Fish 1, Fisherman 0

Well, I don't know the exact score but a fisherman hooked a black Marlin and the boat captain but the boat into reverse (standard practice) but lost his footing while the boat was a full throtle.  The boat sank and the fish got away.  You can read the story at:






http://www.grindtv.com/outdoor/blog/50860/a+hooked+marlin+sinks+a+fishing+boat+well+something+like+that/

Roadside signs, vandal cover

Our church is using a portable roadside sign, 4' by 8' but it doesn't have a vandal cover and we really need one as people are stealing our letters and changing our messages.  Anyone have any ideas on where we can get a vandal cover or does anyone know how to make one? 

Fair or not?

I really do believe our justice system needs a serious overhaul.  I've read about people who commit multiple murders receiving a relatively light sentence and someone who didn't actually commit a murder being sentenced to life and in rare occasions even death. 

In the Saturday edition of the News and Record there are two stories of crime.  Each crime is similar.
In each  situation  a couple was robbed a with a weapon of their rings. 

In one case, one man, with a knife, robbed a couple of their rings.  That man was charged with two counts of kidnapping, two counts of communicating threats, one count of assualt with a dangerous weapon causing bodily injury and one count of assualt on a female.  He is on a $50,000 bond.

The two men in the second robbery hurt no one and have been charged with robbery with a dangerous weapon and conspiracy to commit robbery with a dangerous weapon and were placed on a $100,000 bond.

Maybe the difference is the conspiracy part but I would rather not be cut in the face while being robbed.  I consider the first robber to be much more dangerous. 

A long winters nap

Just hibernating this morning waiting for the snow and ice to begin today wishing it was a little warmer so I could get back over to the church and finish my winter project. 

The pastors wife is resting uncomfortably after back surgery Monday.  I know she wants to be well enough to be at church on February 19, 2013 when Autumn Joy will be singing.  We probably will have Sunday School but we'll just be  having singing starting at 10:30.  This will give the pastor time to rest his voice.  Hey, you are invited to come.  I do believe it will be in the Asheboro paper as well.

I'm really serious.  We would love for you to come. 

Our Sunday School is only 30 minutes long and we have an excellent teacher.  I advice coming to Sunday School if you are planning on coming to the singing.  There are two reasons:  one you will receive a blessing from the lesson and the second reason is One Way Baptist on Sunset in Randleman has limited seating so coming for Sunday School gives you a better chance of getting a seat. 

Sunset in Randleman is a side street that runs between Stout Street and Main Street.  Main Street is 220 Business and Sunset and main intersect in front of Sir Pizza. 

Enjoy the   snow, sleet, and freezing rain and I'll see you at 10:oo on February 10. 

Virus alert

If you are running a JAVA program you should remove it immediately to protect your computer.  I delected my Java but I needed to temporaily reinstall it to do an inquiry with my investment firm and in that brief period my computer was attached with five viruses vis Java, two of them serious threats.  Microsoft essentials stopped them from infecting my computer.

Microsoft and other platforms recommends removing Java. 

Terrorists don't use bubbles.

Pa. kindergartner suspended for bubble gun remark

Associated Press – 10 hrs ago

MOUNT CARMEL, Pa. (AP) — A 5-year-old Pennsylvania girl who told another girl she was going to shoot her with a pink toy gun that blows soapy bubbles has been suspended from kindergarten.

Her family has hired an attorney to fight the punishment, which initially was 10 days but was reduced to two.

Attorney Robin Ficker says Mount Carmel Area School District officials labeled the girl a "terrorist threat" for the bubble gun remark, made Jan. 10 as both girls waited for a school bus.

Ficker says the girl didn't even have the bubble gun with her and has never fired a real gun. He says she's "the least terroristic person in Pennsylvania."

School district solicitor Edward Greco tells pennlive.com (http://bit.ly/13Nu0QF ) officials are looking into the case. He said Friday school officials aren't at liberty to discuss disciplinary actions.

___

Bad ass or dumb ass?

I'm sorry about the title but I'm so tired of pro-gun people claiming that "if he /she had had a weapon then" and you can fill in the blanks.  I am not anti-gun by any means and I have owned guns in the past, both rifles and handguns. 

Two recent stories has prompted my comments.  The first was the woman from Michagan, a college student I believe, who was kidnapped off campus.  She was raped but espcaped from her vehicle and a 14 year old boy took her in and allowed her to call the police.  The suspect tried to burn down the house she had taken refuge in.  After setting fire to the house the suspect fled the scene, stole a garbage truck and was shot dead by the police. 

So many gun owners or gun proponents wrote in to say "if she only had a gun she could have killed her kidnapper at the point of attack." 

