I dunno about other people... But some videos or films in front of HUGE audiences gives my tummy butterflies, my heart swells with emotion, I seem to empathize with the musicians, the thought of being front of so many people, your fans, overwhelms me with emotion.... One of the first times I really felt this was when I saw Metallica playing in front of 100's of thousands of people (to rumor has it close to a million people)... The immense and intense energy is palpable.... Blows my mind....
Metallica... 1991... Moscow....
Harvester of Sorrow
Metallica
[Verse 1]
My life suffocates
Planting seeds of hate
I've loved, turned to hate
Trapped far beyond my fate
I give, you take
This life that I forsake
Been cheated of my youth
You've turned this lie to truth
[Chorus]
Anger, misery
You'll suffer unto me
Harvester of sorrow (language of the mad)
Harvester of sorrow
[Verse 2]
Pure black looking clear
My work is done soon here
Try getting back to me
Get back which used to be
Drink up, shoot in
Let the beatings begin
Distributor of pain
Your loss becomes my gain
[Chorus]
Anger, misery
You'll suffer unto me
Harvester of sorrow (language of the mad)
Harvester of sorrow
[Verse 3]
All have said their prayers
Invade their nightmares
To see into my eyes
You'll find where murder lies
Infanticide
[Outro]
Harvester of sorrow (language of the mad)
Harvester of sorrow (language of the mad)
Harvester of sorrow
Harvester of sorrow
Harvester of sorrow
Harvester of sorrow
Harvester of sorrow
Harvester of sorrow
Copyright (c) 1988 – Metallica Written by: Hetfield & Ulrich
Leave it to Elsa to try and ruin a good thing. Scott & Andrea were kind enough to give us the auto-litter box and last night I go down to check on it and to make sure she's actually using it... And I find the mat that's affixed to the ramp up to the litter tray is flipped over.... So I fix that and then today I check on it again (because once she's figured out how to fuck with it once...).. And she had the mat flipped over AND the lid that covers where the 'droppings' receptacle is flipped up.... WHY??? lol... Damn cat!
Dr's appointment went well... I'm taking a low dose of Methotrexate and when I saw my rheumatologist last he said he was going to add Arava to the mix, along with what my dermatologist (who's prescribed the methotrexate)... So, at the dermatologist, I tell her about Ecker's 'addition' to the mix, the Arava and... She doesn't know a thing about and doesn't even prescribe Arava... She said "Dr. Ecker prescribe that".... So I'm pretty confused at this point, as Ecker gave me no prescription for anything when I left his office... His last words were, "Call us in 6 months and Happy Holidays".. Which is surprising because I didn't think the word "Happy" was in that man's vocabulary... Maybe he got whacked on the head lately or something...
So I called Ecker's and left a message... Good thing my bloodwork is going to all these doctors and they are all coordinating together...
After that appointment I went up to 'Brilliant Glass' to exchange my dry vape mouth piece.
This exchange went ok.. The young man 'managing' the store seemed a bit.... pissy to see me... I had been in before just after I bought the vape with a small issue and he seemed a bit perturbed then... Anyhow, so I sez, 'Logan at the Northside store said that you guys would exchange this for me'...
he kinda looks at me, looks at the mouth piece.... "I don't know what I'm supposed to do here".... So, I sez, 'Well Logan said this has been an ongoing issue with the I-Shred and that you'd exchange the piece for me, he said other's have had to do this too"..... So he looks at me again, then turns and walks to the back of the store where the dry vapes are, takes one out of the display case and takes the mouth piece off of it come back up front to me and says, "Don't run the vape too hot, it expands the cap and causes this"... So, as kinda rude and a bit smug as this guy was, I was and am thankful they did make this replacement. I ain't asking much, it's cool they did it and I thanked the guys again when I left the store...
I'm not going to 'rotate' the mouth piece, even though it's advertised that one can do so and it's made to do so. I really like the vape and aside from that issue it's worked well.
I've said before, I'm a big The Punisher fan (not of the current TV series)... As a kid, brought up on the savagery of Conan the Barbarian and Blade Runner... The regular Marvel comics just seemed a bit bland to me (and to many others, which is why Todd McFarlane did us all the favor of creating Image and all of his ultra violent characters because Marvel was a "family" company... No one 'died' in Marvel comics (not that i wanted to see people killed) and they were not very violent... Then came 'The Punisher'... A man hellbent on death of all criminals, but mostly those involved in the underground gangs and mafias... Drug pushers and violent thugs.. Frank Castle AKA The Punisher took them all out... and I don't mean 'out' for dinner... Around 1987/'88 I found The Punisher comics and was hooked... Due to smoking some hashish laced with angel dust, which was NOT what we paid for... After having a very very bad trip. I wouldn't touch 'drugs' again until 1994. My Brother did some 'punishing' of his own, tracking down the scumbag who sold us the hash laced with dust and gave him a little tuning.... Because of my anti-drug stance, the Punisher became even more heroic for me... So in 1988 when I got my first tattoo The Punisher was it...
