I’m still mining Sundays from 10 years ago. I thought you might be interested to know that the big Web-page makeover that I’ve talked about recently (and have talked about off and on in the past) might really happen this time. If it doesn’t, I just wasted money on a retainer I paid to some fine young people who’re going to help me put it all together technically. Of course, I learned I’m still going to have to provide the content. Sheesh! It isn’t scheduled to roll out until spring, possibly even late spring, and I have no idea what it will look like, because I’ve yet to come up with a concept and the artwork to support it—that “content” bugaboo I mentioned. However, I will keep you posted as events warrant.
Literary Achievement
By Jimmy Johnson
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442 responses to “Literary Achievement”
Did anyone else see the E news that a school district has instituted a dress code
– for teachers? it was a little vague as the tend to be. Teachers are required to wear
underwear and foundation garments. The union is protesting. I did not gather if it were
the dress code or that the teachers had to wear underwear. Also no cutoffs, T shirts with messages, clothes with holes or cutouts, stretch pants(gym & dance instructors excepted) tattoos must be covered. The State Board of Education is taking over the district,
they say because of student under achievement.
Geezer mode kicks in and wonders ???????? what kind of teachers did they hire?
Where did they come from?
EMB, my name is Jackquline Monies, named for my father Jack and my mother Pauline. a combination of the two names.
Jacoba de Sottisoli, OFM or Jacqueline de Settesoli or Brother Jacoba was a follower of St. Francis of Assisi and was with him at his death. She lived 1190-1273 and is buried close to St. Francis’ grave. Like St. Francis, she was a friend to animals and is revered by the Franciscan orders. Her feast day is February 8.
I was born and raised by a Southern Baptist grandmother in the deep south. I learned of Brother Jacoba when my daughter chose her as one of her patron saints for her confirmation. in St. Louis’ beautiful cathedral. I was quite shocked.
Brother Jacoba chose the path she followed, contradictory to her upbringing as a wealthy Roman, assisting and caring for St. Francis. She was his closest confidante I have read.
You probably already know this, I am sure, but others may not.
I was born on February 7 far from Italy. My father died there at Monte Casino, filming for the upcoming battle. He was buried where his plane crashed by local villagers.
Sometimes we don’t pick our patron saints nor our guardian angels or even our beliefs. They are preordained I believe.
Peace, EMB (and no editor in the history of my life has EVER offended me. That is what they do, edit)
Love, Jackie
Old Bear, they came from Arkansas!
Debbe: I’m sorry for your loss of your great-aunt. But I understand what you mean…at some point, quality of life becomes much more important than length of life. Something a lot of people seem to fail to grasp until it hits them in the face.
All my aunts and uncles have passed on. Losing one was always like having a link to the past and to my family severed. There were a total of fourteen children on both sides of my family, along with seventeen spouses (two were divorced and re-married, one was widowed and re-married), and my Mom is the last survivor of those 31 people. (She was not the youngest of them by several years and has outlived the last of them by over two years.) She is literally the last of those families’ generations. And yet, overall, her quality of life at this point is remarkably good. I hope I can do half as well as she has.
Good morning, Ghost, I missed my Ghost “fix” so I hope you had a good time and got decompressed.
My mom had 51 first cousins and each and everyone is gone except one aunt in Indiana, so I know what you mean.
Listening to “Wind of Change” right now, a good thought for today.
My dance card for 2015 is filling up fast and it is exciting, whether it all happens or not. I am “going adventuring” this year, one way or another.
Whoa, this is a good play list I am listening to. Now it is Bob Marley, “One Love”.
The thing that has struck me are the friends I have all over the country and the world who I feel certain will help see I have a good time, no matter where I am. Because as Buckaroo Banzai said, “No matter where you go, there you are.”
Love, Jackie
Good morning, Jackie. Slightly delayed “Ghost fix” follows.
Ooooo…another breathless TV news report of a “scary” flying incident yesterday, when an airline flight “was forced to make an emergency landing” because the door to the flight deck malfed, leaving the pilot locked out of the cockpit.
Give us a break, wussified news media. Stop calling everything even slightly out of the ordinary “scary”, “chilling” or “terrifying”. The airliner was landed, without incident, by the First Officer, as he’d undoubtedly done hundreds if not thousands of times before. That’s why there are two fully qualified pilots on board. Other than the door, everything worked as it should have. And the incident even showed that the flight deck door served its primary purpose of restricting access to the cockpit.
Hint to TV and InterWebNet media: If an event is not actually dramatic, your reporting will not make it so. If an event is dramatic, your reporting will not make it any more so.
Ref the report of the teachers’ dress code, it appears to me they may have simply extended their students’ dress to cover the teachers, which sounds only fair. Oddly (to someone of my generation, anyway), the provision that may give many of their teachers the most problem is the prohibition of visible tattoos. There is a reason why the increasingly popular (!) neck tattoo is known in HR shops everywhere as a “job stopper tatt”.
Jackie, expect your sharply-worded emails from the Arkansas Board of Tourism and the Arkansas Chamber of Commerce to arrive any time now.
My favorite PSA for drivers (which I’ve posted here before but it’s been a while):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-8PBx7isoM
Filming it was a story in itself… and is at Wiki under “Embrace Life”.
Ghost is sad. It sounds as though Jackie is going to run off and leave us poor working stiffs and semi-destitute retired folks behind.
My cousin said it and I am trying to deny it- “We are the older generation”
Somewhere around my 50th birthday my dad said ” I can understand being as old as I am
but it is hard to believe I have a son as old as you”. It has not hit me quite yet but it is coming
I will say the same to my son.:)
10-7 for a couple of days.
