Damage Report

We've been home a few days now, it's hard to get back in the swing of things. While I was at the feast I was a bit worried about what damage Hurricane Wilma would cause to my house. I even considered coming home to board up the windows, but no. I prayed about it and decided to leave it in God's hands. We weren't in the direct path but they were forecasting 50 to 60 mph winds and I left all the chairs and plants outside. I watched the radar on the internet carefully and saw some massive red returns right over our town.

Well, I was right not to worry too much about it. It looked as if nothing happened at all when we got home. James had a little red car he rides on in the yard - still in the same place. All the chairs on the porch and deck - same place. There were a few dead, broken tree branches and the garbage cans moved about ten feet. That's all. It even looks like the power stayed on because my clock still had the right time.

Next time I'm away during hurricane season I think I will take normal hurricane precautions so I will not even have to think about going back.

The surf covered this spot yesterday. A lot of shells left behind, mostly broken.

We took a ride and ended up in Navarre. The area is not as built up yet and what was there was damaged by hurricanes last year. You can see the red flag for the dangerous surf but there are still a lot of people on the beach, more than we've been seeing on Okaloosa Island.

The end of a beautiful day.

The hurricane is really kicking up the surf, even though it is still down by the Yucatan. I'd hate to be here for a direct hit.

Sunset in Destin.

We went on a dolphin sightseeing cruise yesterday. The seagulls were flying along with the boat looking for handouts. Fort Walton Beach and Destin are beautiful.

I am in Fort Walton beach, Florida and this is the view. Like? We drove up yesterday to attend the Feast of Tabernacles.

This morning the garbage man knocked on my door to tell me he hit my mailbox. I don't know what the problem is but it seems everybody hits my mailbox. I told him thanks for telling me but don't worry about it. I'll bang it back into shape and this time I think I'll paint a target on it.

This is Funny

Republican Women Vs. Democrat Women

What's This About?

I can't do it on command and I don't know if it's just me or it's something everyone experiences sometimes - it's just weird. I could be driving down the road, listening to the radio and I'll see a sign or a billboard or something, read it, and at the same time as I read a word someone on the radio will say the same word. Sometimes it happens alot, sometimes I don't notice it for a while.

This evening I was using a calculator (an adding machine) and I punched in the number 1495 at the exact same time a television commercial was on and the man said 1495 (as in "only $14.95 a month). I was adding a column of numbers, it didn't come from my head, but I punched in those numbers at exactly the same time he said them.

I don't know what to make of it. It's a pretty much useless thing to have happen. It's not like knowing lottery numbers in advance or something.

Mychal Massie Tells It Like It Is

'Ugly is as ugly does'

There is nothing that separates the ugliness of the Ku Klux Klan, white supremacist groups, Elaine Harrington, Julian Bond, those who gathered in Atlanta for Jesse Jackson's hate fest, the reprehensible attacks directed at the president by the NAACP leadership at their national convention held in Philadelphia or that of Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas.

And that's the truth.

Watch That First Step ... It's A Doozy

And you can't go back.

Meth Lab May Have Caused Explosion At St. Cloud Condo.

I can get my mind around why someone might want to make and sell Meth - for the quick money. But I cannot understand for the life of me why anyone would ever take Meth. I get people who come to the hotel sometimes and I stand there looking at a skeleton, looking 30 or 40 years older than they should, bad teeth, no job, no home - and they show me their I.D. and they actually look good in the picture. What a shame to throw away their life. No matter how bad it may have been it was light years better than what Meth did to them. Light years.

Don't Ever Forget This

From 'Michael & Me'

In other words, the police aren't there to protect average citizens. It happens sometimes. There are brave police officers who put their lives on the line for strangers. They are to be applauded. But that is not the everyday occurrence you might imagine. Most police work occurs after the fact. Most responses are post-victimization. And, frankly, most of my contact with police these days occurs after I see red lights flashing in my rearview mirror.

For most people, the only time they come in contact with the police, it's a negative experience - and a costly one. It shouldn't be that way.

This morning when I got home there was a rabbit hopping around the yard. A white rabbit. When I walked toward it, it was not afraid (Why is the rabbit unafraid? 'Cause he's smarter than the panther). Anyway, it wouldn't let me get too close. He kept moving off, slowly. I got a carrot and tried to lure him with it and it worked like a charm. He came right up to me and started eating. I petted his head. He let me just pick it up, no problem but, now what? I put him in an empty 20 gallon tank. I was pretty sure the rabbit belonged to Cyndal down the road. I fed him and watered him and walked over to ask them and sure enough, it was hers. James helped me carry him over to her house. Now James wants a rabbit.

This is where some crazy guy shot a shotgun into the floor of his hotel room. No one heard it.

He shot twice. This one into the safe and wall.

Perspective

Not to minimize the hurricanes and the damage they caused but compared to the earthquake in Pakistan, we got off easy. I don't believe America has ever seen destruction on that scale.

Crazy People

There seems to be no end to the supply.

