Blog-B-Gone

Thanks for stopping by.  I've moved to www.phelonyjones.blogspot.com

Home of the original....Me and Misses Jones

Haiti...and that Rascally Pat Robertson.

Haiti is going to need our support and prayers for a long time. Haiti doesn't have the structure and infrastructure that you and I are accustomed to - it does not operate the same way. The world will have expectations about how quickly and thoroughly it should recover, but it's not going to meet them. Everyone needs to be prepared for that.

In the middle of all of this, Pat Robertson made a statement that helps nothing and nobody. I think it was out of line, and not consistent with the beliefs of the majority of Christians. In the midst of catastrophe, you help. The Christian example is compassion: feeding the hungry, clothing the naked. When I hear things like this, my first thought is to say "but this is NOT the way most Christians think". That's not us. Which can be interpreted as throwing him under the bus. It's rebuke, which is very different.

God knows exactly how to challenge us so that we develop as people and in our faith. We get comfortable, complacent, and we forget the basics very quickly. And plenty of garbage and other obstacles get thrown in our path for us to climb over. We have to ask ourselves in this and all challenging situations ...how bad do we want it? We're willing to jump hurdles and pave ways when we are going to get a promotion, a raise, a contract.... but how hard will we try, and how far will we go when we will receive nothing in return?

I admit that I struggle with it. Which isn't helped by being so far away, and having very little to send there.

Ante Up! Sesame Street Edition

We now take a break from our regularly scheduled program with something for everyone. Seriously, this is the funniest thing I have seen in a LONG time!!!

Caption This - Rubbernecking Edition

Always be on your best behavior, even when nobody's watching.

United Airlines Breaks Guitars

Revisionist History: Founding Fathers Version

Shamelessly stolen from the Cavemen, who stole it from Acts of the Apostasy.

Unfortunately, this really IS what our children are being taught... if they're even lucky enough to hear the words "founding fathers".

And yes, this IS what you liberals think of this country.

Go somewhere else and f THAT place up, instead.

Confirmation

Today, I recieved the sacrament of Confirmation in the old Catholic rite. We had candidates as young as 11 years old, and some that I would estimate in their mid-50s. We had 60 candidates, in all, from the surrounding states.

You may have seen the bumper sticker that reads: "I'd travel 500 miles for the Latin Mass".

Confirmation is a sacrament that I believe I put off for many years, and my reasons aren't very well articulated. There are times when I regret not being confirmed when I was younger. But I was ready now. Maybe at the heart of it, I wished that I had been ready, sooner.

Bishop Callahan was there to do the confirmations.

I'd like to thank my sponsor, and everyone who was there today in support, and those who could not make it yet still expressed their support. This was a big step in faith and everything was just right.

One of my girlfriends said afterward, "congratulations! you're a man today!".

Which is kind of true. I chose the Confirmation name of Michael. As in "Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle". I can use the help :)

Iran Election: For an interesting read....

Check out the hashtags #gr88 and #iranians. #iranelection is being monitored by their government.

One person I found this morning:
http://twitter.com/Change_for_Iran

Slowest Day Ever

Today, I feel a little bit like our friend the Blobfish. Only a lot sexier. Now, is it me, or is anyone else rather disturbed by the nature of the Blobfish? It has a face. Look at that eye contact in photo #2!

If They Lower The Amount Of Nicotine In Cigarettes

Doesn't that mean that people will buy more cigarettes, and smoke more of them? Doesn't that mean more cancer and other smoking-related illnesses and deaths from all of the fillers?

More tax revenue, more population control? More control?

Sounds like a plan, if you ask me.

Caption This

Be civil.

Thoughts on D-Day Coverage

I'm watching snippets of coverage of Obama et al in Normandy. Military band music is playing. It's very poignant and somber. And to those who have died for our freedom from tyranny and fascism, which ended up being an easy victory here in America, I say aloud, "I'm sorry, guys".

New Word for the Day: Astroturfing

What About Our Daughters has an interesting post this morning.  I really like this blogger, she's done many posts focused on the cultural hitjob of the Black woman's mind and well being.  Most recently, she did a three part series on Essence magazine's "new normal" for Black women and the best they can expect to get out of life.  I admire her for standing up and saying that the absurd is NOT the norm, regardless of how many media outlets push it.  Coincidentally, she was recently attacked by a media outlet. And I have seen this behavior on other newsblogs.  Heck, just read the comments over at CNN on Sarah Palin's most recent speech on the blatant wave of control the government is trying to exert.  You will see the most vicious skewering of an American citizen, you thought you'd never see.  It should give everyone pause.

