I found this article on agapepress.org this morning. Wow. Please take a few minutes to read it.

Our brave soldiers, and the rest of the world, are getting a horribly jaded view of the war in Iraq from American media. Thank God that the majority of Americans are not buying in to the liberal media’s hateful spin.

In brief, a wounded Marine called in to a talk radio show to share how he and his comrades were scared to death about the reception they would get in the U.S. based on the media coverage they were seeing in the hospital. They honestly believed that they would face the same persecution that Viet Nam vets came home to.

We saw what the media was saying about what’s going on, and we were worried about what we were actually going to face when we came home. We didn’t know what to expect, to be honest with you. From the news media we were seeing, the whole country was basically telling us we’re a bunch of jerks.
…
What’s going to happen? What will we be facing? Is it going to be like the Vietnam era, are there going to be people spitting at us?

Fortunately, he didn’t come home to insults and protests. He came home to an airport full of grateful applause (a month before the super bowl commercial).

If you know a soldier, let them know that America loves them for what their doing. If you don’t know a soldier, you can find one.

(P.S. If you run into any Viet Nam vets, tell them you love them too, and apologize for the crap the hippy generation morons put them through. Funny, that’s the same group of people who are running the current media smear campaign.)

Well, let’s see what else can go wrong.

Last week, if you recall, I had a bout of insomnia. I’m quite sure this lead to me coming down with a nasty cold on Monday; sinus rebellion, fever, and general nastiness. I stayed home from work on Tuesday and tried to sleep it off. I also missed the first practice for the church’s spring musical. Wednesday, I went to work with less fever, but I was still quite loopy and mentally unfocused. Today, I have no fever, but for some reason, I’m still very groggy and unfocused. Honestly, I feel like I’m drunk, but I’m not even medicated, so there’s no good reason for it.

While at work on Wednesday, my PC freaked out again and kept me from getting any work done all day. It’s been slowing dying for a few weeks now, and keeping the new network administrators on their toes all the while. They finally threw in the towel and started build a new computer for me.

Today I received said computer and started setting it up for my needs, installing this and that. In the mist of my installs, the video card puked. Another hour lost. I finally got to get some work done this afternoon. Once caught up, I thought I’d check on the blog. Well, what do you know, I can’t log in. Grrr.

Keep in mind, I’m still only half here mentally. This cold still has my brain working on auxiliary power for some reason. So, I decided there must be something wrong with my installation of WordPress. I went ahead and upgraded my install to the latest version available on Fantastico (the service BlueHost uses to provide nice applications like WordPress).

This did not fix my log in problem, but did do a nice job of overwriting all my style changes. I was able to strong-arm the database for WordPress to get my password fixed and get me logged back in. I was also able to find an old back-up of my CSS files and PHP template, although these back-ups do not have the latest and greatest. I am still missing my WBQotW on the menu. I’m hoping I can find a newer version of my template at home, maybe in my browser cache.

I had hoped to make a couple of posts about current events in the news, but now I’ve eaten up what time I had left today. Now, I have to get home and get to spring musical rehearsal. I just hope I don’t get pulled over, because I’m fairly sure I would fail a field sobriety test.

*sigh*

It has only happened to me a handful of times in my whole life. Last night, I was feeling kinda weird. I was really tired at about 8:00 PM. I decided to listen to my body and go to bed early. Then, I woke up at about 10:00 PM. I laid in bed staring at the ceiling, and listening to my wife, Tammy, grind her teeth.

By midnight I was going nuts, so I decided to get up and find some activity that would put me to sleep. I watched a couple of movies I didn’t really care about. I read for a while. I tried playing some internet puzzle games. Then I read some more.

Tammy gets up at 4:30 AM (She has to be at work at 6… blech!) and when she got up, I was still sitting in front of my computer reading a really dull book. I took the rare opportunity to spend some time with her in the morning.

I got to work at 5:30 AM. It’s now almost 9 AM and I feel all kooky. I’m not so much sleepy as just in a fog. I am SO glad that I don’t suffer from insomnia. I would be ready to kill somebody if I had to go through this on a regular basis.

Yep. I’m sorry to say, I’ve given in and fallen for one of the web’s most ancient evils… the Meme list.

CD I have in my car that I roll up the windows to listen to
It’s actually a cassette tape of my favorite Doctor Demento songs.

