This post is a bit longer than my usual but to discuss Thomas Jefferson properly it takes a little reading due to his many accomplishments. I am a lover of history and have been for as long as I can remember. The history of the United States is especially interesting considering how it was created. We hear so much about the “Founding Fathers” but in my opinion Thomas Jefferson was the founding father. He accomplished more in his lifetime than a hundred men ever did in their lifetimes. He did as much to create this country than anyone and had a remarkable gift of foresight not equaled since. Please read, understand and appreciate this man like I do.
At 5, began studying under his cousins tutor.
At 9, studied the Latin, Greek, and French languages.
At 14, studied classical literature and additional languages.
At 16, entered the college of William and Mary.
At 19, studied Law for five years starting under George Wythe.
At 23, started his own law practice.
At 25, was elected to the Virginia House of Burgesses.
At 31, wrote the widely circulated “Summary View of the Rights of British America” and retired from his law practice.
At 32, was a Delegate to the Second Continental Congress.
A 33, wrote the Declaration of Independence.
At 33, took three years to revise Virginia’s legal code and wrote a Public Education bill and a statute for Religious Freedom.
At 36, was elected the second Governor of Virginia succeeding Patrick Henry.
At 40, served in Congress for two years.
At 41, was the American minister to France and negotiated commercial treaties with European nations along with Ben Franklin and John Adams.
At 46, served as the first Secretary of State under George Washington.
A 53, served as Vice President and was also elected president of the American Philosophical Society.
At 55, drafted the Kentucky Resolutions and became the active head of the Republican Party.
At 57, was elected the third president of the United States.
At 60, obtained the Louisiana Purchase doubling the size of the nation.
At 61, was elected to a second term as President.
At 65, retired to Monticello.
At 80, helped President Monroe shape the Monroe Doctrine.
At 81, almost single-handedly created the University of Virginia and served as it’s first president.
At 83, died on the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
John F. Kennedy held a dinner at the White House for a group of the brightest minds in the nation at that time. He made this statement: “This is perhaps the assembly of the most intelligence ever gathered at one time in the White House with the exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.”
” When we get piled upon one another in large cities, as in Europe, we shall become as corrupt as Europe.” Thomas Jefferson
” I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.” Thomas Jefferson
” My reading of history convinces me that most bad government results from too much government.” Thomas Jefferson
” The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to “Keep and Bear Arms” is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.” Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson also stated in 1802:
“I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around the banks will deprive the people of all property – until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.”
As I was paging through some of my records I came upon a posting that I wrote 11 years ago. My thanks again go out to a Kansas City contributor who assisted me in this endeavor. It had been prompted by a State of the Union message by the president at that time, King Obama. My posting was initially about how democracies tend to destroy themselves financially and as I read through it again I began to realize that since Biden’s election absolutely nothing had changed from then until now. Disregarding the costs of the pandemic to this nation which have been considerable, there are many other things that need to be looked at as well. Read these and weep.
The folks who are getting the free stuff don’t like the folks who are paying for the free stuff, because the folks who are paying for the free stuff can no longer afford to pay for both the free stuff and their own stuff.
And… the folks who are paying for the free stuff would like the free stuff to stop. And the folks who are getting the free stuff want even more free stuff on top of the free stuff they are already getting.
Now… The people who are forcing the people who pay for the free stuff have told the people who are receiving the free stuff that the people who are paying for the free stuff are being mean, prejudice, and racist.
So… The people who are getting the free stuff have been convinced they need to hate the people who are paying for the free stuff by the people who are forcing some people to pay for their free stuff and giving them the free stuff in the first place.
Now understand this. All great democracies have committed financial suicide somewhere between two hundred and two hundred and fifty years after being founded. The reason? The voters eventually figured out they can vote themselves money from the treasury by electing people who promised to give them money in exchange for electing them. The United States officially became a republic in 1776, two hundred and forty five years ago. The number of people getting free stuff is beginning to outnumber the number of people paying for the free stuff. Failure to change this terribly inequitable system could spell serious financial problems for all of us and for future generations. Do we as a people want to become another sad statistic on failed government?
It’s 6:15 in the morning and I’m in my man-cave preparing for my day. This is a quiet time that I have every morning and in many ways it’s the best part of my day. It’s the perfect place and time for quiet meditation and self-reflection. For some reason today I have an old friend of mine on my mind who passed away about a month ago. This will be my memorial to him.