For one, having a gun on school grounds is probably illegal and if she had had a gun with her more than likely it would have been in her vehicle.  It would have been more readily available to her kidnapper than to her.  I don't know the laws in Michagan but shooting an unarmed man might have been considered excessive use of force.  Of course she would have been much better off threatning the man with a gun allowing herself time to escape or for the suspect to change his mind and leave. 

My point is that having a gun in this situation might have been a good thing or it might have been a very bad thing.  The suspect calimed he was going to kill her and she did get raped.  But she is alive and had she not been his victim the next person he kidnapped might have ended up dead.  This story ended well but we can't say "What is" because there was no "Ifs in this situation".  We don't know how things would have played out if the circumstances had been different because they were not different.

The other story was about a may that was shot by his four year old.  If that man did not have a gun he would not have ever been shot by his 4 year old.  If asked he probably would have claimed he had the gun for protection. 

One gun rights advocate said the FBI has concluded that 1.5 million to 2 million murders have been prevented because of gun ownership.  Really?  How many dead people would never have died if there had been no guns? 

Most gun owners are responsible but give a badass a gun and he just might turn into a dumbass. 

My father was a gun owner.  The only two times that gun was ever brought to bear was near disasters.  The first is when one of his children came hom e from college and arrived home very late.  Not wishing to distrub his parents he used his key to let himself into the house.  He was greeted by his father and his loaded pistol.  The son had no idea his father had purchased a pistol. 

The next time the gun came into play was many years later.  My dad was asleep when two kids broke into his home.  One found his pistol and held it pointed at my fathers head intending to kill my father should he wake up. The thief took the gun with him when he left opening up the possibility yhat now it would be an armed thug and not just a punk teenager. 

I know there can be a lot of positive things to be said about gun ownership and I certainly don't want the government to start limiting citizens rights.  What I wish I could do was get the point across to many of these hot heads who brag about what would have happened differently if they had been there with their gun. 

They never have been.  I've never read a story about work place violence or school shootings where a person with a gun was the hero and stopped the killer before the police arrived or before anyone was hurt.  These hotheads arguments don't bare out in reality.  No one will ever know what would have happened if these braggards had been there with their toys but the reality is that they weren't. 

Wells-Fargo. What does it mean?

Well is being or feeling good, but it is also a deep dark hole.  Fargo in a town in North Dakota as well as the last name of the man who started Well-Fargo Bank and a fairly popular last name in the USA but not common or popular as a first name. 

From my resent experience with Well-Fargo, the bank, I would think the proper definition would be an unpopular deep dark hole. 

There are two reasons I say this.  I personally do not have an account with Wells-Fargo the bank but my mom does.  I backtrack a moment on that last statement.  I had some remodeling done at the house which was financed through Wachovia which, as you should know, is now Wells-Fargo.  That bill has been being paid on-line but now Wells-Fargo says that we must open an account with them in order to pay the account on-line. 

We have never received a bill. 

The account is a revolving account and we have a credit card to use except the number we were given to activate it is not a valid number. 

We can't pay the bill at the bank either and we have no address to which we are supposed to send the payments.

Now for the other reason.  My mom has banked at the same location for years although it has undergone many name changes.  It was 1st National, then Northwestern, then First Union, then Wachovia, and now Wells-Fargo.  Mom needed new checks but did not have a check reorder form. 
As I have been doing her banking for her for over ten years now I saw no problem in me running down to the bank and asking them to order some checks for her. 

To my surprise they said no.  They claimed that no one knew who I was.  Strange because the people in the bank at the same people who I have delt with for years but suddenly they don't recognize me. 
Mom is 87, deaf, and legally blind, and doesn't get around all that well but I had to take her down to the bank in order for them to order checks for her. 

So for me when I think of Wells-Fargo and customer service I think of an unpopular deep dark hole. 

Only you can prevent forest fires

"Only you can prevent forest fires" was something smokey said many years ago.  Unfortunately not all fires are in the forest and not all fires can be extinguished using water.  Fires involving grease or oil need something to sufficate the fire.  That is a lesson we learned way back in grade school.  But some people, no matter how rich or how famous, can't seem to recall those elementary lessons.  Check out this story:

 A candle that the rock icon and his manager wife, Sharon, had left burning through the night exploded in its glass vase and sparked a small blaze in their living room. Quick-thinking Ozzy, whose arm had been bandaged up following hand surgery on Wednesday, tried to air the room as Sharon rushed to collect some water, but her efforts to extinguish the oily flames only caused the fire to spread, singeing chunks of the rocker's long locks in the process.

Is Steve Harvey Correct?

