Reclaiming the Family – Part 4 – Celebrating the Holidays Right

Thanksgiving and Christmas have always been a time when Americans get together with family and give thanks for the good things in their lives.  For Christians this is a holy season when they contemplate the beauty of the Holy Family and its Christmas story.  But even for non-Christians and even those with no faith there is a recognition by many that this celebration seems to radiate joy and hope to those involved.  I can remember a few truly awful human beings who, even if for a short period around the holidays, were noticeably better people because of Christmas.  Even scientists have lately come to think that belief in God is organically present in the human mind.  And for those of us who were brought up during the happier periods before the Progressives destroyed the culture, the celebration of Thanksgiving and Christmas brings back thoughts and feelings of happiness and a sense of community that even found its way into Hollywood films and television shows of the time.  But just because the culture has descended into a depravity that derides or ignores the true spirit of these holidays there’s no reason for us to go along with it.

Thanksgiving and Christmas are two of the biggest chances to reconnect with your family.  You’ve got at least a few days off and the kids and grandkids are off from school.  Here’s a chance to talk to the kids about things that are important to you and find out what’s going on in their lives.  And for you older folks like me I’m also talking about your grown children and their husbands and wives.  Ask them about their kids and what is going on in their lives.  And if you have the means, ask them if they could use a few bucks or even a hand with some problem they are having.

And turn off the damn phones and shut off the computers.  It won’t kill anybody to lose track of all the nonsense we are plugged into 24/7/365.  And turn off the television.  There’s literally nothing on that won’t damage your brain and soul.  The only exception I’ll make is if you will pick a good Christmas movie (preferably black and white) or two to watch with the kids.  But once it’s over shut the tv and hide the remote.

Have some fun things to do together.  One of the things we like to do is play cards.  The kids play war and Uno and the rest of us play penny ante poker.  It’s basically just an excuse to sit around a table together and talk and interact.  And, believe it or not, in my family the women even bond over the cooking and doing the dishes.  I’m not saying they enjoy the dishes but it’s something they complain about together and provides a stimulating male/female antagonism that everybody enjoys.  But maybe that’s just my family.  But at the very least show appreciation for the hard work that went into the dinner and praise it to the sky.  That’s a sacred duty.

Go to a Mass at your church if you’re religious and even if you’re not put on some good Christmas music but please try to avoid any of the current crop of pop celebrities.  If you have more than a day off then plan something bigger.  If you know of a holiday show or a good play look into it and see if anyone would like to go.  Go ice skating or skiing if that’s your thing.  Or go for a walk in the country if the weather permits.  Just make sure you talk with every single one in your family and make some kind of connection.  Make some memories.  Sure, you’ll get them their favorite toy or gadget but make it more than that.  Tell them what you like about the holidays and find out what would make it more fun for them.

And something that brings family together is stories about your extended family and the world that used to exist in the better times.  Sometimes old photographs and other memorabilia are interesting to the kids and grandkids.  Hearing about how their ancestors overcame the difficulties they experienced and how the families pulled together is a good example for the kids and encouraging even for us.  Celebrate these great holidays.  It’s your privilege and it’s your duty.

 

11DEC2019 – OCF Update

I didn’t post anything extra yesterday or today, just the Photo and Quote of the Day, because all the action was Monday.  All the rest is the spin going back and forth and honestly I’ve grown bored with that.  When Durham does something then I’ll remark on that.  As far as the impeachment jazz, ho-hum.

And I guess we’ll all have to wait for tomorrow for Boris and the Brexit election results.  Looks like he’ll win the day whether it’s a 28 seats or 68 seats majority, it’s more than enough to finish off Brexit.  If he still fails then it will reinforce the far right’s conspiracy theories.  But I am convinced Boris will get it done.  He may finesse a few things because he isn’t a social conservative but he will cut the cord with the EU.

As far as the Dem primary, there hasn’t been anything funny enough to mock lately.  But I’m sure it will errupt soon so hang in there for that.  I’ll start doing some Christmas stuff soon becuase I enjoy that.  And some more reviews and of course Star Trek continues.

So pardon the lull but I just don’t want to say the same things over and over.

08DEC2019 – OCF Update

This Thursday, 12DEC2019, is the British General Election.  Currently, the Tories are way ahead of Labour in the polls but the smaller parties will come into play if the Tories can’t get an overall majority.  But at least this week, finally we’ll know if Brexit will actually happen.

Tomorrow is supposed to be the IG’s report on Russiagate.  We’ve been told that it will be a nothing burger.  If that is the case it will make liars out of several of the sources we heard from last month.  Anyway, it’s about time it finally ends.  Durham better have something real and have it real soon.