We worked together over forty years ago for six years and when the company that we worked for went into bankruptcy we went our separate ways. At some point we reconnected and became the best of friends for the next thirty-five years. We never saw each other in person again, but e-mailed regularly. He was quite a character and anytime I’m writing a blog I think of him because over the years he must’ve written twenty-five novels worth of information and sent it to me. We talked about everything, family, friends, jobs, and anything that demanded our attention for analysis and sarcastic comments. He had one helluva a sense of humor.
All those years ago when we were still young enough to be concerned about what women thought about us, we were in a bar in Brockton, Massachusetts having a cold one or two or three. He’d been chatting up a young lady for about twenty minutes when he excused himself to make a restroom visit. I eased on down the bar next to the young lady and began to talk to her myself. I bluntly asked her, “What do you think of my friend?”, and she just started laughing and giggling. She said he’s really so damn funny and so smart, he’s kind of like an “Ugly Burt Reynolds”. That got me laughing hysterically and I used that term against him for the next thirty-five years. It just never stopped being funny and just as an aside, he never got the girl either.
We talked on the phone three or four times a year but we e-mailed at least four times a week. I know all about his family, his friends, his granddaughter, and all of those little things that friends share. I looked forward to hearing from him everyday and there’s now a real void in my life since he’s passed. We always had an agreement that if something happened to either of us we make arrangements for someone to contact the other to let them know. Neither of us ever did that. He assured me every time we communicated whether it was written or orally that he was “Still Vertical”. Almost every e-mail he sent me started with those two words and it became a “thing”.
There were so many days when he sent me funny, crazy, and interesting emails. We covered every subject you could possibly think of. Two months ago I went for three days without any contact with him at all. I knew he’d been sick and had been moved to a care center because of his age and frailty. I had no communication information for his family and had never talked to or met any of them. I was forced to go online into the Kansas City, Missouri area and run a search for recent deaths. That’s how I found out my friend was gone. My long Internet friendship was finally over. He was no longer “Vertical”.
It’s a sad commentary but a fact of life in these days of social media and Internet relationships. We all must adapt to our new circumstances. Thanks for reading this and just so you know:
My father was what I always considered a force of nature. He was big, strong, and opinionated, and never feared to speak his mind to anyone. My family on both sides of the tree were blue-collar immigrants to the United States and settled in western Pennsylvania. At that time the area was a maze of coal mines, steel mills, glass plants, and chemical factories. My grandfathers, uncles, and my father worked the mills and mines and were my role models. All of my friends fathers were the same and as kids we watched them march off to the mines and mills every day at 5 AM to return filthy and exhausted at 6 PM or later. Family was everything and taking care of them was every adults priority.
I was about seven when my father’s union went on strike. He didn’t receive unemployment insurance only a small stipend from the unions strike fund. The strike was mean and nasty and seemed to go on forever. My father was forced to find a part-time job to bring enough money home to pay for the basics. There was a government surplus food program that supplied us with 10 pounds of processed cheese every couple weeks, a box of powdered milk, and containers of my all-time favorite, powdered eggs. We survived on that stuff but it was god awful.
My father found a part-time job delivering coal. He’d arrive at the mine at 5:30 AM, pick up the dump truck and a load of coal, and begin his deliveries. He worked between 10 and 12 hours a day just to make $15 a day. He would arrive at the clients home, remove sections of a metal chute from the truck and clip them together to reach the coal chute of the house. He would then tip the truck bed up and push coal down the chute and into the residence. He collected the money from the homeowner and proceeded on to the next house. At the end of the day he turned in the money at the mine and went home.
I was seven years old and I wanted to be with my dad and help him and I bugged him to death to take me to work with him. He finally agreed that a couple of times a week I’d be permitted to ride along and help. So my dad and I delivered coal throughout the neighboring communities for the duration of the strike. Him doing all the work and me trying to help. We’d get home late, filthy dirty from coal dust, and hungry enough to even eat those crappy powdered eggs.
I saw what hard work really was all about by watching my dad. He never complained and always did what was needed to take care of the family. He returned to work after the strike without bitching and complaining and never looked back. He worked for that employer for another 35 years and eventually ran the maintenance department for the entire PPG complex. He eventually took his well-deserved pension, retired, and lived out the remainder of his life a reasonably happy person.
Those memories are what created in me a good solid work ethic. It made me something of an over achiever and that stayed with me throughout my own career until my retirement a few years ago. Everyone should be so lucky to have role models like that. If they did, then the term “work ethic” would never again be a concern or a point of discussion.