This was the image used for my tattoo done by Dave Long at Skinetic Tattoo studios, which used to be on the Restigouche rd in Oromocto, New Brunswick...
It's much faded now and has this 'cut' in it where Peter Gillies closed a door on me while I was following him and the coat hook... hook, actually cut into my arm!
in 1989, "The Punisher" movie came out with Dolph Lundgren....The big Russian dude in Rocky 4.
It was HORRIBLE. In fact I don't recall it even having the 'Punisher skull emblem on his chest... I mean THAT's what makes him The Punisher!! He's just some crazy jackass in swat gear shooting criminals in the face for revenge of the death by the mob of his wife and children because they witnessed a mob hit..... It's like making a Superman movie and Christopher Reeves suit doesn't have the 'S' on the chest.... I felt like crap.. I mean, the tattoo isn't huge, so the face detail isn't altogether clear... But I just felt, 'Fucking great! Now every time someone see's it they'll associate it with that crap fucking movie...'
It never came up that I can remember.... Fast forward to 2004.... Thomas Jane becomes 'The Punisher'... This wasn't too bad of a movie, pretty violent.. OH, somehow they got John Travolta to play the lead villain role.. I dunno if this one made me feel better about people associating the tattoo with any of the movies.... But then in 2008, Ray Stevenson, you might have seen him as Volstagg in the 'Thor' movies, he took on 'The Punisher' and this one I think nailed it... Some of the acting is a bit stiff, but overall, it's uber violent, Stevenson has the best comic to reality 'look' of the Punisher yet, he's massive, looks mean and with the training he got he pulls off an angry tired Frank Castle.
I've got a few Punisher comics left over these days, including a crazy cross-over comic of 'Archie Meets The Punisher'.
Pretty funny stuff.
Ahhh man, December! Fuck.. Christmas shopping.... ugh Christmas music... Although I'm good at blocking shit out with the entertainment constantly unfolding in my head...
Yes, yes my friends! I'm gonna buy a couple cases of this stuff! I mean, what could go wrong? AND it will extend your life!!
Ahh cool refreshing Fukushima water! I wasn't planning on making any kids anyhow!
Tomorrow, Drs/ appointment.... BUT, before that, got kinda an unsettling message from the neighbors last eve. The landlady has someone coming to "assess" the house tomorrow morning.... There'd been talk about her possibly selling the place.... I'm pretty sure my neighbors would be the buyer... But it still kinda like... 'Do I need to prepare?'.... I had just about got to the point of no stress whatsoever in my life... I'm pretty sure they'll buy the place and I'll be ok....
So the 'big storm' never really hit us... We were supposed to get up to 25cm of snow... Winds up to 50k... Supposed to be sideways... I think we got less snow now lol... But still a lot on the ground... And the winds never whipped up... Tomorrow's supposed to be windy and snow should start early tomorrow morning here.... I'm gonna take my I-Shred to the store and get a new mouth piece. I called the main store today and got the lads name i was talking to. He said this problem with the mouth piece is known and they've been having to exchange them, so I shouldn't really have any problems... I do just feel more comfortable now, as I didn't have anyone's name.. So I could walked in there and said, 'Um yeah, the guys at the main store said I could exchange the mouth piece'... "And who were you talking to?".... 'Ummmm.... Someone?'....
So now I can whip out a name, so there really shouldn't be any problem... Kinda crappy that this 'problem' is "well known".
The mouth piece has like a 'spike' in it, so when you put it on the I-Shred the stake inserts into the chamber with your herb, you can then rotate the mouth piece so as to 'churn' up the herb in the chamber... I think therein lies the fault, this turning of the mouth piece seems to eventually cause the mouth piece to... fall apart... It's a great device, I still stand by it, but... Obviously with that outstanding issue... Like how long will this new mouth piece last? How long will they let us keep exchanging it...
I guess when I get the new one, I won't be turning it to churn up the herb....
Man, I haven't drank alcohol in over, jeez, 15 years? But Metallica & Motorhead have just put out two really, really, yummy sounding products...
Metallica's 'Blackened' Whiskey - Uses the aged cedar wood barrels and some kind of low frequency as it ages.... (Sadly, just after announcing this new drink, the owner of Blackened Dave Pickerell passed away... )
The only reason she stops messing with this huge glass frame is because the camera light distracted her... Trust me, she can make that gigantic frame swing....
Holy toledo! You'd never have expected that after taking a perfect clear photo from the InSight instrument deployment camera that shows a wonderful Martian landscape...
Then the next photo they released... This happened!