Book I read flat so no one could see the title
PVP The Dork Ages

Crappiest song ever sung at karaoke
Yellow Submarine

Bad movie I watch repeatedly
Bubble Boy. Seriously, though, I still think this movie SHOULD BE a cult classic. But it’s not… *pout*

Article of clothing I love though I know it’s wrong
Any number of t-shirts that Tammy won’t let out of the house. Particularly one with a line drawn face picking its nose with the caption, “WHO CARES?”

What I order at the bar when no one is listening
As if I ever go to bars. But when I do it’s usually water with lime.

Fast food item I adore
Chipotle!!!!

A TV show that is a good example of the downfall of civilization that I love anyway
King of the Hill. I swear I grew up with some of those people. I AM related to Bobby Hill. Just with a slightly different name.

This came down the pipe from Mouse Words, to Rox Populi, to A Small Victory, to Apropos of Something, to me.

I’m sure you will all be happy to know that we survived the Christmas holiday. We drove to Amarillo Thursday in the snow. (Yes, I know, can you imagine all those Dallas drivers skating around in confusion and we still survived. God still does miracles.) We just finished the drive home and unpacked.

A wonderful time was had by all and Saint Nick was generous. We have had a very blessed year and we are thankful not only for our comfortable status, but also for our hope in salvation that Jesus brought us when he came to earth.

I’ve got a diggy-cam bustin’ with pictures that I hope to have posted in the next few days.

God bless you and have a great new year.

If there is something strange about this post, please forgive me. I am forced to make this entry directly into the database, rather than use my blog site. I’m not sure why, but I can’t get logged on from here.

I am at Microsoft Brainwashing again, this week. What?! Training on the week of Christmas? Yes. Isn’t that sad?

There is much I’d like to post about, but I dare not while Big Brother Bill is monitoring my every thought. I’ll be sure claw my thoughts into the flesh of my arm so I’ll remember to post about them next week.

Until then, BUY MICROSOFT OR DIE!

Alas, the Lord has heard my whining and granted a reprieve. We did not go climbing last night. Instead my dear wife and I sat on the couch from 6 to 10 and watched my new movie, ROTK. (Yaaay!)

Need I bother with a review? Well, of course! It RAWKED!! There were a couple of scenes in the extended edition that left me confused. It has been about three years since I finished the book and my memory is fading, but I’m pretty sure they changed some things. I’ll be taking some free time (Good Lord willing) over the next couple of days to reread a few passages of the book.

The acting in this last chapter of the LOTR trilogy was really moving. As doom closes in and all seems lost, we get to see the tender, emotional side of all the key characters and they all do a grand job. Sean Astin, as Samwise Gamgee, has already proven himself in the previous movies. More than any other character, I believe he deserved an Oscar.

The one that really struck me was Billy Boyd, playing Peregrin Took. His character is the child of the fellowship and always the one getting in to trouble. Up to this point in the story, he’s been almost entirely carefree. But in this last edition, he really goes deep with the character and does it with excellent results.

Many of the actors had to do scenes in which they had to tell the story without words. There are many long close-ups that serve only to express the emotion of the moment. Any actor can tell you that is the hardest kind of scene. And they all pulled it off wonderfully.

And so, I risk setting a dangerous precedent, but I feel it’s only just. For my very first movie review, I award the LOTR trilogy a perfect score of 5 grins.

Now look what you’ve done. You’ve gone and made me start thinking about movie reviews. I’m going to have to create a whole new post category and post reviews of all the movies I’ve seen in the last few months. Shame on you. Now go to your room.

Last week… no… the last month has been insanely busy. We wrapped up the Christmas play on Sunday with great success and relief. Tammy and I were looking forward to a solid week with no commitments AND (insert cheesy trumpet fanfare) the release of LOTR ROTK. (If you’re not geek enough to know what those acronyms mean try mousing over them.)

Sunday night, our great friends, the Preeces, invited us to “scream out our stress” from the last few weeks at Six Flags. Okay, we’ll start our relaxing “us” time on Monday.

Monday, we realized we still had yet to go grocery shopping since we’d moved into the new apartment… three weeks ago. We had absolutely no food and were dangerously low on other essentials, like toilet paper. Okay, we’ll start our time of rest on Tuesday.