Shortly after I got to work tonight, we heard a loud noise and some cursing outside so we went out to investigate. There were four people out there. Two were walking away, toward the road and it seems they were fighting, the source of the noise. They were leaving, fine. Walking towards me is an old, drunk guy, carrying a dirty, broken styrofoam box - he said something about the couple walking away, I didn't quite make it out. My coworker recognized him, he was drunk when he checked in. He went quietly towards his room.

Coming up behind him, about fifty feet or so, is a younger guy carrying a few packages of, what else, beer. He was walking in the middle of the parking lot just inside the entrance of the hotel. As I was watching him his packages started moving, he started juggling a can but it fell. Then another, and another. Then they all came tumbling down, spilling onto the parking lot. It was like watching a Laurel and Hardy episode. I couldn't stop laughing at how it happened, I had to go inside so he wouldn't hear me.

He started picking everything up but then he just sat down among all the cans. He was just sitting there, if I didn't know better I would have thought he fell and got hurt. I felt bad now. I looked for a large box to bring out to him but he managed to pick everything up. He walked toward the back and met up with the old, drunk guy. I walked back to make sure they were OK. They got in the room OK but not before dropping more beer cans and leaving about six broken cans in the parking lot. I picked them up and threw them away. One wasn't broken. I smelled like beer.

Meanwhile, back in the lobby, my coworker said something about a shotgun blast in one of the rooms. What? I didn't hear about this. Sometime in the past few days, one of our guests blew a whole in the wall with a shotgun. Nobody heard, or at least reported, the noise. I had to see that. The blast hit the safe first, putting a deep, long dent in the heavy metal, then went on (luckily) into a outside wall. Of course, the guest had checked out by the time the hotel noticed. A police report was made.

I don't have my camera to take a picture of it and I'm off Friday night. I will bring my camera Saturday night and hopefully they won't fix the room before then. I want a picture of that.

To top it off, a hotel down the road was robbed at gunpoint Thursday morning at 6:15am.

Oh what fun.

OK ... but, Why?

Man Wins Award for Creating Fake Dog Testicles

Miller has sold more than 150,000 of his Neuticles, more than doubling his $500,000 investment. The silicone implants come in different sizes, shapes, weights and degrees of firmness.

I'll take the large, firm model, please.

Washington, Too

For a baseball park. Landowners must yield to ballpark

The District will begin using eminent domain to acquire parcels of land at the site of the Washington Nationals' ballpark by the end of this month, after unsuccessful negotiations with nearly half of the landowners.

Baseball. Stealing. How apropos.

Another One

This one in New Jersey.

Union Twp. moves to seize land, give supporter building rights

They want to steal the land from one developer who legally bought the land to develop condos and give it to another developer who intends the same thing.

On May 21, Albert G. Mauti Jr. and his cousin Joseph hosted a fundraiser for Assemblyman Joseph Cryan at the Westmount Country Club in Passaic County. The two developers and family members picked up the $10,400 dinner tab, donated another $8,000 and raised more than $70,000 that night for the powerful Union County Democrat, according to state election records.

Three days later, the governing body in Cryan's hometown of Union Township -- all Democrats -- introduced an ordinance paving the way for the Mautis to build 90 or so townhouses on six acres of abandoned industrial land along the Conrail line in town.

There is just one problem: Union Township doesn't own the land.

It is owned by Carol Segal, a 65-year-old retired electrical engineer. Over the past 10 years, the Union Township resident says, he has spent about $1.5 million to acquire the property, and he, too, wants to build townhouses there.

Segal said he met with Cryan, who is head of the township's Democratic Party, and other local officials "scores of times" over the past five years to discuss the project. He claims the talks turned adversarial after he rejected proposals to work with various developers they proposed.

On May 24, the five-member township committee voted unanimously to authorize the municipality to seize Segal's land through eminent domain and name its own developer.

"They want to steal my land," Segal said. "What right do they have when I intend to do the exact same thing they want to do with my property?"

I don't care if the Supreme Court says it's OK or not - the government is stealing this land at the point of a gun, it's no different. The government has the guns to force you to do what it wants. It's WRONG.

That's Gotta Hurt!

13-Foot Python Dies While Trying To Eat 6-Foot Alligator

The snake apparently tried to swallow the gator whole -- and then exploded. Scientists stumbled upon the gory remains last week.

Someone Wants Your Home

Florida City wants to steal the land of 6000 of it's residents.

"Now eminent domain is affecting people who never had to deal with it before and who have political connections," Mr. Brown said. "But if we don't use this power, cities will die."

Well, whats wrong with cities dying? Cities have a "basic right" to life but babies don't? Cities come and sometimes they go. So what? Our government is out of control.

The Kelo v. City of New London is perhaps the 2nd worst decision made by the Supreme Court, topped only by Roe v. Wade. Both decisions marked a major decline by our courts in the sense of right and wrong, a darkening of national conscience.

"They always think economic redevelopment will bring more joy than what is there now," she said. "Once someone can be replaced so something more expensive can go where they were, every home and business in the country is subject to taking by someone else."

You may be next.

And justice is driven back, and justice stands afar off; for truth has fallen in the street, and right cannot enter. Isaiah 59:14