We look, but we don't see - at least I don't. I've lived up here in this pretty rural area for 11 years now, yet every time I head out on a local road where I know every bump and curve, I see a house I've never SEEN before.

Recently I was chatting with my wife while driving and suddenly saw a deer standing in the swale RIGHT BESIDE THE CAR! I should have seen it 50 yards back, but my poor mind was elsewhere.

This is a big danger in motorcycling; car drivers don't see one when they should.

Have you photographed any light lately?

Think about this; all we EVER photograph IS light! Sure we're looking at the "subject", but all that happens when we click the shutter is capture a bit of light through the lens. Then, either chemically or digitally we get a way to see what it looks like.

I'm thinking of developing a website (pun intended) to demonstrate the importance of the light source. I've taken shots of subjects lit different ways to show how important the light itself really is.

Thinking about light before taking the picture can really make a big difference.

I am beginning to understand me. What a relief!

I spent too many years, actually most of my adult life, on a totally frustrating, impossible endeavor; trying to live up to what I THOUGHT I was. But the brass ring was always way out of reach.

I can't speak for others, but little by little I'm learning about me - what or who I really am. This was initially painful, of course, but after a while there comes a feeling of peace when realizing that I'm OK right where I am. I no longer have to strive for a fantasy.

Dick Tracy? "What's with Dick Tracy?" I wondered as I browsed my way through the usual dozen or so comics I enjoy every morning. Four of them referred to Dick Tracy - one of the fav comic strip characters of my childhood. This seemed remarkable as I couldn't recall the last time even one of them did so.

Google to the rescue! I found that October 4, 1931 was the grand beginning of one of the most popular comic strips in America.

Happy 75th anniversary Mr. Tracy! Surely you have disposed of Pruneface by now. May you never be forgotten.

Lie of the Week.

A computer repair technician recently closed my repair account, saying the repair was successful and the owner (me) was satisfied, when actually, he never even appeared at my home, the location of the damaged computer.

Pretty bad...but even worse was the response of his employer when we asked, "What happened ??

Nothing, except promises that "A supervisor will call you right back." Despite repeated frantic telephone calls for help, no supervisor ever responded.

This apparently uncaring service provider is under contract with a major computer manufacturer to handle repairs here in the States.

What a crying shame.

The goings on in Washington suggest awful new meanings to the word "honorable". No, not just Foley, but rather, the childish brouhaha that has erupted over his less-than-honorable activities.

My America is being diluted by millions of illegal aliens who want to just plain take what we have worked for, and we are seriously threatened by maniacal murderers abroad and within our borders who would enjoy slaughtering us; every man, woman, and child. Yet The self-serving feeding-frenzy of the officials we elected to represent us make it clear that, to them, the "enemy" is simply the other party.

Honorable? Hardly!

"What is this thing called Death? Is it the end, or the beginning? If it is the beginning - the beginning of what? There are conflicting views on this.

Who is right?

Whatever, It is a fact of life for every single one of us, like it or not.

When we go, we leave part of us behind for those who follow. My father died many years ago, yet we still have memories and thoughts about him. His wisdom and foolishness come to mind from time to time, softly, when our mind is comfortable. This is how it should be. "

What is this thing called Death? Perhaps the end. Perhaps the beginning! If it be the beginning, the beginning of what? There are conflicting views on this.

Who is right, if anyone?

It is a known fact of life for every single one of us, like it or not.

When we go, we leave part of us behind for those who follow. My father died many years ago, yet I still have memories and thoughts about him. His wisdom and foolishness come to mind from time to time, softly, when my mind is comfortable.

This is how it should be.

Who do you believe?

Daniel Pipes writes, "The Muslim population in this country is not like any other group" as it contains many who hate our America and desire, ultimately, to bring us all to the restrictions of Islam.

Then there is Shaker Elsayed, Secretary General of the Muslim Society, USA. She says, "The American flag symbolizes all of our Islamic values: freedom, civil liberties, and respect for human life."

Thanks to our so-called 'News' media, focused on politicking in Washington and other inanities, we hear nothing of this.

How are we to react if there are more 9/11 horrors?

Some write here to demonstrate their remarkable writing talent. Me? I have to be satisfied with just demonstrating who I am - what I think about today.

Right now, near the end of this day, my mind is filled with disgust with politics. No, not YOUR politics as compared to mine, but the obvious thinking of those "Honorable" beings in Washington to whom the only thing that matters in the coming election is their party winning a majority. The welfare of those of us who elected them and our country itself is ignored.

Lord Acton said it right: "Power corrupts."

Oh my GOODNESS - someone is hurling their soiled hankies at my NAUGHTY America. Andrew Buncombe in Washington earns his last name by whining:

"The US - with five per cent of the world's population - uses 23 per cent of its energy, 15 per cent of its meat and 28 per cent of its paper." And as our wicket population grows, even MORE people will be seeking a share of those often-limited resources.