From WAOD, the definition of Astroturfing:

"What I do not admire are deceitful, insecure, cowardly, duplicitous, dishonorable, unprofessional, neurotic employees of one of the largest media companies in the world PRETENDING to be someone else by using a pseudonym and a FAKE email address to try to defame me on MY OWN BLOG in the comments section I PAID FOR and have the audacity to do so from said LARGEST MEDIA COMPANY IN THE WORLD’S COMPUTER NETWORK! I believe its called ASTROTURFING:

Astroturfing is a word in English describing formal political, advertising, or public relations campaigns seeking to create the impression of being spontaneous “grassroots” behavior, hence the reference to the artificial grass, AstroTurf.
The goal of such a campaign is to disguise the efforts of a political or commercial entity as an independent public reaction to some political entity—a politician, political group, product, service or event. Astroturfing may be undertaken by an individual pushing a personal agenda or highly organized professional groups with financial backing from large corporations, non-profits, or activist organizations."

Read the rest over at her blog. Unfortunately, I'm afraid that astroturfing is the New Norm of the left, the media, and those who try to control our impressions. The media is much more powerful than we think, and we have given them that power.

Hang in there, WAOD. You are right, they are wrong.

Come And Take It

Yeah sure, there are higher spending priorities on my list right now...

...but then again, maybe not.

"I am Geddy Lee, and I will do whatever I want!"

Love me some Rush... and South Park...

So I called Mexico last week...

...they didn't have a prompt of "press 2 for English".

Conspiracy Corner: Paula Abdul is responsible for Danny Gokey's demise!

Why?

Because Terrence Trent D'Arby SUCKS.  She picked a lousy song for him.  Cool to her as a cougar, but not so much to tweens and the rest of the nation.

Turkey Time!

This weekend, Mr. Jones is taking me turkey hunting.  I've got my gear, heck I've even got my rear in gear.  However, I still don't have a lot of experience with the bird barrel or turkey loads.  So, my friends, this is going to be a long shot.  I'll take my camera with me though, just in case I get lucky.  I'll leave it up to Jimi to decide whether there's a joke in there somewhere!

Thursday at noon... the junior Mossberg 500 is going into the car and off we go....

Yes, My Yahoo Account Was Hijacked

Sorry everyone, I don't know how it happened. I apologize for the disruption.

Chivalry Win

Tomorrow, my friends, I switch to decaf. It's time. And I think everyone "knows" when it's time to switch to decaf. It's not just that you're tweaked up.... but burnt out.

But all throughout this rather tough day today, this particular funny has been tickling my funny bone. There are so many funny things about this picture. If we was in the dennists office, this would be the Highlights magazine of lols ;) Click on pic for full size....

A Painful Lack of Reverence

I have the feeling that this is going to be a long post. But stick with me, there is a moral to the story.


Bleeeaaaaahlhhhhh....

Believe it or not, that last line took me about five minutes to write. Why? Well today I attended my nephew's first communion. It should have been a beautiful occasion, and I'm sure it was to a majority of people who were there, although many of them shouldn't have been anywhere near a church. Some people should just stay away. Yeah, I said it.

If you don't read this blog very often, or it's your first time here, I returned to the Catholic Church about a year and a half ago. However, I returned via the traditional Latin mass or TLM. The Catholic Church before it was radically dismantled in 1962. I never quite liked growing up in the new and improved Catholic church, and it's very painful for me to say that. All that time I didn't even know why I didn't like it, but I didn't. But when I returned to the Catholicism of my ancestors, I experienced and continue to experience the true joy and reverence of God.

