No.  Still no luggage.  But my inlaws got us round trip tix to Honolulu so  I could visit the Arizona - now renamed "Valor in the Pacific".  Park has been redone in the last few years.  Stirring.  Even my ahistorical pacifict wife was moved.  I cried.  Alot.  We visited all of the free stuff, boarded the Missouri, went to the Pacific Aviation Museum and the Arizona.  My wife was just looking at ships and planes but the site brought much of it to life and I tried to fill in some blanks.  Really lost it when describing the aftermath of Doolittle's raid and why the raid itself was important.

After about 6 hours there (the duration of which surprised my leftist pacifist hosts) we bussed to Waikiki Beach and got a good look at DiamondHead.  Walked along the beach - caught a glimpse of the two Bowl teams for tomorrows game (Fresno State and CMU).  Enjoyed a cocktail as we watcdhed the sunset over the South Pacific ... then cabbed to the airport and back home.  VERY nice, albiet emotional, day

Mood:  don't ask

Day two: lots of sightseeing.  Seems to be this family's stated objective to keep me moving.  Is there a foreign power attempting to zoom in on my location?  Why must we be constantly going somewhere?  Why can't we sit and visit like MY family does on Christmas?

Morning wasn't bad.  Several hours at Volcano Nat'l Park with a VERY knowledgable guide.  Except for the 20-30 minutesw of listening to the six year old cry and lament over Santa's workshop being destroyed by global warming.  Took everything I had to NOT ruin the kid's belief in three myths (tooth fairey - he's missing his front tow [how appropriate], Santa, and AGW)

Afternoon consisted of frantically driving from site to site trying to find one not closed or being rained on.  We closed out the day by visiting a lava flow.  I'm nearsighted.  Even WITH binoculars it looked like the mating ritual of a small flock of fireflys.  Not impressed.

Maybe tomorrow we'll get out luggage.

Ok,  Have reached my destination.  My lugage hasn't.  Was asked to read a book to the chillin' (2 and 7).  Was given a selection of kids Christmas stories.  Picked one at random.  Was all about the North Pole melting due to global warming and ruining Christmas.  Needless to say I terminated my reading in the middle, made up the rest of the story and abdicated.

This is going to be the longest, most passive agressive Christmas EVER!

12/22 New Orleans - East Carolina vs Louisiana Lafayette (the Mud Dogs?) - Rajun Cajuns get a double digit win before a (small) national audience.

12/22 MAACO - Las Vegas - Washington vs Boise State.   BCS outsiders top BCS also-rans by 2.

12/24 Honolulu - Fresno State vs SMU.  Scrappy small conference team vs former SWC member still trying to recover from the death penalty.   That recovery will take a mite longer as the guys with the green V will snag a double digit win.  Stay with family. No real reason to watch this game.

12/26.  Little Ceasers Bowl.  Detroit.  In what might be the LAST college football game played in the City of Detoit before it is decommissioned by the State of Michigan.  Hilltoppers vs Chippewas.  Kinda like Buckeyes and Wolverines, right?  Cher?  Madonna??   Socrates???  Hilltoppers by a TD.

12/27.  Military Bowl, Washington DC.  San Jose vs BGSU.   My niece is a frosh falcon.  She'll be sad.  Spartans by 13+

You set up a standard.  Some group isn't meeting the mark.  There are logically three things you can do to address the issue.  First, relax the standard.  That’s what racial preferences (a.k.a. affirmative action) do, and that’s wrong. Second, you can attack the standards themselves. That’s what the “disparate impact” approach to civil-rights enforcement does, and it’s wrong, too. Or, third, you can figure out why some groups aren’t meeting the standards and address that problem. The principal and underlying reason for most racial disparities is the disparity in out-of-wedlock birthrates. So, for a number of obvious reasons, this would be a good issue for President Obama to talk about, as Jonah Goldberg and, today, Kathleen Parker point out.

Above from Roger Clegg.  Think it'll happen?

NFC

West - 49ers

South - Falcons

East - Giants

North - Bears

wild cards:  Seahawks, Packers ... but da SAINTS are still alive!