I’m just sitting here looking out the window and it’s raining, it’s humid, and I am bored out of my mind. These days between seasons leave much to be desired. When I get this bored I fall back to something that I enjoy doing. If you don’t know by now that means diving in to my archives for useless bits of semi-interesting trivia items. The 10 I’ve listed below are interesting and a little unusual, my favorite kinds. Maybe by sharing them with you it will take the edge off my boredom before I scream out loud. Enjoy!
A cat has 32 muscles in each ear.
According to Genesis 1:2022 the chicken came before the egg.
Chop Suey is not a native Chinese dish, it was crafted in California by Chinese immigrants.
Chrysler built B-29’s that bombed Japan. Mitsubishi built the zeros that tried to shoot them down. Both companies now build cars in a joint plant called Diamond Star.
Due to gravitational effects, you weigh slightly less when the moon is directly overhead.
Tigers have striped skin, not just striped fur.
The dragonfly has a life span of 24 hours.
The goldfish has a memory span of 3 seconds.
The characters Bert and Ernie on Sesame Street were named after Bert the cop and Ernie the taxi driver in Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life.
Rubber bands last longer when refrigerated.
There’s your trivia for today. I thought I’d throw in a little something extra for you because who doesn’t love a good limerick? I have in my archives hundreds and hundreds of limericks of all categories. I have family limericks, children’s limericks, animal limericks, sporty limericks, and on and on and on. I even have naughty limericks and a category of limericks that goes three steps beyond naughty but I’ll save those for another time. Here’s one that’s rather tame but I like it.
A surgeon of some imprecision,
Decided on self-circumcision;
A slip of the knife –
“Oh, dear,” said his wife,
“Our sex-life will need some revision.”
Well there’s your limerick for today. I thought I’d stick to the medical profession for this limerick because I know how much they love off-color humor. Mostly the nurses but especially the retired ones.
Have you ever had something piss you off so bad you felt a sharp, stabbing pain behind your eyes. If you have then the following list will be perfect for you. I love reading lists and I also love writing them from time to time. Over the last few years I’ve experienced almost 60% of the things listed below and it seems to be getting worse each year instead of improving. The pandemic has done nothing to stop these annoyances, it has possibly increased them.
The person who insists on explaining at length something I have absolutely no interest in.
People who snore the paint right off the walls and then deny ever snoring.
People who love to talk over me during a conversation make me want to scream.
Waiting in my car at the ATM for 15 minutes for some moron on a bicycle making a deposit.
The guy in the next men’s room stall at Walmart who opens a stolen package of underwear, puts them on, and leaves his old pair on the floor when he departs.
The attractive woman driving the gorgeous new Lexus who rolls down her window and spits a huge oyster into the passing lane.
People who will stand quietly in line at a movie theater but can’t shut the hell up once the movie starts.
Screaming out-of-control children in public places with parents shopping elsewhere.
The woman chatting on her cell phone as she smashed into my left front fender.
Loud and obnoxious beer drinking morons at any sporting event.
People who are “close talkers” with chronic “stench breath” who won’t stop talking to me.
Finding short and curly hairs in my restaurant food.
Waiting endlessly in a register line for a customer to be trained in the use of their own debit card by the cashier.
People who loudly bitch and moan about their meals and the service at a restaurant.
City workers who insist on destroying my mailbox every year with a 10 ton snowplow.
I feel much better now that I’ve gotten all of those off my chest. It’s a very cathartic experience to say the least. I wrote these items in less than 15 minutes and I’m afraid if I took a bit more time the list would’ve doubled.
Every guy loves ogling women. It’s been that way forever and I don’t see it changing anytime soon. Women always claim to dislike being stared at but do they really mean it? I’ve had them try to tell me that they wear makeup, sexy lingerie, and revealing clothing just to look good for other women, not for men. Not a chance that’s true. They want to be stared at, whistled at, and ogled just as much as the men enjoy doing it. It’s that famous dance that the sexes do in this age-old mating ritual. If you look good your choices of acceptable mates increases exponentially.
Over the course of my life I’ve had many relationships. I’ve watched women try to walk that fine line with some difficulty. If you get too revealing you look like a slut. While many guys say they wouldn’t mind that, they’re in the minority. If you dress down too much you won’t attract those potential mating partners. So as a public service I’m going to supply you with my relationship tips and advice for women. Hold your applause until you’ve read them all.
Rule 1 – Look good but not too good. Just slutty enough to make his mouth water and to make his fantasies more interesting.