Do I dare even suggest that the above is why so many "others" want to come here?

QUICK - Gimme a quick slap on the wrist! Ah...

THE INTERNET - WOW!

What a fantastic opportunity for us all to learn something about "them", those decent people "over there" who we see mentioned in the 'news' now and then, but we really do not understand. Note the word 'decent'. This eliminates any interest in those who delight in slaughtering men, women, and children they know nothing about.

The 'net' gives me the opportunity to read newspapers IN MY OWN LANGUAGE from all over the world.

If we don't destroy ourselves in the future, I think the Internet will rank with the printing as a major step towards understanding.

Hi, are you having a problem with Paraskevidekatriaphobia today?

Oh, how unfortunate.

Oh, oh, I can't look down my long nose and sniff at your mentally disordered foolishness. While I'm not hiding under the bed in quivering, morbid, and irrational fear of Friday the 13th, I AM aware of it. Is it only a cowinkydink that I don't really want to go anywhere today? What would I be thinking if I had to fly somewhere?

I believe that if we hear something often enough it becomes a part if us.

I'd better say no more than "Have a nice day."

Today is Sunday. I just crawled out of bed. It is unreasonable to expect great thoughts at this time.

OK, I'm 76, and while I feel OK and enjoy my life, 76 sounds awfully old. Perhaps related to that sobering fact is that I notice that I'm saying "Thank you God" now and then.

I never used to say that. I remember the time when, drunk, I sat on my bed and cried out, "God, if you're there, make that picture move!" But that picture on the wall didn't even quiver.

H'm, that says that my days are getting better.

Today is Sunday. I said that yesterday too.

Confused? Nope, I wrote yesterday's 100 words this morning - finished them just 10 minutes ago. Hope the world doesn't stop turning.

At this late date, it's pretty unlikely that I'll ever do anything that will effect the world beyond the boundaries of my (and June's) 5.4 acres. If that sounds resigned to you, you're wrong! it's said with gratitude that I FINALLY can accept the things I cannot change. Yes, it took a while to get here, but it's well worth the effort and occasional pain.

YES, Life is VERY good!

AGAIN - media twisting the news!

Banner headline in the [UK] Sun:

"Now even Yanks claim UK asylum"

Picturing no one left here but the illegal Mexicans, I rushed to investigate.

WRONG! Out of about 300 million, 5 of us were sufficiently disturbed this year to flee to the UK. Hardly a sign of serious depopulation. Rather like noting the deranged slaughter in Amish land and screaming, "AMERICANS ARE MURDERERS!"

It appears this is because newspapers and even TV is recognizing the enormous power of this Internet to grab people's attention. Yes, the world is a-changing, hopefully for the better.

"It shall be the policy of this Nation to regard any nuclear missile launched from Cuba against any nation in the Western Hemisphere as an attack by the Soviet Union on the United States, requiring a full retaliatory response upon the Soviet Union."

President John F. Kennedy's words in 1962.

This was scary, but Americans supported him. Today we face similar chaos, but petty political division does not allow our president to stand strong as he desperately needs to. The enemy, well aware of this division, knows he only has to wait until we cut and run. This is happening.

I rejoined ICQ again today with this description: "I'm an old American who believes it important to get to know people in other countries."

I really DO believe this. I've learned that without investigation we gain false impressions of others. For example. I'd always thought of Russians as mostly dull gray depressed people like the WW2 newsreel images of the old Babushkas sweeping the streets and pushing wheelbarrows full of bombed rubble.

Now, two of my best friends are bright, colorful Russians, indistinguishable physically and mentally from many Americans I happily know.

Ah, another wonderful miracle of this computer age!

Pretty people don't always lead pretty lives, as evidenced by this recent horror:

Adrian Hall and Zackery Bowen were a well known attractive young couple in New Orleans, but she earned he had cheated on her and tried to throw him out of their apartment. Zackery responded by strangling, decapitating, dismembering, and cooking her. Several days later he leapt to his death from a hotel balcony. Police were led to the grisly scene by a suicide note in his pocket.

The apartment landlord who had been a candidate for mayor commented, He may have in retrospect seemed a little troubled."

Did you ever have a serious problem with an on-line firm, or, been so favorably impressed with them that you just HAD to tell them about it? So you emailed them a real barn-burner...

And got this reply:

"We have received your e-mail inquiry. Your message has been submitted to a customer service representative who will respond to you as soon as possible. Please do not reply to this message. Thank you for contacting [you name it]."

Here's hope! At http://www.gethuman.com/ you will find phone numbers for 500 American companies, AND tricks to get you through to a real human.

"Multiculturalism" is a word getting lots of play these days.

I'm hardly a racist, but I'm against it. Hear me out.

MANY years ago, my wife and I rented the other side of our "double" house to the first black family in Wharton, NJ. They had moved up from Texas.

