Guard Dog

Did not know that. Soon it will reach the point you can’t get away with anything anymore LOL

Exactly why I liked those the best! The longer, more vague, and more dissembling the answer.the less scrutiny it received from the teachers. Teachers are busy folks they don’t have time to read five paragraph essay answers. As long as you were somewhere in the vicinity of the correct answer and they see the words they’re looking for I found they didn’t read everything Word for Word. Like they say if you can’t dazzle them with brilliance you could always baffle them with BS!

She’s at work now. I’m being a bum watching TV on her couch. But she will be home shortly I’ll have lunch ready and some creative ideas on how we spend our time this afternoon!

I’m not home. I’m in WI. Hurlshot was right!

Me too! Actually that’s true of just about everything I know about the Civil War. Most of what I learned through books are actually visiting historical sites. One of the best books I read about the border war was “three years with Quantrill“. It was an eyewitness account. It’s only telling one side obviously and it’s heavily slanted towards that point of you. Some of the events recounted I am pretty sure it did not happen. But the descriptions of the fighting, conditions, thoughts and motivations of the people make it worth reading.

HOLY F--K it is COLD here. Below freezing in October? Not used to THAT!

The US Civil war was a lot more recent. There are people alive today whose parents and grandparents actually KNEW people alive during the war. So the history is not so far removed as the middle ages. One other note on atrocities. Very often the acts were retribution for previous acts. The Border War between Kansas & Missouri was the worst outside of Sherman's Army of Tennessee. In Sherman's defense they were fighting militia, armed citizens, and regular army most of the way. The worst acts of the Border War were against civilians. The Lawrence Massacre is a commonly held up example. But what people tend to forget is one of the things that led to that was the death of female civilians held as prisoners of war. The military commander of the Kansas forces ordered the arrest and imprisonment of women who were "aiding" Missouri guerillas. The women they imprisoned were wives/family of suspect guerilla fighters. There are numerous and credible eye witness accounts of rape and other abuse of the prisoners by Ewing's soldiers. Ewing was not a military man and had little real control over his troops. It's widely speculated the collapse of the building where the women were held was deliberate to cover up what had happened. I think that is possible and may be likely. Ewing was a politician and a personal friend of the President. There was also Doc Jennison and his "red legs" and their raids into western Missouri. In fact this was depicted in the into to the movie "The Outlaw Josey Wales". And all of that was in response to a three year period where Missouri slave owners tries to "take over" as much of Kansas as possible to prevent it from being admitted as a free state. Bad act followed bad act. No one one in that war had clean hands.

I have given a lot of thought so why the “lost cause“ narrative of the confederacy and the Civil War has taken such deep root. Most of the people who believe it are not bad people. They are not racist nor are they discriminatory. Whatever you might think of their voting habits and the political “team“ that they cheer for they are just regular folks. Because of that it’s uncomfortable to reckon with the fact that their ancestors we’re not good people by our standards. 99% of people are not comfortable with the fact that slavery was a thing. And because of that it’s hard to imagine that your ancestors actually took up arms to keep it being a thing. So they look for reasons and explanations that just sugarcoat the actual history. That makes the actions and the heritage of the time easier to bear or even something to be proud of. And that’s actually what makes it so pernicious. you guys of heard me say this 100 times. Well here’s 101. History should never be buried nor should it be softened. It shouldn’t be explained. It should be presented as a fact. The stories and the narratives that grow up around it to make it more entertaining or easier to deal with should be dismissed. There is a great Internet meme that is misquoting Carl Sagan. But the quote is good so I’m using it here. If something can be destroyed by the truth then it should be.

With regard to war crimes and war criminals in the US Civil War, there was absolutely no shortage of both on either side. there’s no such thing as a clean war but that one was particularly brutal and nasty by Western standards. That was more so true at the end than it was in the beginning. For a couple of reasons. In the first two years of the war both armies were very well led and disciplined by professional and experienced officers. By the third and fourth year of the war a great many of the professional officers and real leaders in both armies had been killed off or otherwise removed from the battlefield. In the last two years it was clear the south had lost and the desperation of fighting on home soil cranked up the bad acts to an all-time high. Neither army thought twice about flying the black flag. And yes US army “atrocities “ against southern civilians were both common, documented, and rarely punished.

It all started when the union attacked Fort Sumter! LOL someone actually tried to tell me that once!

LOL do NOT get me started!

Jan 6 knuckleheads were told beforehand they would be pardoned LOL! The irony of this just drips and it’s so delicious. What have I always said? Do. Not. Trust. The government. Nor anyone in it. how do you know if a politician is lying? They’re saying something. LOL I keep thinking about this and laughing. Imagine a bunch of people who are angry at the government, because they think the government is lying, disrupted the government because somebody in the government told them they could get away with it!

@ComradeYellow

The movie was just "pretty good". Lucy Fry and Debby Ryan made it worth watching.

Bye, Maryland? Lawmakers in 3 Counties Float a Plan to Secede From the State. Nothing will come of this. And that is a shame. I think counties should be free to reorganize themselves into other geographically continuous states by simple referendum if the new state is receptive. The democrats will bleat and screech about "democracy" until the exercise of it diminishes their power and influence. But they would and have act JUST like the Republicans with gerrymandering, voter suppression and intimidation if it is to their benefit. Never forget poll taxes and literacy tests was ALL democrat ideas. And both parties fight like starving sewer rats to keep third party candidates off the ballot. There are no real advocates for democracy in either party. When they say they are they are just shoveling bulls--t and expecting us to eat it with a smile.

150 mph without a driver: Indy autonomous cars gear up for race Please, please tell me the cars are controlled by teenagers with X-Box controllers!

Well I will say this about Biden. His administration has not done anything overtly unconstitutional that I’ve noticed. That’s certainly an upgrade. They don’t appear to know what the hell they’re doing on most anything. So that’s a push. If we can get into the midterm elections without any major legislative accomplishments and at least one house of Congress changes hands I’ll be happy. I don’t really care who wins elections anymore as long as the government is divided I’ll be happy.

Seriously worn out after yesterday’s activities. Today is going to be even worse. Oh well. Putting it off won’t make it easier. Times like this is when I wish I had kids LOL

So we’re the same height and build but you’re “packing” an extra 15k "somewhere"!

I watched “night teeth“ on Netflix last night. It was pretty good. Or at least those two vampire girls were pretty freaking hot together. definitely worth two hours of your time. After all of his acting work I imagine Alfie Allen is going to have a negative association with knives.

Sitting at my kitchen table drinking coffee. Going to be very, very, busy for the next few days. I rented a new storage unit in Dyersburg. Larger, air-conditioned place. More expensive and with better security. I rented a truck from them for two days and I’m going to move all the crap in the one in Covington up there. That’s the plan for today. Tomorrow is really going to suck though. I’m going to have to start packing up things in my house and moving them to the storage unit. The gun safe is the thing I dread the most. It weighs 400 pounds empty.