"Act Like a Lady but Think Like a Man" or something similar to that is the title of a best selling book by Steve Harvey, the comedian, game show host, and talk show/variety show host.  I have to admit I like the format of the Steve Harvey Show and he is an interesting character in and of himself. 

I haven't read his book.  It is written to the ladies and if you watch his show you will notice it is about women and for women.  He does fancy himself a ladies man and in his book he proposes to teach women to act like ladies by understanding how men think and using that knowledge to their advantage. 

When I was a younger man I had a high school girl writting me and she was telling me about her life, especially about her relationships.  Like Steve Harvey does in his book, I told the girl how men think.  At first he made her mad but she later admitted that I was right.  I knew I was right.  I'm a man. 

I don't agree that everything a man does is about sex.  Oh, I know a lot of what men do is about sex.  The prettiest women get the most attention from male workers in retail stores, are less likely to be found guilty in a court of law, and are probably treated much better in most aspects of life than either men or their less attractive counterparts.  A rescent study showed that men are most likely to find guilty in court an overweight woman than either any man or attractive women.  Life isn't fair that way.

One of the most talked about people of late is a football player named Tim Tebow.  It isn't so much his atlectic abilities that have drawn the interest of people but rather his religion.  Whether people expressly comment on it or not, I think it makes him a polorizing figure and he has drawn much scorn because he is a Christian.  No, not because he is a Christian like most Christians view themselves as but a Christian like the Bible teaches us a Christian should be like. 

A person who is fully surrendered is a new man.  One doesn't have to try to live a Christian life but God will take from us does things we do not need and give to us those things we do need.  I see in this young man a desire to live as Christ would have him live.  He isn't motivated by sex but by love. 

Men like to be winners and I believe  that winning is a stronger motivator of men than sex is.  It dating, sex is the goal, the reward, if you will, for winning.  But that is just the regular season.  The championship is determined by whom a man gets to be his partner.  Prestige, power, and things are the rewards of being a winner at work.  It is about being good at what one does. 

I believe if women understood that they would have a better relationship with their husbands.  What your husband to take more interest in housework?  Sure you have nag him and plead and beg all you want but that will only make your husband mad or withdrawn.  That is telling the hunter he isn't a good hunter.  It is what he does and you critize him for not being good at it.  That isn't motivation.

Tell him you like the way he washes the dishes because he is faster or better at it than you are, or more careful or whatever.  Make him feel special and appreciated and he will wash so many dishes that you may never get to do that task again. 

We all like to think we are special.  Whomever you married you married because at the time you thought they were special.  If one continues to treat their spouse/partner as if they are truly special the relationship will not only last but be a happy one. 

Thumbs down

I do believe some people would give a thumbs down to anything.  I'm not always right and sometimes people don't recognize my humor and I can understand that.  What I don't understand is why someone gives a thumbs down on concrete issues. 

I wrote a response about a boston butt.  The author of the article said one should get a bone-in as it adds flavor even though a boneless one is easier to deal with.  My comment was that one could ask the buther to remove the bone and tie it back on which would make it easier to deal with while giving the flavor of the bone-in one.  Someone gave me a thumbs down on that. 

I was a butcher and I know a lot about meat.  I started cutting meat before the meat was broken down into small primals.  I'm the type of person who researches what I don't know.  I was one of the smartest buthers you would ever meet and I was a member of Mensa if you have any doubts about that. 

I suppose it just goes to prove the point that one can't please everyone. 

Pat Robertson has diarreha of the mouth

"If your husband isn't paying attention to you, it's probably because you don't look 'pretty' and 'alert,' according to evangelical talk show host Pat Robertson"

I wish this guy would just shut up and go away.  Every few years he just has to say something stupid.  He is an embarrassment and I wish people would quit supporting him.    

Jesus is a fantasy

I'm hearing more and more young people caliming that Jesus is a fantasy, the stories in the bible are not real, there is not God, and that religion is responsible for more wars and deaths than any other csause. 

It would be just terrible if they were right, wouldn't it?

I don't want a bunch of fat old men deciding what I can do with my body

"I don't want a bunch of fat old men deciding what I can do with my body" was a quote in the  recent news by a famous lady .  Who the lady is does not matter because this is the exact sentiment express by many abortionists. 

In an attempt to justify their actions and ease their quilt, many claim that a baby isn'at a baby until it can survive outside the womb.  Until then it is a fetus which is a thing and not a human being.  The truth is, most people cannot survive outside the womb until they are in their teenage years.  Seriously.  Just kick a ten year old out of the house and see how long they survive. 

I know, it just doesn't seem right that the people on the Supreme court, especially the men, should have a say so in what a woman does with her own body.  Then again it doesn't seem right that a single person should have sole power over the life of another human being with the power to say whether they live or die   and they have no input into the decision. 