Without making this too long, here are the bullet points of what I observed today that has been stuck under my skin:

- the sheer volume of gabbing prior to mass - and even during mass
- When I sat down at my pew, I kneeled down to pray, which I do before every mass. To my surprise, I got looks from people.
- I was also hoping to be able to go to confession before mass. That's also customary in the TLM as needed. As I looked around for an usher, I saw one man, leaning on the wall at the back of the church, reading. So I inquired, "is confession available before mass?". He looked at me like I was from another plant. He started leafing through the bulletin, and said "I'm not sure we even offer that anymore". !!!!!! I should have asked him if someone would make it available to me.
- As I sat at the pew, waiting for the service to start, I could very audibly hear people saying very casually, "oh my God!!!" Who takes the Lord's name in vain, in his own house????
- All throughout the service, people talked. And audibly. The two ladies in front of my Dad and I were having a straight up conversation.
- There is kneeling in the Catholic church. I'd say half of the people were kneeling at the appropriate times.
- At communion time, the chatty lady in front of us said to the girl next to her, "no I'm not going up, I'm Protestant". Now, there is nothing wrong with being Protestant, but the way she said it was in a way that dismissed the little girl's going up for Communion.

Half the time, I was looking to my father in disbelief. I could hardly believe the behavior I was seeing. No reverence, no respect, no nothing.

And as long as I'm ranting, I'll make it much worse.

Altar girls. Lay people distributing communion. And my ex-sister in law later saying, "I went to communion for the first time today".

WTF??????

But in all of this, I had one very beautiful shining moment.

The service was attended by a Monsignor who was (I think they said), the oldest in the diocese. After mass, I went to find him. There are many good priests, but I have an affinity for the faithful Old Timers. When I found him, I introduced myself, and he took my hand as I talked with him. There is a very specific look of someone who is at least, let's say, 98 years old. This is a man who has lived a long time, and has probably witnessed many events on the human spectrucm. I asked him if he would please bless my Rosary. I can't recall his exact words, but he was a very pleasant and kind person...he said something to the effect of, "why, I would love to."

As he blessed it, I could focus on nothing but the glow of the pearls in his small hands. At that moment, I heard nothing else in the room. It all fell away. And he blessed it in latin...

He handed it back to me and said, "I broke mine the other evening". And I replied, "you must have been praying very hard."

Through all of that today, it made me realize one thing. In all of the chaos around us, you have to stay faithful to what you know to be true and right.

And... you have to create moments of grace, they won't simply find you.

Retro Canape Party

Yawls, I almost forgot to share a picture from earlier this week. Your gracious host, Miss Jones, held a retro canape party among her female frethren. Deekawife 3.0 was unfortunately unable to attend, but next time, we shall attempt to tempt her with an abundance of bacon-wrapped waterchestnuts. Sorry fellas, it's ladies only!


From near to far... of course one must have crudites to balance out the abundance of protein, spice gumdrops, jello mold with fruit cocktail, deviled eggs, chive cream cheese filled black olives, ham rollups, and bacon wrapped waterchestnuts. Oh, also I decided to display a sample of my classic cooking pamphlets from back in the day. We used these all the time when I was growing up. Oh, the table, which is the convertible table, is for sale now. It'll be on Ebay within the next day, with bidding starting at $199. And yes, it's totally that awesome :)

The movie for the evening? Breakfast at Tiffany's. What would you 'spect?

And we're all too old for pillow fights. Sorry fellas!

Stevia. THAT Didn't Work

Okay dahlings. I know you are all out there workin' hard and breaking a sweat for bathing suit season. Which isn't what it used to be but I digress (actually, it isn't what it used to be primarily because I was 24 oh-so-many years ago).

So back to the matter at hand. The leaves are starting to bud on the trees and it's time to shed those winter pounds. I've been working at this for a while, and despite hundreds of situps weekly, I am looking more like Grimace than Jessica Rabbit. Whyfor? Nothing was really outside of the norm.... no more cans of reddi wip, no diet coke, pie crust, or other goodies. I have been settled nicely at 1300 calories a day plus exercise. It always works, never fails.

....cue the surprised gopher music.....



Instead of sugar, or any other artificial sweetener.... I was using Stevia a few times a day. Stevia is an "herbal" or "natural" calorie free sweetener. And of course if it's natural or organic or whatever, it's supposed to be (morally) superior.

Yet here I sit, with an enlarged belly, googling "stevia abdomen". I didn't find many, but I did find some hits that fit my search and quest. Even one that detailed an experiment on baby chicks, denoting increased abdominal fat, in particular.