Thanks to Larry Burke for the pic
Solar panels have been deployed and InSight is gaining energy! Man, gonna be such a long wait for science... BUT, the camera's seem to be up and working, so between the time it'll take to test the instruments bed, they'll hopefully take lots of nice pix for us!
the 'Snow storm' we were supposed to get never materialized, in fact I think we lost snow today... But the night is young and there's still time to get walloped!
Disappointed that my dry vape has 'broken'... It's not a fatal break, but it's a pain in the ass. The plastic mouth piece has seperated.. So I called the main store and they said if I took it back to the store I bought it from that they'd replace the mouthpiece.... But the guys running the store I bought mine from, well no offence to 'em, but they've always seemed a bit 'dick-ish'.. So once we get another good day for being outside, I'll see if they'll replace it, if not, i'll go back to their higher ups.
Now, some might say, welll use CrazyGlue to put it back together, but that 'metal' part heats up, I ain't about sniffin' no glue lol... That would be a maybe fatal or sickening result....
While a lot of people are NASA fans, there's also a lot of people who do not believe that these probes and missions even exist... SOME people think no huemahn has ever even left our atmosphere.
Those kinds of people really, really piss me off, but their 'belief' now is so strong and true, that arguing with these folk is like arguing there's no 'god' with someone who believes in it.... Futile... I hope those people are left to rot on this planet when we leave for the stars. Harsh? Yes, but their level of stupidity is such they deserve whatever they'll get.
But this isn't time for anger... Count to 10.... One of the other 'cool' things about this 'mission' was that InSight wasn't traveling alone. Launched just behind it were two 'cubesats' the size of about a cereal box to a briefcase. These' mini-statellites were a World first in 'deep space', as they followed InSight to Mars and helped out by sending the 'A-Ok' signal back to Earth.
Now, in a few more hours the solar arrays will deploy, then they will begin to system check all of the science instruments. The 'cover' will be removed from the cameras and they will inspect there area around InSight to see where is best to get this science mission going... This will take weeks to months before the full mission is up and swinging.
Here's the first image:
My first reaction was, 'YAGGH Space ants!!!!'
One of my favorite things about these 'Space Naysayers' is they are always going, "There's no real photo's from space", "They are all Photoshopped", "All the photo's are fake!"....
Ok tough people's...Here's a link you can go to anytime, they post RAW images from the mission.
RAW images are the end all to all arguments about 'photo's and space'... These photos are untouched copies of the originals sent from whatever mission they belong to. NO one has touched these images and NASA is more than happy that anyone is looking at them. Even civilians 'touch up' photos on their own and some for NASA.
So I had on my NASA JPL cap. I'm a bit of a NASA geek. Here's a peek at my collection...
My NASA Kennedy Space Center 'Metalion' hat. With the frosted NASA Mug (comes in a set of two) and a NASA patch.
NASA 'Gateway to the Future' sweater with a scale model of the space shuttle 'Discovery'.
I had always wanted to see a shuttle blast off, but never made it to Florida before they axed the shuttle program. Most of the launches to the ISS are done in Russia and any unmanned missions are done in California or Florida.. So maybe someday I'll see some astronauts lift off from the US, as they've just put out their 'deadline' for June 2019, and that's when we'll (The Canadian Space Agency too uses the Russian Soyuz) see the US back in control of it's ferrying astronauts and cargo back and forth from the ISS (Until it's put out of commission)..
So much more exciting missions to come, lots of science to come from Mars... NASA's 'New Horizons' is soon to meet up with an asteroid in the Kuiper belt (the first time this has ever been attempted) and New Horizon's finished it's primary mission, so they thought since it was doing just fine, they'd throw it another!
Well they did it!! InSight has landed on Mars..... This 'feat' is no small thing... It takes years of planning, programming, testing, retesting, fixing, time, money, blood, sweat and tears of thousands of people working to help expand our knowledge about Mars!~
NASA has had a great track record of late with hardware getting to the surface of Mars and actually working... These missions ride atop a rocketed, rattling them so much their teeth could fall out!
Then traveling through the radiation of space, then this crazy descent, that has proven well for NASA before... But will it work this time? That's the question! They'd have been asking themselves.... Once on the ground, will the missions instruments work? Now we have to wait 5 hours before a signal tells them that the solar panels have opened... Landing was a major hurdle, but now comes the question of 'Will it all work'?
Elsa got some 'new' stuff today. Sadly over the last 4 months my older Brother Scott and my Sister-in law Andrea have lost their two cats, Paia and Cooper. Both were elderly cats, loved so much throughout their lives and will be missed.
I'm glad I got to spend time with Paia when I was house sitting over the Summer and Cooper recently.
Both of them were such awesome cats.
So, as they won't be getting new cats, today Scott dropped of their automatic cleaning litter box and also some food dishes.