The Pelosi Psychiatric Facility will be performing their Impeachment Follies next week also.  Meh.

Lots of stuff going on, hopefully lots of laughs.  Stay tuned.

 

The Alice in Wonderland Election

Four years ago, Michael Anton named the 2016 presidential election the Flight 93 Election.  The analogy was that voting for Donald Trump was the equivalent of storming the cockpit to attempt to stop the Democrats (and Republicans) from hijacking and crashing the Unites States of America.

Unexpectedly it worked.  And over the last few years we have seen just how apt the Flight 93 metaphor was.  But we have moved well beyond the analogy because although we may have wrested the cockpit out of the hands of the terrorists, the plane is still taking anti-aircraft fire from enemy forces on the ground.

Well, enough of that metaphor.  Let’s try a new one.  A few days ago I reviewed the current state of the Democrat Presidential Primary and I declared that the only way they could get me to watch them was if I thought I’d get a laugh out of it.  Creepy Uncle Joe could get me to listen to his Tales of Corn Pop or watch him bite his wife’s hand but I wasn’t interested anymore in watching their boring debates or commercials.

But on closer inspection I think maybe boring is the wrong word.  I think the correct word is painful.

Let me elaborate.  When Liarwatha or Bernie starts yammering about the Green New Deal or Medicaid for All, the disconnection from reality is actually painful to listen to.  A sane listener experiences a jarring cognitive dissonance.  It’s like someone is scratching his fingernails across a chalkboard or when you bite down on a sore tooth.  So, it would take quite a bit to get me to listen to this stuff again.

And the same thing occurred when the Schiff gang began their little sitcom around impeachment.  Listening to Pelosi’s minions pretending to be Watergate investigators is just too tedious and nonsensical to follow for more than a minute or two at a time.  One of my friends sent me a link to the testimony Jonathan Turley gave at the hearings.  He is the one “expert” that wasn’t an obvious hack trying to legitimize the Schiff kangaroo court.  I listened to his measured and balanced discussion of what kind of presidential actions would and would not amount to an impeachable offense.  I found him credible.  But I also realized that he would not influence opinion one way or another.  Forty percent of the country would agree with him, another forty percent would call him a liar and the last Twenty Percent would be “unsure.”  The needle wouldn’t even twitch.  So why should I watch this stuff if it makes no difference at all?  I mean I think it’s good for our side to put their side of the story out there to make sure the Twenty Percent hears both sides of the story but for me and my readers there’s no new information provided.

Which brings me back to what I was saying the other day.  The only possible reason to watch the Democrats is for entertainment value.  Creepy Uncle Joe or foaming at the mouth commies will have to pull out all the stops if they want me to tune in.  The denizens of the Island of Broken Toys will have to really try to get me to watch.  Maybe a three stooges slap fight between Joe, Petey and Bernie or a hair pulling cat fight between Fauxcahantas and Hillary might get me to view but not much else.  I mean after the Swalwell fart it has all, more or less, been done.

So here we are with a United States Presidential Election going on, hundreds of millions of Americans making up their minds who will wield the most powerful office of the most powerful nation that has ever existed.  The occupant of this office, an office that has as one of its responsibilities deciding whether to launch a thermonuclear strike with the planetary extinction capability of the US nuclear arsenal, will be chosen by this process.  And as the leading opposition candidates for that job we have Creepy Uncle Joe, Liarwatha, Bernie the Stalinist and Butt Pete.  There is no other way to characterize the situation but as a bizarro world scenario.  The classical description is Alice in Wonderland.  We have a normal observer, Alice, confronted by a world where everything is inverted and the normal rules of nature are suspended.  She struggles to cope with the inconsistency and outright madness but finds herself unable to do more than move from one absurdity to the next.  In this analogy no one would try to make sense of the Mad Hatter or the Queen of Hearts.  It would be futile.  Admittedly some people find this amusing but a steady diet of this sort of thing results in the experience I noted at the beginning of this essay, jarring cognitive dissonance.

To my mind the sensible way to address this election is to try and sway the Twenty Percent by highlighting the positive results and agenda of President Trump and exposing the absurd and dangerous positions and bizarre behaviors of his opponents.  This is what the talking heads on the Right need to do.  They need to pound away at Adam Schiff and Nancy Pelosi and the Deep State that handed them this hot mess.  It’s up to Bill Barr and John Durham to connect the dots on what the Russia and Ukraine scandals are really about.  If it turns out that Hunter Biden was part of a bigger payday for the Obama administration then that will cook Joe Biden’s goose for sure.  But even without that I think we’ll see our side prevail in 2020.