The man was enjoying his career, but his wife was unhappy. She constantly told of how she missed "her people" in the Black community in Texas, despite the serious racism in the area.

I think it's perfectly natural for people to want to live with those they can relate to.

I wandered by the TV just now and noticed their knickers all twisted up about "The Material Girl" ,Madonna, adopting a Malawian child.

While I thoroughly dislike Madonna for her sick and revolting career, I can see no reason for all the excitement.

The pompous suggest she should be doing much more, and others question her ability to be a Mom.

Oh?

Obviously she can afford the best possible nanny and other help. So why worry? If she can rescue even one small child from the horror that is HIV, genocide, and corruption polluted Africa, I say God bless her!

There seems to be a surplus of discouraging news these days. I'm speaking of the immoral behavior of well-known American firms that up until recently were sort of "part of the family?"

Names like Kellogg, Gerber, Tide, Coke, Glidden Paint. Even Scott toilet paper. Making bigger profits by not telling us they raised the unit price of their products. They shout about their fixed prices, but the tiny print tells us the contents are smaller.

That's even worse than the $.99 that makes us think something is cheaper than it really is.

What is happening to my once proud America?

What is this thing called "Wisdom"?

There's a collection of cute quotations giving definitions; from Albert Einstein's, "Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen." to Harriet Beecher Stowe's thought: "Common sense is the knack of seeing things as they are, and doing things as they ought to be done."

I prefer the latter. Certainly not because I'm skilled at it, but, rather, because I've seen so many folks that I foolishly considered mentally inferior who could untangle complicated tasks that baffled me.

How about: "wisdom is, at last - FINALLY, recognizing what we really don't know"?

We live on planet Earth revolving around the Sun which is just one of the 4 billion stars in our galaxy, the Milky Way.

The Andromeda Galaxy (the nearest) contains about one thousand BILLION stars. Light from it takes 2.5 million years to get here.

Scientists recently discovered a galaxy 13 billion light-years away. Since the estimated age of the Universe is 14 billion years, when we look at this distant thing, we are seeing a portion of the universe when it was very young.

There are billions of galaxies in the universe.

We know the God that created this?

We're told that the universe we see through our telescopes is but 10 percent of the total. 90 percent being "dark matter" that we cannot see or detect. Scientists "know" this because of it's effect on gravity, that force we know all about.

This sounds to me a bit like the ancient "knowledge" that nature was made up of 4 elements: Earth, water, Air, and Fire. And, that the Sun, the Moon, and all the stars revolved around our flat Earth.

Could the confident scientists of today be just as wrong about what is?

Could our world be just ______?

Why is it sometimes so darn difficult to come up with 100 words? The hassle of a crazy working day might leave one burned out. And then there are those, like myself, who have time but are emotionally "out of it."

Ah, there, I said it! The problem is our thinking!

The solution is simple to express, thou often difficult to do - THINK ABOUT SOMETHING ELSE - as I am doing right now. Just one hour ago I was clamped down HARD on my pity-pot, but by forcing myself to start typing, I find myself laughing at my foolishness.

I read of the terrible fire in California and see they know it was set by an arsonist who they are looking for. I wonder if it's smart for that information to be in the public media?

If I were the perp, and was aware of all the publicity of the deaths and destruction, AND KNEW THEY WERE LOOKING FOR ME, right now I'd be frantically doing all I could to hide my tracks.

Could be he is just one of those who doesn't follow the news or even realize he started the fire. There are plenty of them around.

I remember sitting on the porch and my father telling me that the end of mankind would be brought about by what made us masters of the world - our intelligence. He said some 'genius' would develop a magic pill that was supposed to cure all illnesses, but instead, would destroy us.

He reasoned this by considering that this happened in the past to the then leading creatures: the dinosaurs got too big; The saber-tooth tiger's teeth finally got in the way of eating; the Dodo bird got too big to fly.

I laughed then, but perhaps it's happening today.

Western civilization is collapsing: Germany is failing economically, France is writhing with riots, England is no longer "English", and America is consumed with sex; high-school girls showing more skin than prostitutes did ten years ago.

I hate to say it, but the Muslims are correct: We ARE a decadent society. Some are outraged that a Muslim cleric "comparing women who don't wear head scarves to "uncovered meat who invite rape," but what rational man has not had the occasional thought, "She's asking for it."

Great civilizations had grown and died...The wheel of history grinds around. Is our time approaching?

Did you ever hear of the "Ten Thousand Things?" The Kyoto Journal puts it elegantly: "a Buddhist expression representing the dynamic interconnection and simultaneous unity and diversity of everything in the universe." More simply; I think of it as the 10,000 things that are always around us, wherever we are. If only we could bother to look; and see.

I thought of this today, driving up to West Plains for the quarterly car service - an hour's drive through pretty country with so many NEW things to see every time we go.

How is it possible to ever be bored?