Elsa's been stand-offish with the new bowls, even though they had been thoroughly washed, I'm guessing there's still years of cat scent on them and when you're used to having the some 'ol eating and drinking bowls day in and day out for years, then all of a sudden there's these two new 'objects' holding your food, well anyone would probably be a little wary...\
I was wondering how she'd fair with a really weird new litter box, I mean going from this was like going from a regular toilet to one of them cool new ones that flush on their own.
I can only imagine Elsa's reaction when she's in there takin a crap someday and the thing switches on to clean it LOL, she'll probably not shit in it again for a while.... Wait a second, that's not funny...
Thanks to Scott & Andrea for the inheritance from Cooper and Paia
LOL I was just gonna say, 'Looks like it's gonna be a great weather week ahead!', at least it wasn't with temperatures that were like LAST WEEK... with it's evil -25 and below temps...
And I just went to Environment Canada's webpage to get some temperature quotes And what do I see?
'Special Weather Statement'
Fredericton and Southern York County
An extended period of messy weather expected for mid-week.
A pair of low pressure systems approaching the Maritimes will bring a mix of snow and rain to New Brunswick, beginning on Monday night and continuing into Thursday. Precipitation is likely to taper to showers or flurries on Wednesday as the first low weakens, then increase in intensity again on Wednesday night as the second low approaches. Although it is too early to forecast snowfall amounts, total accumulations may exceed warning criteria of 15 cm in some inland areas during this event.
In addition, strong northerly winds are likely to develop over eastern New Brunswick on Thursday behind the second low, then diminish on Thursday night as it moves off.
So that's a fuking mixed bag of shit! Is it going to rain and snow? Snow and rain? Freezing rain and snow? Wind and freezing rain and snow and rain?
Oh well, it WAS gonna be a nice week.... Guess it'll be more indoors time getting rid of shit....
I've taken four bags of old clothes I don't wear anymore to the Canadian Diabetes clothing donation bins.
My upstairs is just about 'purged'... I only have a couple more cupboards to clean out, then it's done...
The big job is downstairs, more clothes and then all of the packing boxes I moved in with, they gotta be broken down and recycled... I wanted to wait for the basement until it was below freezing, so any of the spiders or other creatures that have made their homes in those boxes for years are good and ... DEAD!
After the boxes the biggest work will be getting rid of old stuff.. SO, stay tuned! There could be X-Files or Electronic Arts merch, MAYBE lots of Metal shirts and who knows what else...
But I've been posting for years about shrinking down my 'footprint'.... I wanna get rid of as much stuff as possible..
Too Much Stuff
Dave Brockie
[Chorus]
Too much stuff, too much stuff
I've got too much stuff
Too much stuff, too much stuff
I've got too much stuff
[Verse 1]
A little calculator in my computer machine
A doctor with a rubber glove that keeps my butthole clean
A thing I got in Austria that pulls hairs out my nose
A giant piece of wood that's formed to keep track of my clothes
[Chorus]
Too much stuff, too much stuff
I've got too much stuff
Too much stuff, too much stuff
I've got too much stuff
[Verse 2]
A car with wheels that sucks my life because it never moves
A penis that will help me with the taming of the shrews
A little boat with bells on it, oh who could ask for more?
I'll sail my ship across the seas and fuck exotic whores, oh
[Solo]
Too much!
Too much!
Too much!
Too much!
[Bridge]
I've got so much stuff, I can't see my stuff
But here's some prints from a guy named Hieronymous
I'm addicted, addicted to stuff, maybe I should go
To "Stuff Anonymous"
[Break: Mike Derks, spoken]
Hey! Yo!
That's too much stuff!
Too much stuff!
That's too much stuff...
[Verse 3]
A weird potato peeler that fills an entire room
A wardrobe trunk that's densely packed with moldy pantaloons
A savage giant narwhal with a lacerated spleen
A moldy truss once worn by Freddie Mercury of Queen
Banana bread, etruscan head, a shoe once licked by God
A bunch of stinky band-aids rolled up in a smelly clod
The dark command of Sauron and a face that swarms with bees
I’d give it all to you if I could find my fucking keys!
SME, The Orchard Music (on behalf of Metal Blade Records)
Tomorrow, Monday, November 26th! NASA's InSight martian probe will scream through the Martian sky as it lands on Mars for yet another amazing science packed mission to the 'red planet'!
Yes, yes my friends, in 24 hours, as of typing this, InSight will on Mars and hopefully not a bug splat, like The European Space Agency's 'Beagle' mission... They made a laughable "error" and well their science Mission will probably be cleaned up in the future for a Martian highway.... But let's not talk about failures, but of success' and not every NASA mission has been successful, many have failed. But with Mars, NASA's been on a winning streak for decades. They got so much hardware on Mars and we've learned and seen so very much from all those missions. Including the 'Mars Global Surveyor', the rover missions, 'Opportunity' and 'Curiosity', Mars Pathfinder and Sojourner... So they could be in for a 'splatter' event.. It truly is a major gamble doing these missions, but the treasures of success are incalculable!