For me this though this is not the mission.  I preach to the choir.  There’s no need to bang that drum.  You all know all this.  My job is to provide my opinions and hopefully amuse.  So, I don’t want to bore anyone with logical arguments as to why the Democrats are wrong about this or that policy position.  You all know they’re the enemy.  I don’t have to convince you.  What I need to do is find some interesting things to discuss about the world we live in and make fun of the evil cretins who want to make us Orwellian slaves.  And that’s what I’ll do, I will chronicle the evil, stupid, absurd and insane doings of the Progressives and their allies in the Media and the Deep State.  That is my mission in the Alice in Wonderland Election.  So down the rabbit hole we go.  Hopefully we’ll meet on the outside again after we wake from the nightmare.

 

30NOV2019 – OCF Update

So we’ve survived Thanksgiving and have today and tomorrow to recover sufficiently to stagger back into work on Monday.  Bravo, congratulations!

Looking ahead, The British General Election is a week from Thursday (December 12th) and by all accounts Boris Johnson will get his majority and the Brexit that it’s based on.  Supposedly he has all the Tory candidates sworn to a blood oath to vote for Brexit when they are elected.  As always, wait for the outcome but there may be some very good news for the English people by Christmas.

My article  “Reclaiming the Family – Part 3 – Recruit Grandma and Grandpa” seems to have been well received when I posted it on Tuesday.  I take particular pleasure in this because, from my point of view, advocating for practical and constructive action is greatly preferable to just spouting anger and predicting gloom and doom.  Not that there isn’t plenty to be angry and worried about but if you’re not going to do anything about it then just dig a hole and jump in.  I’ll try to expand the series when I have something useful to add.

Like everyone else I’m waiting impatiently for Durham to show some progress on his investigation.  Your guess is as good as mine on this whole thing.  We’ll just have to wait.

On the 2020 election things seem to be moving in the right direction.  The House is stuck with their impeachment fiasco.  Even the MSM has sort of gotten bored and wandered away from their freak show.  I don’t want to get too positive but it’s starting to look like the 2020 Democratic Presidential Candidate field is barren.  Even if Mrs. Clinton or Mrs. Obama “surprises” us by joining the race I don’t think that it will move the needle much at all.

So between now and Christmas there may be several very interesting stories developing.  Once I recover fully from the several hundred thousand calories I ingested this week I’ll diligently report on and bloviate about what I think they mean.

And of course I’ll faithfully update my Star Trek series.  The schlock shall not dry up.

Stay tuned.

Thanksgiving Message – 2019

How the year does fly.  Another remarkable journey around the sun is almost complete and so of course we get to the two Great Holidays, Thanksgiving and Christmas.  These are the times when we gather together with friends and family and enjoy rich food and good company.  And Thanksgiving is supposed to be the day we count our blessings.

The last couple of years have been happier and more prosperous thanks to President Trump’s policies.  The economy has recovered from the Bush/Obama Depression and a number of his executive actions and judicial selections have given us something to be hopeful about.  The “Resistance” has seemed to reach the point of open absurdity with impeachment now looking like a losing issue for the Democrats instead of the President.

So, all of that is reason to be thankful and I agree it is.  But what I’m most thankful for is that I can see.

I can see through the GOP Establishment in the government and in the press and recognize them as just part of the enemy that we must beat.  They are the ones who have been responsible over and over for snatching defeat out of the jaws of victory and selling us down the river to the Progressives for money.  The Republican politicians did it for the money they get from lobbyists to vote for sending our jobs and industries to China and allowing endless immigrants to replace us.  The Republican Pundits (and judges) sold us out for the right to go to the Left-Wing dinner parties and rub elbows with the Cloud People.

That knowledge is what I’m thankful for.  Now I know who my enemy is and I also know what I have to do to protect me and mine from their agenda.  Donald Trump showed us what it means to be unafraid of being called a deplorable.  If all they can do is call you a racist or misogynist or homophobe or transphobe then we can ignore them and get on with our lives.  We can search out like minded individuals and form our own society.  It won’t be easy or without pain but so what?  What good thing ever is?  And we won’t vote for anymore McCains or Bushes or Romneys.  No more mealy-mouthed losers who call themselves Christians or Conservatives or whatever they want to pretend to be but vote for depravity and defeat.  No more.