AFC:

East - Patriots

West - Broncos

South - Texans

North - Bengals

Wild Card: Ravens. Steelers?  Boy is the AFC weak!

Patriots over the Broncos, Niners over the Falcons (in an OLD NFC West rivalry game) ... then the Niners beat the Patriots AGAIN!

We need to raise taxes ... Peter Kirsanowhas convinced me ... thusly:

. . . to avoid the fiscal cliff and to address, in part, the $1.2 trillion deficit, circumstances directly attributable to the fact that George W. Bush lowered tax rates for billionaires, millionaires, and other corporate-jet owners, leading to the financial collapse that he could’ve avoided had he just listened to experts such as Barney Frank and Chris Dodd, both of whom helped President Obama engineer the current robust recovery, perpetuation of which requires the top tax rates on the wealthy go to 39.6 percent, a move that will generate at least $70–80 billion in revenue annually but, admittedly (and through no fault of President Obama) still leaves us $1 trillion in the hole each year and will cause the national debt to surpass $17 trillion next year, the interest on which will exceed $280 billion, which is more than three times greater than the federal government will receive by raising the aforementioned tax rates on the rich while doing nothing to address the consequent increase in federal spending because said tax increase will leach money from job creation; thereby reducing federal revenues, further increasing the deficit (and therefore the debt) and resulting in annual Medicaid and Medicare expenditures in excess of $745 billion as more people will drop out of the labor market and placing even more than the current 48 million people on food stamps while helping to maintain or increase the present foreclosure rate, causing a softening in the housing market and weakening related sectors of the economy even more, further stifling hiring, especially among the low-skilled and recent grads who won’t be earning income to pay off their student loans that total $930 billion (bound to skyrocket); so that eventually there will be demands for a bailout, leading to an even greater deficit; primarily because the top 1 percent pay only 40 percent of all income taxes, an amount that we all know isn’t close to being their fair share and won’t remotely cover the gap between federal spending and tax revenues, which means the federal government will have to borrow over $1 trillion a year for the foreseeable future; which is why President Obama needs unlimited authority to raise the debt ceiling unilaterally, because there’s no telling how high the national debt will go presuming, of course, that the Chinese and others continue to lend us trillions of dollars, which they almost certainly will do because they, like the rest of us, can see that the untold trillions we’ll save when Obamacare finally kicks in will rescue the country’s economy and put us on a path to health and prosperity forever and ever, amen.

Forward.

 

10/25 my weight was under 205, my 3m was about to go under 9m/m, my spee work had plateaued but I was adding some weight/core work to bust through, and I was mentally prepping for the approaching Halloween / Thanksgiving / FFL Playoff / Anniversary / Final Exams / Bowl Season / Christmas / NYE draw down.

Then I popped a gastrock.  And fell off the roof cleaning guttars.  And picked up four consecutive w/e driving gigs.  So November was a TOTAL waste and I'm back to square one kinda. 

I've made a few discoveries that I won't hafta go through again, but I'm back to r1w1 distance (sticking at 3m, not going to 1m) and I've stayed under 210 so things are good.   I'm basically back to where I was last June/July.  Ten days in Hawaii might help!  And we'll see where January takes us.

Haven't dealt with this much .... here's a catch up since the NYT is surprised. 

There is no oopsie here as the morons at hot air would have you believe. This is Obama's foreign policy. Consistent and pro-jihad.  Here's a year and half old coverage....

Back in March 19 2011 : President Hussein Backs Al Qaeda in Libya - Atlas Shrugs

March 26, 2011:  Troops join Al Qaeda, Rebels in Libya - Atlas Shrugs

March 27, 2011: "Al-Qaeda snatched missiles" in Libya - Atlas Shrugs

March 21, 2011: FOX Nation: "Geller: Obama is 'Essentially Backing Al-Qaeda in Libya

May 24, 2011: Contacts between insurgents and  al Qaeda for the announcement of jihad in Libya 

July 21, 2011:  Al-Qaeda Part of New Libyan Government Recognized by Obama 

October 30, 2011: Al-Qaeda Flag Flies Above the Libyan flag in Libya

October 15, 2011: Obama's Disastrous Foreign Policy: Missing Libya Missiles Turn Up in Gaza