InSight's missions is a really cool and crucial one. It's not a rover, so it won't be going nowhere, but it'll be 'digging' into Mars, with both probes and radar, to look for signs of ... LIFE! Or even if just to see if life was possible on Mars at one point... We now know for sure, without a doubt there there was and still is water on Mars today... Did it thousands and thousands to millions of years ago have life? Did that life transpermiate to Earth? Was Mars the spark that lit the fire for life on our own planet? Stay tuned my friends because this mission and future ones may just break that secret|!|
You and your family can tune in and 'watch' InSight land via the missions webpage or NASA TV
This page will give you websites where you can tune in live!
AHH Tim, he does know me well. Like I was saying, Tim and I are both audiophiles and we both know what each other likes as far as all kinds of bands in the cornucopia of genres we both embrace... So last night, Tim whipped one out on me.
Wolves At The Throne Room hail from South of my old stomping grounds in Vancouver, they are from Washington State. And from what Tim was telling me, these Brother's live off the grid somewhere out in the mysterious, awe inspiring Pacific Northwest woods.
All forests can be majical, but there is something truly supernatural about the West Coasts forests, with their massive redwood trees that tower like skyscrapers, to the mist of the mountain ponds and lakes. Home to ancient mythical entities that haunt the woods to this very day, this is where these guys make their home... Though apparently they do trek into the cities every so often to record an album, tour and cause chaos as anarchists, like true rioting folk here.
Their music is not like your standard Black Metal from just as equally supernatural Norse country's where the genre was birthed.
The bands lyrics take aim at their enemies and also invoke the majic of the world they live in when not on the road... They are actually on tour with Behemoth as I type this. Tim know's I've become a big Behemoth freak. I don't think he even knew they were on tour together and obviously the guys in Behemoth or at least Nergal (the bands vocalist/guitarist) have great taste to have these guys along.
This music is best heard when alone with headphones on or in a great immersive surround sound environment...
I don't want to scare people off with the 'Black Metal' title, as the band is more Ambient Shoegaze-ish than straight up 'Black Metal'... But it's truly entrancing music, at least the tracks that I've heard from their second release back in 2007 called 'Two Hunters'.
Wikipedia has this to say about the band:
"The band's music has been described as "atmospheric black metal" " and "Cascadian black metal". They have also been considered significant to post-metal for their combination of "ambience and violence" to create "emotionally impacting" music, especially on their 2007 sophomore album Two Hunters. Wolves in the Throne Room has not incorporated most of the traditional traits of black metal such as corpse paint, the use of pseudonyms and Satanic imagery. Member Aaron Weaver has said, "Wolves in the Throne Room is not black metal, or, more accurately, we play black metal on our own terms, for our own reasons. "And unlike most modern metal bands, Wolves in the Throne Room always use vintage amplifiers and recording equipment."
And some of the artwork for the band is out of this world!!
Me likey a lot!
Check out this this cut called 'Dea Artio' from the 'Two Hunters' album:
Smoke some medicinal, put on the headphones and lose yourself to the mists of the Pacific Northwest...
OK, I know we're in Canada.. but we've been pampered, at least here for the last many years that I've been back we've had long Falls with no real snow coming until late December early January, but temperatures, with the windchill factored in getting down to -20's and close to 30's... I don't recall weather like this before... Just fugly... Really freakin' fugly!
BUT, 'milder' more seasonable temperatures are on the way. From Saturday, through into mid next week (as far as the 7 day forecast goes), it looks not too bad... I only left the house today for a quick hobble up to The Goody Shop to grab some pop, but that's been it. I keep an eye on the forecast and if the weather is not agreeable to me, I'll try to prep a few days in advance to not have to leave the house for any reason... I did have bloodwork this week, so that can't be helped, but after that I was and am prepared to be done until the weather smartens up.
[UPDATE: Had not seen Tim and Natalie in a LONG time, While we had random encounters on the street since I had spent time with Tim and the Raynemaker crew on the houseboat this past Summer, we hadn't really talked in a long long time. So I had a hold of him this week and we agreed we'd talk today. So I called him earlier and we talked about getting together, maybe on the weekend or hopefully next week... I had put the phone down and was just getting read to prep supper when the phone rang, "Have you started making supper yet?" Tim asked, I turned off the oven, 'Nope' I said, "Hold tight I'm coming to get ya, we'll have supper over here"....
Was great to see them all, Hayden growing like a weed (aha, I remember 'older' folks talking about us when we were young tykes and tots). Mile's (I embarrassingly called him 'Milo') can scoot around the house like lightning, crawlin' like Spiderman!
