One year ago today: November 11, 2018, locked out by Google.
Five years ago today: November 11, 2014, my 25-year head start.
Nine years ago today: November 11, 2010, 2 pictures a day!
Random years ago today: November 11, 2008, a whopping 0.1%, APR
Today was originally called Armistice Day. In 1954, it was changed to Veterans Day. There is more to this than it would seem. If it was truly an Armistice, everybody would be observing the event. But they don’t mark this day on the other side. Something is terribly wrong with that. Read today’s addendum remembering that I have a degree in military history. Another batch of burning leaves today, now that we have it down to a science. The entire delay is the leaves remain damp and smolder up to half hour per load before igniting. Each session begins with an hour for an initial bed of coals to commence. I’ll invest in a propane torch kit and some briquettes to solve that.
This means that this morning, I’m taking an extra hour to work on my jigsaw puzzle. I worked all morning after daybreak until noon, clearing out the back yard. I’ve cut more bamboo in Tennessee than I did with almost four years living in the tropics. You can’t see that this pile of bamboo cuttings is six feet high. Look around here for a video to see if I got ambitious and made a clip. Ah, there it is. It doesn’t show, but that pile of bamboo leaves is over six feet high. I haven’t touched the bad spots yet. I'll need new saw blades for that. What I have is giving out, but may I point out that I consider a kitchen dishwasher to be a much more versatile tool that most people. Hey, no different than the guys who put golf balls in the washer. My paint brushes are like new.
My plan is to build the turtle hacienda. I read a few articles on bamboo joinery and they state to use bamboo that has been air-dried for three years. Um, I don’t think that is an option here. The bamboo shrinks and it is also said to soak it in boron. Dang, a tub full of boron, that’s another thing I don’t have handy. I’m slipping in my old age. I threw some of the larger bamboo pieces on the ground back there. Seems to me the sprigs that I took home in June dried out pretty fast on their own. They never took root and I had to remove them before they became punji sticks.
The difference is I have specifically targeted “bar band” as a separate musical variety in its own right. I see the same sad tale so many times. A talented musician who does not play bar music, but plays in bars because he needs the money and there are no other readily available venues. These people would be devastated by any act that came along and catered to the bar audiences. What’s saving them is that for most guitarists, changing their music to what the audience wants would be a seismic shift in their song lists and their attitudes.
I’ll contact the guy back tomorrow because he was in agreement with my description of the problem and the solution. But he has not yet agreed to change anything, and if he doesn’t, that makes him a Type B. (If I recall, Type B is the sort who say they will learn your music, but only because they think once you hear them play, you will be so overwhelmed you’ll toss your nonsense and follow only them. Fat chance.)
Sri Lankan limes.
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I’ll tell you who is becoming a real pest on the Internet. Pinterest. I did not like it when it first arrived in 2010 for two reasons. One, they smacked of social media, and two, they required registration. This was at the time when most new users were beginning to forget that the very premise of the Internet was that you could look up information anonymously. To me, the requirements of Pinterest were riding the crest of that ignorance wave. I recall their original registration process kept roping you in deeper and deeper. And if you changed your mind, you could not delete the information you had already given them. I don’t know how it is today, but I do know it is practically impossible to eliminate Pinterest from search results.
Have you ever seen a dog eat bamboo? Here’s your video. Don’t base anything on it, this dog loves to chew on big sticks. I keep reading how bamboo, once planted, gets away and spreads like, well, bamboo. I’m toying with the idea of preventing that by placing them only in planters along the south yard. I don’t know if that works and once again, my searches on-line do not reveal any articles on the idea. Wait, I finally found some material on growing them in pots. You want the spreading bamboo, not the running bamboo. Of course, the stuff in the back yard is the wrong species.
I would like to congratulate another unsung hero. This is the guy who invented a bowl. Not just any bowl, but a tin bowl. You’ve seen this man’s handiwork dozens of times. I would like to be the one who finally gives him the proper recognition for his achievement. The spread of his work is enormous, from the Lone Ranger, to Rambo, to Clint Eastwood, and probably every other spy or war movie. He’s the guy who came up with the little tin bowl or cup that, whenever somebody in the movies digs a bullet out of a wound, they drop it into this container with a very satisfying “clink” sound. See, you know who I mean.
ADDENDUM
Today was originally called Armistice Day. It was renamed Veteran’s Day in 1954. I respect all the soldiers of both sides who fought in that horrible war. I do no celebrate the politics that caused and prolonged the conflict. I have something to say about that.
The Treaty of Versailles was signed in June, a hundred years ago. To end all wars, they said, but the flaws were apparent immediately. On this day one year earlier, the warring parties signed an Armistice, which is basically a ceasefire. Nobody won the war, nobody lost it. A ceasefire. Everybody had expected the war to be over by Christmas of 1914—but do you know the reason why that was expected? Because modern war costs too much money to last very long. The British Empire had been bankrupted by the Second Boer War of 1899 – 1902.
Then, how was World War One able to carry on for four years? Credit. England borrowed the money. The biggest lie of the century is that they borrowed it from the USA. False, the USA had no money to lend. The Federal Reserve had just been created in 1913 and as yet had no printing presses. The USA was so broke it had to issue war bonds to its own population to build up an army. They had to enlist movie stars and boy scouts to sell them. My understanding is that the US only recently finished paying off those debts.
So who did the British borrow the money from? They borrowed it from an international banking cartel that had offices in London. In essence, the British borrowed the money for the war from Germany. When you figure out how all this worked, you’ll be on your way to grasping the awful truth. It should surprise nobody about how the Germans felt about this once the truth was learned. It’s kind of like finding out somebody who you graciously let live in your own house was lending money to people who wanted to burn it down. This is a part of history left out of all Allied accounts of the war.
Germany knew the British were a naval power unable to fight a continental war. Each expected their blockades to starve the other out, the British using surface ships and the Germans using submarines. Instead, the war carried on because England was able to keep borrowing money on the promise it would be paid back when they won. The problem was, by 1918, nobody had won. The bankers would not be repaid unless there was a victor, so they had to create a loser. They chose Britain as the “winner” because at that time, the British had a mandate (permission to control and govern) an area in the Middle East that could be used as loan collateral. It remains arguable whether the British saw that one coming.
The Treaty stated that all warring parties would disarm. Germany was the only country who kept their word. You’ve seen the piles of burning German airplanes, but never British or American planes. That’s because the Allies did not disarm, and while sending drafted soldiers home, they continued to build up their armaments, particularly in ships and airplanes. They knew they could not defeat the German Army, but could defeat the German Navy and Air Force. The Treaty further stated that the England would never again surround Germany with military alliances. British joined with Poland and France in no time at all, so they lied.
Much has been made of Hitler’s “demands” to unify Germany. They were not demands, they were rights granted to every country that signed the Treaty. Germany was honoring the Treaty, not breaking it. Germany re-armed only after they realized they had been taken. It cannot be stressed enough that Germany did not lose the war, yet they were treated as if they had been defeated, the infamous Article 23. The bankers wanted Germany to be the loser so as to pay reparations to England, to pay back the war loans, which would be used to purchase land in Tranjordan. It’s a pure example of merciless banking: the longer the war, the more money they made. And I’m not going to be the one to tell you who those bankers were. While I respect the valor of the soldiers on both sides, the politics stinks and it still stinks to this day.