This year I took the whole Thanksgiving week off and was able to enjoy time with family and help prepare a little for the feast.  This year we have family from near and far arriving and Camera Girl has risen to the challenge and will have a total of 48 pounds of turkey and two refrigerators full of other mouth-watering delights including cornbread and sausage stuffing, mashed potatoes, turkey gravy, sweet potatoes, candied yams, buttered rolls, buttered corn, cranberry sauce, cranberry jello mold, peas and onions, roasted Brussel sprouts and cranberries and string beans and almonds.  For dessert there will be apple pie, pumpkin pie, cocoanut custard pie, blueberry pie, home-made ricotta cheese cake, ice cream and chocolate covered fruit.  And lots of strong coffee

After that we’ll collapse in the living room and watch Laurel and Hardy in the 1934 movie, “March of the Wooden Soldiers” and the 1939 animated version of, “Gulliver’s Travels.”  Then I’ll spend time playing with my grandchildren and making plans with them for the holidays.

So, tomorrow may not see much in the way of posting unless something earth shaking occurs.

But Happy Thanksgiving to all you folks out there and may you and your family enjoy a feast and a wonderful time.

 

Reclaiming the Family – Part 3 – Recruit Grandma and Grandpa

Reclaiming the Family – Part 1 – Bring Back the Dowry

Reclaiming the Family – Part 2 – The Family Business

At least going back a generation or more a pattern of behavior has become established in the colder areas of the country that once people reach retirement age they head south to Florida or Arizona and live out their days in a retirement community.  And I suppose if you are sufficiently wealthy this would not prevent you from supporting and staying in touch with your descendants back North.

But in today’s world of limited opportunities and constrained resources another choice is to use your retirement and the resources you have accrued to reinforce and enhance your family’s opportunities.  Think about how difficult it is for a family with two working parents to provide the opportunities and attention that their kids need to grow up right.  If they manage to check their kids’ homework and get them to sports practices and games that’s probably taking up their whole free time left over from work and sleep.

Now as touched on earlier in this series it is much to be preferred that children have a stay at home mom to take care of them and make sure they’re staying out of trouble but even then, kids should have a lot more of their family’s time and attention.  For instance, who says a father is the only one who can bring the kids to a baseball game or a museum or a movie.  Why can’t grandpa do that?  And grandma is about a million times better at babysitting babies than a 15-year-old girl who will spend all her time on the phone while the baby sits glued to Sesame Street.

With respect to school work many of the baby boomers are STEM professionals and can not only help out with homework but can provide real world insights to children on what career paths make sense and which are dead ends.  For instance, if one of my grandsons asked me whether he should major in computer science or intersectional gender studies I think I’d be able to give him a very clear answer!

But this is just the tip of the iceberg.  Even the tradition of having the Sunday dinner at Grandma’s house does more for bonding the family than an occasional phone call to Florida provides.  And it may provide the opportunity for a request for financial or other help that otherwise wouldn’t happen.

And what are you sacrificing if you forego the condo in Florida.  Playing shuffleboard with other old people that you don’t even know?  Missing out on skin cancer?  Sure, maybe your arthritis won’t hurt quite as much but don’t forget those alligators that are waiting to pick you off at the mail box.  And how does that stack up against teaching your grandkids how to fly a kite or telling them about the time their great-great grandfather shot it out with armed robbers from the running board of a car.

And there may even be a payback for you besides satisfaction.  When the day comes when you are against it and your time is up maybe there will be someone to shed a tear and say a kind word at your bedside instead of just a text message from up North to say goodbye.

 

17NOV2019 – OCF Update

It’ll be busy at work this week because I’m taking the whole Thanksgiving week off.  But I’ll try to do my part to make OCF an interesting site for my loyal readers.

Of course there is the last installment of ShatnerKhan 1 and the weekly Star Trek episode mockery.

And I’m just dying for some info to come out on Horowitz’s report or John Durham’s investigations.  It might have to wait until Thanksgiving week but I can always hope for something sooner.

I believe we’ll have to wait for the British General election in December for the rest of the Brexit saga but maybe something interesting will surface sooner.

The Fat Man will bring his inimitable review style and cinematic acumen to bear on the recent release of Ford v Ferrari.

I will have something to say about the Sony FE 100 – 400mm f/4.5 – 5.6 GM OSS telephoto lens.  In fact currently all the Photo of the Day selections beginning with the bald eagle today were shot with this lens.  This includes the “macro” dragonfly shots which are actually enormous crops of a much larger image.

I’ll have a review of Sturgill Simpson’s two most recent albums but unfortunately for Country Music fans there’s nothing there to look forward to.

So stay tuned.