Tim, and most of our friends and associates are music and filmophiles, so we always talk about any new stuff, always talk about old stuff and always have really great conversations. Both Tim and I love to talk (anyone who has done or does radio does)... And we're always super passionate about who, what and why we love what we do.
What can I say, we're passionate people. Tim et all are doing really well. Tim's shut away editing 'The Capital Project' and I'm never, ever not excited for him and the crew.
Was great to see them.
I wondered how 'Buddy' is fairing today. The snow came quick as did the cold, I had wanted to get a marker pole as to where his last hole he dug is, so I could keep an eye on it through the Winter. I do have a good idea where it is, so I can generally see if he pops up, but I don't expect to see him until Spring,
I did however see my nemesis today!
Fucking Shitrat dry humpin' my fence....
The Greeting Song
Red Hot Chili Peppers
Drivin' around I've got my baby and my top down
Mary-go-round I ride you for my love
Throwin' me down in the backseat underground
I'm on the mound I make it for my love
Makin' my way I brake another L.A. day
Time in the town I need it for my love
My Chevrolet rollin' to another play day
This is the sound I listen for my love
Who, you talking to, talk to me you
Sound of music
Who, you talking to, talk to me you
Sound of music
I love you swim through me
Good feelings come to me
Sought and I found a life of makin my blood sound
Do anything for the one I love
Something profound the face of God is in Sensurround
I'm on the mound I make it for my love
Who, you talking to, talk to me you
Sound of music
Who, you talking to, talk to me you
Sound of music
I love you swim through me
Good feelings come to me
Songwriters: Michael Balzary / John Anthony Frusciante / Anthony Kiedis / Chad Smith
So, today after having blood drained from my body, I got up to the 'mall' and ventured again to find a 'door draft guard'... Now, there's kinda two different 'door draft guards'.....
These ones:
And these ones:
Which is the one I found at Lawton's Drugs! I had searched and asked several Wally-Mart workers, but since most of them are married to their Brother's and Sister's, you can't expect much from them... So I searched high and low and none to be found... So I found a couple of stores in the mall that carry like home decor, not like 'Bath & Beyond'... I dunno, they sell crap I wouldn't put up lol... 'Home body' stuff, knick knacks of art and stuff ... Anyhow, they didn't have it...
So as I went to Lawton's as, you know, some of the 'drug' stores get in just about everything these days... No go... They had a Christmas section, but nothing there... So off I went and was only dismayed... Then, on my way out of the mall, walking by Lawton's... There it was! In the fucking window!!
So walking back into Lawton's, I ran into one of the kind young ladies who had helped me when I had asked... and I said, 'I found it!' and she said, "The door draft thing?" and I said, 'Yep, it's in the front window, behind the glass!'... As they were getting it for me, several older ladies saw it and asked how much it was and if there were more... 'Nope' the Lawton's gal said, 'That's all that we have AND, it's 40% off!
SCORE! So, now I want to find one more for the bathroom door... And then, then my life will be complete...
[CORRECTION: In the previously reported story below, it was reported that the stupid dumb ass christian's body was found. His body has not yet been found, but I'd like to add that it would be great if they did find him and he was crucified or decrapitated like John the baptist was)
Saw this news story this morning and couldn't help but chuckle...
christians BE WARNED... I'm going to say some nasty stuff ahead here....
So, in India, there's an island, ok, there's a shitload of islands off of India's coast, it's in the Bay Of Bengal... On this island is one of the Earth's last remaining primitive tribes... Scientists believe this is one of the tribes, the original FIRST tribes to leave Africa and came to this area some 60,000 years ago...
It is against the law for us normal huemahns to set foot in their island, it is illegal to take photo's or video's of these people who inhabit this island (although, both exist)....
This place is called 'North Sentinel island'...
Even after the big tsnami of 2004, when rescuers attempted to land on the island and other's flew over in a helicopter, they were attacked by flying spears and arrows! These people WANT to be left the fuck alone.
So, some fucking christian missionary, despite being warned, despite being told, "YOU CANNOT GO THERE", decided that he'd say 'fuck you' to the rules and laws and paid some fishermen to drop him off in the island, so he could try to convert this tribe, called the Sentinelese.
A few days later his body was found, stuck with arrows and spears! HAHAHAH... He didn't have an army of thugs to hack up the tribe, like the Spanish and other 'christian' armies have done in days long gone.
Yeah I laughed hard.... Good on them those Sentinelese folks! They do not want interaction with the outside world and there have been laws set down to protect them, but fucking christian's, they think, "Oh, well 'god' is on my side! god will provide me safety! god will show his light to this primitive folk, he will show them the way"....
Nope, they fucking killed him. It's too bad they didn't hack him into pieces and feed him to the fish... I'd probably guess they wouldn't eat him, I mean, they don't want the 'evil spirit' within this dumb ass to get into and infect any of the tribe..
Here is a photo of the now dead missionary for 'christ'... Rest In Peace jerkface!
