well, I am ready to win that MegaMind drawing tomorrow....

so my daughter occasionally messages me while I am at work This in and of itself is a tad weird to me but I have long ago gotten past the fact that both of my children can text me from their iPads... so When Ryles sent me a message saying she could call me,  I was a little skeptical, a bit amused and  incredulous seeing as how their iPads are wifi only and that they didnt have Skype or anything... and that I was pretty sure I hadnt seen voice calls coming from an iPad... to the right is the conversation leading up to the events... after i said "OK" i had a little smirk and continued to work on something at my desk thinking that she wasted her time chasing some goose down a path... when my cell rings... me: "whaaa...???" as I look at my phone and see an 864 number. and seeing as how my phone NEVER rings as no one ever calls me, i was like..."WTF?!?" so... incredulous.. I answer. Ryles:"Hey Daddy!!!!!".... me: "um...hey....." Ryles: "Told ya!!!!".... I am thinking to myself " NO FRAKKIN WAYYYYY!!!!!!" How did she just manage to totally circumvent and fire the first salvo in the You.Don't.Need.A.Cellphone.Battle before I could even see it coming.... AND IT ISNT EVEN A CELL PHONE!!!!!!

... got a chance with I-Man's off weekend from soccer to go down and see Cousin Madison play in her soccer match, as well as see Uncle Wes, Aunt Ashley, Aunt Ellen and Cousin Meredith.... The original intent was for Jessica to get to see her Grandmother but that seemed to fall by the wayside but it was still great to hang out with everyone. I was left thinking on the way home about a bunch of things about how communication works...  I thought about this quote... "If the family were a boat, it would be a canoe that makes no progress unless everyone paddles". -LETTY COTTIN POGREBIN ....

um.. yeah... sometimes discretion IS the better part..... Zielke clued me in on this link about this happening. I can remember a LOT of stuff being yelled out back in the day. But even then, I somehow think the modern day jdwyatt would have thought better of yelling that out...

There was a time for a while that I thought Ryles might never ride a bike. She initially got a bike at the same time as I-Man (seen in this pic as a spec off in the distance, paying no regard to any oncoming traffic having long ago left us behind both physically and mentally) but never wanted to go beyond the training wheel stage... but then suddenly I thought about the fact that one day sooner than we all think she might be in a situation where she needed to at least know how to ride a bike (as we all know, once we learn, it is something that sticks with us)... well, once I was able to scrap together a few pennies from my bonus after the government had taken virtually all of it, I got her a larger size bike, slapped training wheels back on it and i am amazed that it really only took her a week to rid herself of the training wheels and now she is tooling around relatively good. She aint jumping over stuff like I-Man or tooling up steep hills, but at least she has that hurdle behind her now....

I am putting these here as not everyone messes around with Facebook in the family... I-Man and Ryles classes did books this year where they wrote a page and it was printed into a book with the rest of their classmates. Their two classes did different topics.

I-Mans's was a paragraph or two about what they have done so far, I guess. ( I suggest you click on the picture to blow it up larger to read it). Other than they typical 10 year old grammar in writing (because he certainly doesn't talk this way) i found it a bit interesting to actually look into his mind and how he thinks.. a glimpse perhaps. Like I was telling someone else who saw this, it fascinates me that it isnt the iPads or the Call of Duty games or being decent in soccer or wildly successful in school that he thinks of... its visiting the Cherokee reservation over a year ago.. or spending a couple of nights with Nana and Papa in their camper.. or simply being the last man standing in his class at the end of the year.. that he thinks about. Sometimes we forget just how much the simple things are important. I suspect that when you ask Papa about how much money he spent on his camper weighs on him, I bet he doesnt give a crap at the end of the day. But what he thinks about is spending time with his grandchildren, which makes every penny worth it to him. I know that I-Man constantly talks about going to the water park with Grandma upcoming this summer... and I know the costs of the trip wont mean much at all to Grandma... but the memory and time spent will be well worth it....

then you have Ryles... While it has been chronicled that she is perhaps the sharper, more calculating or the twins i at times see a longer range vision with her. She has mentioned a couple of times about being a teacher, which I kinda flippantly disregarded for some reason or another.. but then her class did the dealio where they were writing a letter to themselves in the future. And yes the writing and sentence flow seem to indicate a little more advanced place for her, what struck me more was the actual content and how ironic this all is... she already plans to be in the band... she already plans to be a teacher... i doubt she really knows this, but her parents were in band and aunts and uncles... and grandparents did the music gig... Virtually EVERY female on my side of the family, from my mother, grandmother, great grandmother, numerous aunts, cousins and even uncles were/are ALL school teachers. That she is heading down virtually the same path that so many people ahead of her went is tre interesting... especially since Ryles mother played clarinet, played in band and became teachers... next thing we know is that she will be wearing a long skirt, tall boots and being Drum Major for Easley High...

...funny that tthis mental image of Ryles also makes me visualize I-Man in the same band, up at the top of the stands in the back of the band... with his Contra... dropping peanuts on people at the football games from the top of the stands, constantly dodging trouble (like he does now) yet somehow inexplicably making even better grades than Ryles...

oh.. and another thing... THIS is why people get annoyed when Obama and "Progressives" go on about "spreading the wealth" and making sure no one goes without. This person wins the lottery and thinks she should still get assistance from taxpayers?