Rule 2 – Be flirty but not too dirty or off color. Just a hint of “bad girl’ is usually enough to drive most men over the edge.
Rule 3 – Drink enough but don’t get sloppy drunk. No one wants to have the woman they’re going to have sex with throwing up on them. Don’t laugh, it happens!
Rule 4 – Lay off the bad language except for during sex. Be coy at first and then turn into that bedroom slut he’s been hoping for.
Rule 5 – You may be more sexually experienced that he is so don’t show off. Save some of your better moves for later when he’ll think he motivated you to do them.
I can already hear you ladies out there mumbling under your breath about my opinions. Take a deep breath and relax, I’m just trying to help, that’s all. Who would know better about what men want than a man.
I’ve always been partial to women who look good but not too good. I’ve always fantasized about a woman who wears her long hair in a bun and only lets it fall as she’s walking towards the bed (in a non-slutty way) to have her way with me. It’s an old Victorian fantasy of mine where I spend a great deal of time peeling off layers of clothing, petticoats, bustles, and slips. After all that work she finally lets down her hair and I’m on my way. It still gives me shivers after all these years just thinking about it. Let me calm down for just a second while I recuperate.
Okay, I’m much better now but I did get a little flushed there for a moment. Lets get back to the topic. I’ve had dealings with a few women in my life and they fallen into any number of different categories. Beautiful, not so beautiful, and all points in between. Each one was a totally different experience, some good and some really bad. They can try and deny their innate desire to attract men but down deep in their hearts they know it’s the truth. They want a good man in a good relationship with kids, a dog, and a white picket fence. After all of that they also need and want to be the biggest slut they can be in the bedroom.
Today is not just a day of remembrance for me but for the descendants of nearly 1200 Jews saved from death at the hands of the Nazis during the Holocaust. Oskar Schindler died at the age of 66 in 1974. Being a member of the Nazi party made it possible for him to bribe officials and obtain forged documents. He placed himself and his family at mortal risk and when it was all said and done he was penniless.
As a member of the Nazi Party, he ran an enamel-works factory in Krakow during the German occupation of Poland, employing workers from the nearby Jewish ghetto. When the ghetto was liquidated, he persuaded Nazi officials to allow the transfer of his workers to the Plaszow labor camp, thus saving them from deportation to the death camps. In 1944, all Jews at Plaszow were sent to Auschwitz, but Schindler, at great risk to himself, bribed officials into allowing him to keep his workersand set up a factory in a safer location in occupied Czechoslovakia. By the wars end, he was penniless, but had saved 1200 Jewish lives.
In 1962, he was declared a Righteous Gentile by Yad Vashem, Israel’s official agency for remembering the Holocaust. According to his wishes, he was buried in Israel at the Catholic cemetery on Mt. Zion.
Years ago my favorite blogger, the late, great, Acid Man, wrote a few hundred words on swearing, cussing, and the differences between the two. I am nowhere near as eloquent as he but here goes anyway.
I come from an area in the country known for its blue-collar roots, coal miners, mill workers, and some downright bad ass cusser’s. Western Pennsylvania is arrogant in its pride of self and I find myself guilty of that at times. At age four I was sitting on a street corner in Natrona, Pennsylvania with my grandfather and swearing for nickels and pennies from his buddies. If by chance I yelled the ultimate motherfucker, I got a quarter and some ice cream. So you have to admit I come by swearing honestly.
Of course we were all raised as avid Steeler fans and if you didn’t curse loudly and often enough while watching their games then you were a horse’s ass. Any bastard who called some other son-of-a-bitch a rotten prick was a no good shithead or so I’ve been told. You always had to be ready to voice your support for the Steelers as they kicked the shit out of those pussies from Cleveland and those bastards from Houston (hopefully).
We lived in a diverse area with Irish, Poles, Slavs, Blacks, Italians, and the occasional Hispanic. To be a professional cusser in our neighborhood you had to know cuss words in at least six different languages to be properly understood. We were the UN of fucking, half-assed, dirty rotten language and damn proud of it.
I’ve now lived in New England for more than 37 years and I have to admit that the swearing here is a little more laid back than I’m used to. A little too polite and prissy for a boy from fucking Pennsylvania. I actually look forward to trips back home where I can walk into a bar after 37 years of living in New England and have someone say, “Hey, who let that motherfucker in here and is he buying the next goddamn round?”. It’s just not the same here in New England. Two F-bombs in one sentence seems to be too much for New England sensibilities. Well hell, if they don’t fucking like it they can kiss my fucking ass.
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