Oh, btw, the fishermen? They've all been arrested... So any pay off they got from this slimy piece of shit missionary, was wasted...
Yes, I resent the christians... When you think of the death they've reaped across the planet for centuries, it's stomach turning... Yes, yes, I know very well other religions have also killed many and evil dictators have as well... But unlike 'evil dictators', the religious do this in the 'Name of 'god''... They feel that, if heathen's don't believe, then they don't deserve to live... Sickening. Our planet would fair so much better to be rid of these ridiculous beliefs in ancient, archaic and useless 'gods'.
Now, learning from this story, one can only HOPE that more christians will attempt to go to Sentinel island and meet a similar fate.We can 'pray' for that 💀
It was this week in 2010 that I boarded a Vancouver flight with Lufthansa and flew to Frankfurt, transferring there and on to Cairo, Egypt and to say it was a 'trip of a life time', is an absolute understatement.
I've said before, I am so fortunate and so thankful of my childhood... The long, sometimes excruciating drives across the continent and back, allowed me to see and get to know over 40 US states including Alaska and New Mexico. Traveling a lot will introduce you to so much culture and broaden your horizons, being able to see the Grand Canyon, Meteor Crater in Arizona, Mt. Rushmore, Mt. St. Helen's, Death Valley Arizona, to see all those places and so many more with my own eyes and not through some National Geographic documentary or book. Those Summers put the 'travel bug' in me and Dad was kind enough on a couple occasions to pay for my train ticket, so I've seen all of Canada (except NFLD & NS) by rail.
Traveling alone was no big deal to me, I'd traveled as a kid, as I said, on the train, on the bus and on the plane by myself. I'd taken trips to Washington State as well as Oregon state on my own and in 2010, after I had received some inheritance money, I decided I wanted to go some place special. But I didn't want that 'special' trip to be something 'usual', like going to Cuba or Mexico or Europe (not that there's anything wrong with those places)... In fact, it was a fellow patient at the outpatient physiotherapy that I went to who gave me the suggestion of Egypt.
One day while pondering places with my physio, the lady in the bed next to me said, "What about Egypt?" and that hit me like a bolt of lightning! "YES! What about Egypt"!!!
I had read and been bitten by the ancient curse of the ages since I was a young kid. Egypt captivated and enthralled me. I read all I could about the place as an added bonus, during my teens my favorite band in the World, 'Iron Maiden' did an album which had a few songs about Egypt and the ancient place, where 'Eddie', their mascot, had been put through the rites of mummification and was resurrected there!
And even before my trip there I had several books on ancient Egypt in my library.
So I did some investigating and I could do a 'Grand Egypt Trip' through Avalon Waterways, a tour company known around the World, they do 'boat tours' of Europe, China and now, Egypt isn't even on their list anymore, which is sad, as from what I've been told by people I know who have gone to Egypt since the 'revolution' say it's fine, just use caution.. Our tour had an armed security detail with us at all times... In fact and I'm super proud of this lol. In Alexandria, in freaking Alexandria, one of the oldest cities on the planet, I had a double armed escort to an ATM! Two dudes, who took Men In Black a little too serious, with not hand guns, but assault rifles were like clearing people out of the ATM room lol... Anyhow. when I went to Egypt, before I left, I had checked and there were more travel warnings for Mexico than there were for Egypt.
So with Avalon's tour, we had just under 3 weeks, we had a cruise on the Nile river for almost a week during which we would 'sail' at night and then show up at a new city or village, disembark to see the sites and then back onboard for supper and evening... Which was, again, mind blowing....
One of the only times and things I regret, was being 'alone' on the Nile river as a full Moon rose over the palm trees and sand dunes in the background... Probably THE most romantic scene one could see lol and I was *singing* "All by myselffffff".... But it was still cool nonetheless.
The full Moon rising on the Nile river. November, 2010
So off to my travel agent and she hooked me up. I was staying in 5 star hotels the whole tour, my first hotel was the grandest, the world famous 'Mena House' which was built as a hunting lodge in 1890... Presidents, Royalty and celebrity's have stayed where I did and Oh my gosh was the place grand! And because I was travelling alone, I got a room in the old part of the hotel, while the rest of my group were put up in the high tech new and modern part of the hotel... The difference? I had a patio that stepped out onto a private deck and the fucking Giza pyramids were RIGHT THERE!
Because I flew in at night, I had NO clue about this, as I was beat from near 20 hours of travel... Anyhow, the video will show..
Now about this video, it's frantic and frazzled, as I was. I was using the video camera to take photo's, so you might wonder why there's not much to 'see'... It's more about the trip, than the trip lol...And everything was happening so fast, I was overwhelmed, I mean, I was in fucking Egypt! Sometimes the brain was just trying to compute that this was reality.