 Asked if she had the right to the public assistance money, Clayton answered, "I kind of do. I have no income, and I have bills to pay. I have two houses."

WHAT?!?!?!?

Sooooo...STUPID!!!!.... if you aint got no job,why not use that 500,000 large, build a 150,000 house to green specs, put solar panels on that house and be off the grid completely... what? 300,000 is you do it right? drop 50 on one (or two) cars.... 50 to furnish house completely and get land.... leaving you a 100 grand to sip off of until you can figure out someway to get a steady income of some sorts....

Instead, we are in a culture now and being led by someone who fosters this idea that you will simply be given everything you need. Look.. I have sympathy for those less fortunate or those who have lost jobs, whatever and are trying to make do until they can get their situation righted. I have little to NO sympathy for those who dont even try...who are standing around with their hands out... when I get my bonus every year for the time, effort, knowledge and hard work I have put into making myself earn that bonus, approximately HALF of it is taken in taxes and given to others who havent earned it. And to see this person WIN THE FRAKKIN LOTTERY and still be expecting taxpayers to pay her is why I have NO SYMPATHY at the end of the day....

i am about as tied in to social media, internet, etc as anyone but.. I dont get how we have people who act as if their life comes to an end if they dont have a working phone with them for a day. Yeah... i know... somebody is thinkin that Jerome ALWAYS has his cell/smartphone/mini computer with him and is never truly disconnected from the "grid". But i seriously think that it would not bother me if I had to go without it for a few days. But i saw someone today virtually go postal becasue they would have to go without a phone for... ONE DAY. And this person seemed to be older than me and would certainly remember going out of the house to the store... WITHOUT A CELL PHONE... went to school WITHOUT A CELL PHONE... went to work WITHOUT A CELL PHONE.... went to church WITHOUT A CELL PHONE... went to the movies WITHOUT A CELL PHONE... went to the game WITHOUT A CELL PHONE... went and played videogames at the local Fast Fare WITHOUT A CELL PHONE... oh well, i know. I have turned around and went back home to get my cell that I forgot. But I am fairly confident I could do without it. Now... I would still like to be able to access the web occasionally. But anyways... maybe its because i dont really get ANY phone calls and rarely get text... anyway... this lady was crying because she would not be able to have a phone until Thursday (or so she thought as you can ALWAYS get a phone for 20.00 virtually ANYWHERE) and how would she be able to do her farm or something another....

THIS is why we can't get anybody normal to run for office in this country. This sorta extremist way of thinking is why you have Whackos on the Left and Whackos on the Right dictating who gets to run for office and then policy of people in office. Seriously, who thinks that you are going to find people who can adhere to those qualifications? Because even if you do, you KNOW what is going to happen... the media is going to dig up some random person  you had a couple of beers with 25 years ago who you vaguely remember kissing goodnight yet suddenly is you being the father of her love child... or the picture of you smoking pot at some frat party... or WHATEVER. They will find something on you, be it real or manufactured. Of course, the State GOP party is saying that they dont support this. But I cant help but think that the type of people we need to run for National office will never run in this environment. Hell, why even run for city council if you have loonies screaming foul at every vote that doesnt meet their extremely narrow and unrealistic view points? But I will say this... This is why Bill Clinton would win in a landslide if he could run today. Yeah, he was/is a typical politician but something about him makes you think that he is a somewhat "normal" guy. He's got flaws. He's not perfect. And he aint saying that he is.... but anywho. That aint happening.

and while I think Limbaugh was stupid to have called that lady a s**t, and he should (and has) apologized... and I certainly agree with him at times and dont agree with him at times.... why is it that Liberal commentators and/or donors like Bill Maher arent held to the same standard. Why does he get to call Palin a c**t and a t**t and all get get is chuckles. he gave a MILLION dollars to Obama. Yet I bet you aint going to hear a peep from the same people screaming about Limbaugh condemning Maher, are you?

Strange (to me) that daylight savin' time is coming THIS SUNDAY!!! I am not really a fan of it despite it giving more "daylight". For some reason I havent been able to come to terms with, I find the change unnatural and weird. But I will adjust as we have converted to a country where we spend more time in this altered time than we do outside of it. I feel a lot of my resistance is that when the sun goes down has little to no bearing on my life. Nothing stops with me just because it is dark.. or nothing continues just because it is light. And it is no longer an issue with my kids in regards to getting them to bed at 7:30pm and it still being light outside... One of my first memories is the confusion I had when I was forced to go to bed and it was still bright outside... I didnt understand what was going on....

anyways....

i paid 4 dollars for a gallon of gas today. I only put in 20.00 and at highway drivin I figure to get 300miles...or maybe 225 miles at back/forth to work drivin. As chronicled here before my car gets good gas mileage. But... if this goes to 5 dollars a gallon wont this have a far negative effect on everything? It really ticks me off that out leadership thinks that we should let it get to 8 or 9 dollars a gallon. Its easy to be all "green" andstuff when you havent paid for your own gas in years and will probably NEVER have to pay for gas for the rest of your life... Not everyone lives in the city.