Keep smiling – It will make them wonder what you are up to.
I have issues with any group who want to be treated as “professionals”, but then present themselves to the public in nonprofessional attire. While we both work out of our home, for client or organization meetings we always dress for the occasion.
St. Francis of Assisi is my patron saint. 🙂
Jackie is going to take the laptop and the Smart Phone along on the road trip and I suspect I will be able to keep living here. The really funny/strange/unbelievable part is this does not include any international travel although I might as well cross into Canada from the Pacific Northwest and Maine as well, since I am going to Almost Canada at least twice if not three times.
What a person can do with their lives often depends on a willingness to go small, go now, as the magazine’s mission statement reads. I have many friends who are proponents of this philosophy and lead amazing lives. One I love very much has been all over the world, living as he says, “On the smell of the oil rag.” He is Australian, that is an Aussie joke, living off the oil rag, so he says he is so poor he doesn’t even have a rag, just the smell.
I have many Canadian friends, this year eight of them from various parts of Canada dragged boats all the way to Oklahoma, a definite record. They live on both ends of their nation so I can go east or west. I have British friends who will take on on journeys down their rivers in canoes, sailing. Sailing the Thames. What an idea!
Not to mention, New Zealand, Australia, the Philippines, Micronesia, Greece, England and most of the European countries. It is amazing how far one can go in a little boat.
Love, Jackie
Jackie, that reminds me of the “chicken shadow soup” story where the peasants are so poor they survive on soup boiled in the shadow of the rich guy’s chicken…
And here’s the funniest set of pranks I’ve sat through:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kPU3Cg7LdTU
Not a mean-spirited gag among them!
If anyone is interested, here is a link to Jerry’s obit…
http://www.bundy-lawfuneralhome.com/obituaries/Jerry-Wolfrom
My children will not be pleased. I am not going to sit and knit. And they worry about their inheritance of course. Ha!
I plan on a deathbed confession to the girls that the money is in the house. Knowing full well that number three will miss the message and destroy the house. 😉
Sign on the back of a very expensive motor home going down the highway: Spending Our Children’s Inheritance.
Just pulling your no doubt shapely leg, Jackie. Sitting and knitting would of course be the last thing I’d ever expect you to do. As a friend used to tell me, “Always take big bites of the apple.”
I’m actually starting to give some thought to what I will do when the inevitable day arrives that I don’t get up and go to work. Volunteer work, of course, and toward that end I’m thinking about getting re-involved with the Civil Air Patrol. So if one day I sign off as “Ghost Rider 6, Capt, CAP” you’ll know what happened. And for some reason that is inexplicable even to me, I’ve been thinking about taking up skydiving. Wouldn’t that be poetic justice after all the grief I’ve given sandcastler™ about jumping out of perfectly good airplanes?
GR6, get a few jumps in. Then I’ll see if we can qualify and get you a HALO jump; as near to space walking as you can get without a rocket.
Did I ever tell about the time I was flying commercial in uniform and somehow ended up seated next to to tall, slender and attractive young blond who, as soon as the takeoff roll began, grabbed my left arm with both of hers and buried my arm in her cleavage (where it stayed for the entire flight), explaining that even though she was a member of her college skydiving club she was terrified of flying? I’m pretty sure I did.
There was something about her story that didn’t ring quite true. I wish I could decide what it was.
Saw something recently about HAHO jumps that allow SpecOps operators to glide as far as 100 miles to their landing zone, sand.
Ha! Just heard a pilot announce on the UNICOM frequency he is about to dump a load of skydivers from 4000 feet over a nearby small airport.
George Bush did it. That impressed me. Or you could bungee jump naked, an option offered to me by a friend in New Zealand where it is aa popular as nudity in general. But I would refer you to a very funny video called “Don’t Bungee Jump Naked With A Baptist” by Jeannie Robertson who points out the obvious gravitation pulls on the human body and settling of body parts.
It is going to take some work before I am even willing to expose body parts period! I don’t believe I would either bungee jump or ride a zip line, clothed or otherwise.
For those who do not know, nudity is not a crime in either Australia or New Zealand and sailing nude is extremely common. Or so I have been told!
Guess skydiving might be the aeronautical equivalent of sailing a Duck or a Rascal. But with a lesser chance of drowning.
Many years back I was on a flight to a city where MLB All Star game was being played. Young lady seated beside me was wife of one of the pitchers. Her fear of flying put my hand in a death grip for the entire flight. Later, her hubby pitched a couple of respectable innings.
GR6, the ground is unforgiving. I can attest to it twice over and is the reason why #83 was the last jump.
The ground is of course involved in this old saying among pilots…
“The air, like the sea, is terribly unforgiving.”
I suspect Sand would be a good coach for practicing minimalist travel (not sailing nekkid) One of my good friends is retired Army helicopter pilot who I need to pay more attention to about that subject. He says he can live on dew and dirt. And I believe him!
Perhaps I should mention that the Scamp I am buying can not only go in lakes but also in real salt water, is designed so that you put a tent over the cockpit and it becomes a sleep aboard sailboat or a gypsy travel wagon. In other words, to save money you can actually pull your little twelve foot boat into a camp/parking lot/whatever and use as a small travel trailer.
If what you want in life is Princess Cruises with 3000 others, this is not for you. But if you want to see stuff up close and personal, go small, go now is a mantra. I guarantee it will not be a dull journey.
Crazy people. Love, Jackie