And sadly, I lost the last day or so of the trip. When I got home from Egypt a few weeks later I took a trip home to New Brunswick and on my way, lost the camera.... I was pissed, Air Canada would do NOTHING for me.. So someone probably got themselves a nice SONY handicam... Maybe even marveled at my home movies of Egypt and I think my Iron Maiden excursion might have been on their too. It was a real bummer.
At the end of the trip was the city of Aswan and we stayed on 'Elephantine island', which has a bird preserve on it, as well as about 200 or so cats!
Also, because I was in Egypt AS the Revolution was ramping up, things started to happen, like increased security forces, more visible military and on our last day and night in Cairo, the Egyptian government had shut down all social media and email. No FB, no Twitter, no Snapcrap or whatever it's called and yeah not even Hotmail/Outlook or Gmail. There was nothing scary about this situation nor did I ever feel once that my safety was at risk.... Actually, that's not quite true...In.. Hmm, I think it was Luxor, we had gone to a museum and when the bus had parked, we had parked on a narrow street and the building was quite close to the road... As the bus parked, we had a narrow sidewalk/corridor to walk down to the entrance of the museum... So, being at the back of the bus (where all us 'cool' folk hung out), we disembarked via the middle door of the bus... As we exited, to our left and right stood some local security dudes, each with an automatic rifle.. So, we turned and headed toward the museum entrance.. All of a sudden *CLACKITTY CLACK!!!** We all jumped and turned to see that one of the 'security' guys had dropped his fuking rifle... We all kinda looked as shocked as the next person, wiped the sweat from our brows and continued toward the museum... *CLACKITTY CLACK!!!* AGAIN! the SAME guy dropped the rifle twice! That coulda gone off and shot any one of us, but, the 'Gods of Egypt' were with us and we made it out and into the museum sans bullet holes!
Here's a link to my Youtube Playlist of the trip. If ya don't wanna watch it, you can go to my Facebook page and under 'Photo's/ then 'Albums' scroll down and you should come across I think 3 galleries of Egypt trip pics.
[Just a note about the videos, the 'first day' in Egypt is footage of the fucking Mena House hotel. Because I had never traveled internationally and with my arthritis, I wanted to give myself a good 24 hours before the tour started, so I came in a full day earlier than the rest of my tour group and didn't venture far from the hotel grounds because I was alone - ALSO, the footage can be a little 'blurry'. I didn't realize that I had the footage set to a lower resolution until AFTER the trip]
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8455FB6BBAF5174C
(Yes, my videos, back then, had an 'Intro', a friend of mine from a forum I used to frequent wrote that intro for me... I know, it's annoying, you can skip past it, I won't be offended lol)
The trip was absolutely, by far, THE best 'trip//Journey I've ever been on. Had such a great time and saw so many mind boggling and wonderful things.... I know it's impossible, but everyone should be able to experience a place like Egypt, as it's part of the dawn of our civilization.
Fun fact, did you know that the time of Cleopatra is closer to our time now than she is to when the pyramids were built?
It's easy to forget just how 'ancient' some of the temples and structures in Egypt are because they look so 'modern'.. So fantastic... And it is forever etched into my soul.
Myself and 'Doris' from New Yawk city! Her and her sister had me laughing the whole trip. Here we're at the Aswan dam, built by the Russian's and Egypt between 1960 and 1970. Doris was 85 years young on that trip.
In front of the Great Pyramid of Giza. Holding a copy of the 'Burnaby Now!' A local paper in my neighbourhood, that had a 'Trip section', so I emailed them my photo and this appeared in the paper before I even got back, which freaked out my travel agent because her office was just around the corner from me.
Do I need to even explain this one?
A bunch of Egyptian school kids decided they wanted to be in my picture... So, hand on my wallet lol, we all posed.
Dipping my hand in the highly polluted Mediterranean sea. After I returned from |Egypt, I dipped my hand in the Pacific and then within that month had dipped my hand in the Atlantic.
Making sure it's 'real' in Karnak Temple
Obelisk in Karnak temple. Construction at the complex began during the reign of Senusret I in the Middle Kingdom and continued into the Ptolemaic period,
Luxor temple... Luxor was the 'highlight' of the trip.. Yes, Cairo is beautiful, is Alexandria, they both have amazing sites, but nothing compares to Luxor and Karnak temples. I actually got a little weepy at karnak because I just couldn't believe I was there.
The only 'known' female Pharaoh's temple, Queen Hatshepsut. The enormitty of this complex does not shine through photo's.
Temple Edfu, the temple or Horus
Temple kitty... Spirit of a long past pharaoh? I loved seeing all of the animals on our tour. LOADs of free range temple cats, lots of weird looking dogs... I was saddened that all of the 'wildlife' you might expect to see in Egypt is gone. On the banks of the Nile we only saw donkeys and cattle. Some cranes and other birds.