So this is my speculation: Stevia gave me a gut within a matter of a couple of weeks. I'm going to throw it out and start over with the same diet approach, sans Stevia. We'll see how I'm doing in a couple of weeks, once we're at a firm 70 degrees during the day.

And further... no, there is no substitute for sugar, if you're going to eat it.

Caption This: Janet Napolitano

Tawk amongst yahselfs. I'll give you a topic:

Message to the People's Republic of Obama

Day after day...

"Everything's fine. Everything's fine. Everything's fine."

Simple Truths Conveyed Simply

Gather 'round everyone, it's cartoon time! Now, those of you who are conservatives, sit back a little bit and let the liberal kids have the front row. After all, you big kids know how this one ends :)

H/T to Another Black Conservative

Well, this is an interesting bit of info about "The Flu"

Here at the Confidentials, my point is not to tell you what to think. My approach is to give you food for thought. Now, I know that thought is being bred out of our culture in favor of being told what to think, what to do, but I'm not budging from the basics. Case in point is that we now indoctrinate instead of educate children and some adults so that they are primed to simply swallow what they're told as long as it's delivered with fear, but I digress.

I thought it was relatively odd that Swine flu made a jump so quickly, while other animal flus are still years away from person to person contact. Turns out that Drudge might have had the same thought. He linked us to a little CDC flashback: check it out here.

Another Side of Abu Ghriab?

While eating my recessionary lunch of tuna salad, dill and capers, I came across quite a gem over at the Lair of the Catholic Cavemen. And from time to time, a post is so good, that I'll re-post the whole post. Hopefully the Lady and Gentlemen of the LOTCC will not mind.

So in reposting this I ask, how many times have you heard about the original usage of Abu Ghriab?

The Other Abu Ghraib
Bad Americans... BAD AMERICANS!

There are two wings to Abu Ghraib prison. In one wing, American personnel humiliated Iraqi prisoners by putting them on dog leashes, etc. In another wing, Saddam Hussein's son beheaded women, etc.

Which wing are you more familiar with?

The Defeatocrats and their propaganda machine (aka: MSNBC, CNN, The New York Times, NPR, etc.) are yet again resurrecting Abu Ghraib prison and all the "torture" that took place there. But here's the rub... which wing do you think their hypocritical rage is aimed at? (By the way, should I even bring up Nancy Pelosi knowing/not knowing about waterboarding?)

Here's some of the article from WND.com from back in 2004; (Emphasis mine)

One journalist present was New York Post's Washington bureau chief Deborah Orin, who wrote of "savage scenes of decapitation, fingers chopped off one by one, tongues hacked out with a razor blade – all while victims shriek in pain and the thugs chant Saddam's praises."

Noting that "Saddam's henchmen took the videos as newsreels to document their deeds in honor of their leader," Orin added, "but these awful images didn't show up on American TV news."

The following, according to the State Department report, were routine in Iraq during Saddam Hussein's rule:

- Medical experimentation

- Beatings

- Crucifixion

- Hammering nails into the fingers and hands

- Amputating sex organs or breasts with an electric carving knife

- Spraying insecticides into a victim's eyes

- Branding with a hot iron

- Committing rape while the victim's spouse is forced to watch

- Pouring boiling water into the victim's rectum

- Nailing the tongue to a wooden board

- Extracting teeth with pliers

- Using bees and scorpions to sting naked children in front of their parents

Saddam also routinely tortured and murdered women. The daily newspaper Babel, owned by Uday, Hussein's eldest son, contained a public admission on Feb. 13, 2001 of beheading women who were suspected of prostitution.

Let me ask you again... which wing of Abu Ghraib are you more familiar with?

If that doesn't infuriate you, then facts truly do not matter to you. I'll keep you in my prayers either way.

Stolen from Dad29, Who Stole it from Owen

I'm going to try to find said shirt.

UPDATE: Didn't take too long, did it? Women's and Men's T-Shirts here

Founding Bloggers Report

This is a must-see wrap up of the Tea Parties, including the CNN footage.

But you really, really have to fast forward to 7:00. I've seen other accounts like this on Youtube and on TV. And I think we should take a tip from Ronald Reagan: "Don't be afraid to see what you see"

See the rest of the report at Founding Bloggers