for that one day.
To learn more about Masturbation Month and about masturbation in general, visit the Darklady Masturbate-a-Thon web site. While your there, check out the links section for some very interesting reading.
Now if you’ll please excuse me, it’s already the fourth and I’ve missed some of the celebrating. I have some catching up to do. ;-)
My great grandfather was from Glasgow, Scotland. I don't really know much more about him. I do know that his family name, Archibald, originated in 1066 though. The Archibald's were from the Clan MacPherson or something like that.
I remember my father's parents very well, they were always around, but we hardly ever saw my mom's parents, so I have very few memories of them. My mom's dad and grandfather were born in Scotland and her mom in Pennsylvania. She was Pennsylvania Dutch (Really German: Lime told me all about it one day). My mom said her mom's family can be traced back to the Mayflower. Don't know if it's true, but that's what she said. I don't have any memory of my mom's mother though.
The thing I remember most about my mom's father was that he had a glass eye. He got a piece of coal in his eye once, so they had to remove it. He would take the eye out to wash wash it and show it too me. I was about five, so that was very cool. He also ate raw onions like apples. Guess where I got my taste for them from.
My dad's father was from Poland and smoked cigars, so he always smelled like cigars. That's what I remember most about him. He would also give us kids $5.00 each when he visited, which then, was a lot of money, but my parents always took it from us. We were very poor, so they needed it to pay the bills or something I suppose.
My dad's mother always smelled like moth balls. Guess she kept them with her clothes. My grandma and my mom used to work together, as both were house wives, doing the cooking and cleaning when they visited. They talked and talked at length. That's how my mom learned she wasn't really Polish, but White Russian. I checked into it and found out that she was really from what today is known as Belarus, Russia. Seems that her father was a mayor of a town and when the 'red Russian' (communists) were taking over Russia, her dad sent her, her 10 brothers and sisters and their nanny to the USA to escape the slater. As far as she knows they were killed as they were aristocrats.
I could go on and on, but I guess that's enough for HNT. Happy HNT y'all!
Memorial Day, originally called Decoration Day, is a day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation's service. There are many stories as to its actual beginnings, with over two dozen cities and towns laying claim to being the birthplace of Memorial Day, but it is more likely that it had many separate beginnings. It is not important who was the very first, what is important is that Memorial Day was established. Memorial Day is not about division. It is about reconciliation; it is about coming together to honor those who gave their all. Traditional observance of Memorial Day has diminished over the years. Many Americans nowadays have forgotten the meaning and traditions of Memorial Day.
The is SSG Temple, the lead drill sargeant assigned to our platoon. What a prick! He was a real redneck from the back woods of Tennessee and hated yankees. Since most of us were from the northern states, he gave us shit for almost the entire time we were in basic. He was the most despised drill sargeant we had.
This is SGT Krietz and the most liked of all the NCOs commanding us. Just look at him, can you blame us for liking the guy?
Couldn't find me? No biggie. Here's a close up of Private BTExpress. Look at those fucking elephant ears!
Happy HNT Soldier!
Today is the 39th anniversary of the day our Uncle Sam drafted me into the good old United States Army. If your interested reading about that fateful day, and my little adventures in Vietnam, check out my Vietnam stories blog.