Monday night (more like Tuesday morning) one of our kids called us. She’s been experiencing huge amounts of stress too and she really needed some quality time. So we decided to take her out for dinner Tuesday night. We ended up at the mall until way past our bed times. Tammy had picked up the ROTK extended DVD at lunch, so we would snuggle up and watch it on Wednesday night. Half a week of rest is better than nothing, right?

This afternoon (Wednesday) another of our kids called. She’s the one we’ve all been stressing about because she is suffering through a deplorable situation at home. Long story short, she needs a ride to church and there’s no way we’re turning that down, even if her mom has dragged her off to some new boyfriend’s house an hour away.

Okay, “us” time is not in the cards for this week. We’re going climbing with the Preeces tomorrow and Friday God only knows what’s in store. Maybe we can sit down and watch the movie together on Saturday. Maybe.

I don’t mean to sound whiney. I am humbled and honored by the fact that God has trusted us with so many responsibilities. I relish the fact that we are doing His work.

But still…. I’d really like to see that movie.

Wow… Where to begin…

Nine days ago, Sunday before last, I headed out on a camping trip with some of the guys from the church youth group for a retreat. We were planning to go to Pedernales Falls State Park near Austin, but it had been raining the whole week before and the forecast was for more rain. We decided to stay closer to home and opted for Mineral Wells.

It did rain every day we were there. It was soggy, but we all still had a good time. We got some good hiking time in and the guys got to spend a lot of time with the Lord.

I got home Tuesday afternoon cleaned up and hung my tent and sleeping bag up to dry. I took my wonderful wife out to eat and then got a phone call from my sister, Sabra. Sabra and her fam were going to be driving through the next day on their way to my folk’s ranch in La Grange and offered to save me the gas of driving down myself. I took her up on it.

They pulled in to Arlington at about 3:30 on Wednesday and I hoped in. (Tammy flew to Amarillo on Thursday morning to spend Thanksgiving with her family. Long story, but it was a good decision.)

My dad was having some survey work done on the ranch which required cutting some paths through the dense woods along the perimeter of the property. These paths revealed other, smaller trials through the woods created by the horses and wild deer. This gave him the idea to buy some cheap paintball guns from Wal-Mart. Thanksgiving was great. We had paintball wars in the woods every day. Oh, and the food was good too. (Thanks, Mom!)

I got back from La Grange around lunch time on Sunday. I met Tammy at the church and we did some counseling with one of “our kids” who’s having some personal problems. We got home in time to catch the 3:00 football game. Then we started packing.

“Packing?” you ask. Yes, packing. The apartment next door to ours is an end unit, thus no neighbors on the bedroom side, thus much quieter. It also has a bigger balcony that’s screened in and new appliances. It’s been vacant for a couple of months now and we decided to move. This is certainly our easiest move ever. Our living room couch is moving literally about a foot, even though we have to carry it out one door and in the other.

Last night (Monday) we started moving and got about half way done by 9:30. We both tuckered out and called it a night. Today we should have 90% of our stuff in the new place. Since we’re not really packing most of it, there’s no unpacking to do. Just take and arm load off this shelf and put it on the exact same shelf next door. We do still get the benefit of moving in that we are going to get rid of LOTS of junk we don’t really need.

Once we’re done moving and cleaning up the old place, we’ve got our usual busy weekend ahead, and next week is going to be the craziest of all. As I inherited the church’s Christmas play, and it is STILL behind schedule, I’ll be at the church EVERY NIGHT next week for tech set up, que rehearsals, dress rehearsals, final run throughs, and finally, three performances on Saturday and Sunday (Dec. 11th and 12th).

So, now you will understand and hopefully forgive my lack of posting the last week or so and for the next two weeks. Hey, at least we’re not bored!

I’ll be gone all this week. The first half, I’ll be camping with the guys from the youth group. The plan is to go to Pedernales State Park, down by Austin. But with the weather map being green from Nebraska to Mexico, we may choose plan B, which is to go to Mineral Wells. If we going to get rained on, might as well be closer to home.

After the camping trip, I’ll be back in DFW just in time to put Tammy on a plane to Amarillo, change out the clothes in my bag, and head down to La Grange. Tammy’s doing Thanksgiving with her family, to lend support to her sister who is getting divorced. I’m going down to our traditional Ladd family Thanksgiving on the ranch. There has been talk of paintball wars in the woods, and I plan to bring my “game face”.

So, please forgive me if your comments don’t get approved for a few days this week.

Now, go and be thankful! God think’s you’re special and He loves you very much!