Now most people will agree that if a woman becomes pregnanr because she was forced to and had to input into becoming pregnant should have the right to terminate that pregancy.  But, in my opinion, if a woman feels the reason they want to have abortion legal is as a last resort birth control method under the pretence that it is their right to have control of their body, then they are not really wanting to control their body but an escape clause to undo the consequences of not controlling their body. 

The time for control is before the act, not afterwards. 

There really is not any do overs.

Someone has to die. 

Gun Control or not?

Every time there is a mass shooting people come out of the woodwork demanding gun control and weapons bans and an equal amount of people are there to shoot them down and claim their 2nd amendment rights. 

So, should there be some form of gun control or not?

I read stories about people being murdered and gun lobyists claiming that if they had had a gun they could have defended themselves but then I think of my dear old father, laying in his bed one night, suffering from the cancer that eventually killed him and my mother, asleep in bedroom one night when two teenagers broke into their apartment. 

It wasn't an apartment like people would normally think of but it was actually the fellowship hall at the church my father was pastor of.  There was a small den and a bedroom/bathroom built at the back of the fellowship hall that my parents stayed in.  The intent was to let visiting pastors use the bedroom/den instead of having to stay in a motel. 

My dad slept on a cot in the fellowship area because of the pain of the cancer.  The two boys discovered my father's gun and held in on my dad in case he awoke.  He later stated if my father had woken up he would have killed him.  Of course, if my father did not have the gun the burglar could just as easily gone to the kitchen and retrieved a knife. 

One of the most commonly stolen items in breakins are guns, especailly in homes where the owner has a large gun collection.  I wonder sometimes if having guns is an encouragement  to thieves to break into a particular house. 

I understand the fasination with weapons.  Some people just like the power, some like the history, while others like the financial rewards of buying and selling things.  Most people, however, just like the feeling of protection having a weapon affords them. 

I will admit there are many people that should not have access to guns.  They can be mentailly unstable, just plain mean, irresponsible, or immature. 

Granted, it is a lot easier to kill many people at once with a firearm than it is by most other means but in the over all scheme of things mass murder represents a small fraction of murders. 

In order for gun laws to work, they must keep guns from being stolen and prevented from ending up in the hands of people that should not have access to firearms.  No set of laws can be prefect so there will always be people with weapons that should not have them.  Outright gun bans is not the answer, or I don't believe it is. 

People do stupid things all the time and we cannot make enough laws to prevent people from doing stupid things.  We can, and have, done things to make the stupid things people do less harmful to themselves and others and we will continue to do so. 

But along with that we have to take upon ourselves a degree of responsibility.  People sued the theater because they banned handguns so victims felt the theater owned them a greater degree of protection.  But the victims forgot personal responsibility.  If they felt unconfortable about the gun bans they should have not gone to the theater or they could have demanded the theater provide them with the level of security they felt they deserved.  But to claim the theater was at fault after the incident is too late and benefits no one and is not going to fix or solve any problems. 

No one wants to live in an environment of security cameras, metal detectors, and body searches.  If we give up our freedoms for safety then we have neither safety nor freedom.  There are risks in being free and there are costs in maintaining that freedom. 

Responsible people thinks of all the consequences before deciding on a course of action.  I believe a well thought out response is due this matter as well.    

Taxes rise, but it could have been worse

The Yahoo headline read "Taxes rise but it could have been worse".  I agree.  We could have elected Obama to four more years.  Oh, that's right.  He was relected. 

At least we had good news from the stock market this week,, especially today.  As of this point in time, the stock market has risen over 300 points. Maybe I'll recoup some of that money I lost last week.  I just wish people would stop investing and selling based on their emotions (at least the reasons given for huge swings in the market place are reported to be based on emotions). 

Logic would dictate less volitilty in buy/sell reactions. The only reason to sell at a loss is if one really needed the money.  If the stock was a bad buy or is becoming a bad but why would anyone else purchase it?

New business in Randleman

I stopped in the newest business in Randleman and I liked what I saw.  The store is in what was part of the old CVS in the former Lowes Food shopping center.  Lowes Food's place is being remodeled for a church but that will be months in the redoing.  Hopefully the addition of the church will be a boost to Sunshine Pets.  They have a really nice aquarium setup, the store is clean and bright, and the owner is cheerful and friendly. 

I purchased a cat toy from them and come this spring I'll provide them with some pond fish and some pond plants. 

Pet stores are expensive to set up and are a tough business, especially with all the new megastores and Walmart but if the prices are anywhere in the neighborhood of my budget I prefer to to business with the small family owned businesses.