Ding dong the witch is dead…

Quite the weekend we’ve had, led into it with a momentous wedding, which  I have maintained my tradition of watching (this being my second in my “tradition”). I sat in front of the TV, watched the crowds go crazy as different people arrived (with me not having the foggiest who most of them were, oh, but I did recognize Elton John, so that’s good right?). Then I watched the procession of vehicles as they arrived, Princes William and Harry, Prince Charles and Camille, and finally the new princess’ vehicle was en route. And true to my traditional watching format, I don’t remember a thing afterward as I fell asleep. This time, however, I was able to catch the wedding online (at least I was able to skim through it, I won’t pretend to be that interested that I sat and watched it in it’s entirety). So the next wedding… I know EXACTLY when to get some sleep started (as the bride approaches).

Now onto Saturday, we got up and headed over to Watson Lake for the Civil War Reenactment event. This was pretty epic, and really got my curiosity up about the Civil War and some of the things that took place. Whether it was a brief candle flame that will flicker out in a few days or it ignited a solid flame that will keep me going for awhile still is to be determined, but either way, I know I’ll be at more of these reenactments. One thing about this area I’ve relocated to, it is rich in heritage and it loves to share that with everyone. July we have the “Shootout on Whiskey Row” that I’ll be at, and there are a lot of museums and such around I still want to get in to see. Might make it to Sharlot Hall Museum tomorrow with Jim, Vanessa, Diana, and grandma (depends on how the morning meetings go, won’t know for sure until I am actually standing there with them most likely). Anywho, back to the Civil War stuff, the first reenactment of the day was quite a sight, everyone dressed the part in their period clothing (I even saw someone riding around in an authentic period replica power chair, that was impressive!). During the reenactment there were cannons being fired, muskets being loaded and shot, men pretending to be killed. It was quite a sight and I got some decent video of it that I’ll do my best to get onto Youtube in the next few days and post some links here. Unfortunately the cannons lose ALL of their impact through my little camera, each time they fired you felt it through your entire body, it was quite a rush. The kids all seemed to enjoy it, and hopefully it gets their curiosity piqued enough to pay attention a bit more in school for those history lessons (I didn’t exactly set the bar high for them, just for the record).

Then Saturday night it was UFC fights. I was a UFC virgin (I’ve attended a cage fight back in California once), but this was the first time I was attending a Pay-Per-View event. The fights leading up to the “main event” were all pretty decent, with a good mix of some going the full distance, and some finishing up in just a few hits. The main event was nothing major to speak of as the two opponents (in my humble opinion anyway) were evenly matched so the fight was fairly uneventful. However, the big fight of the night happened a little earlier. Between Jose Aldo, and Mark Hominick, in which Hominick was clearly not on top for the first 4 rounds, with the 4th round being stopped about half way through so a doctor could examine the huge welt forming on Hominicks forehead. They continue the fight and going into round 5, Hominick gives it his all knowing he won’t win by decision. It looks like he might actually pull off the upset when the final buzzer rings and Aldo ends up with the win. It was quite an exciting event, not sure I would press the order button on the pay-per-view fees myself for a future event, but definitely willing to attend and watch more.

Then Sunday I get up, check through my emails, thinking it odd that I have so few but not really putting it all together, before realizing that my web server is not responding. That was quite an interesting event, but I’ll save that to share with you on the Tekamba blog (you DO read that one too right?). The general gist of the story is my server was down, I dealt with not so intelligent people (see? I CAN be politically correct, I didn’t call them idiots!) and finally they got my server restarted and working. If you want to read the details of this part of my day, you can do it here – Servers crashing everywhere, and no support to be found…

I finally return home then Sunday night to see everyone in the house watching news reports of Bin Laden having been killed. Reports were still sketchy (and will probably remain so for quite awhile (and by awhile I mean ever)). Long and short of it is this, Bin Laden is dead, Obama is taking the credit, and we should be scared s%@tless! I got into a debate several years ago (don’t remember who with) regarding America’s ability to take out anyone deemed a national security risk (which could potentially be anyone, but I digress). I believed, and still do, that we have the might, intelligence, capability, etc to do exactly that. Pick a target, and within hours (not days, or weeks, or years, but HOURS) of making the decision, the targeted person would cease to be a threat. This person I was debating with didn’t argue that point with me, but rather stated that it wasn’t a matter of our ABILITY to take these actions, but our leaders DESIRE. Please don’t put words into my blog and say I don’t think our military has desire or any such thing, our military is FULL of men and women who just ooze desire to do right by their country no matter what, and my utmost respect and love goes to them for their risking the most ultimate of sacrifices. Instead, what they were debating me was our leaders wish to actually get rid of someone as powerful as Bin Laden.

Now they could never publicly come out and state they were reluctant to give the order, but the argument was this. Bin Laden is (at the time, was now) a most intimidating and ruthless force who could potentially attempt anything. But he was a KNOWN source. We knew what type of a person he was, who (or what) his anger was most directed at and how he was most likely to express that anger. Basically, we KNEW Bin Laden. Now that he is gone, we know MUCH less. Who will attempt to take over? What will their focus be? We may have won the battle today, but what have we done to the ultimate outcome of the war? And the fact that Obama is standing up and taking credit just adds fuel to my fire. I find it odd that Bin Laden was taken out now, as we start heading into the presidential election period. And Obama (who knows his days are numbered) takes credit? I am the LAST one to cry conspiracy theory most of the time, but I find the timing of these events to be peculiar and just hope everyone keeps their eyes open for the bigger picture. It is my firm belief that we could have take Bin Laden out and almost any time we wanted. The fact the Obama gives the go ahead now (whether he makes that statement (or made) I don’t know, but again this is my belief) seems particularly troubling to me. He needs his numbers raised, and what better way than to nab America’s Public Enemy #1?

Well, enough of the political talk. Keep you heads up, your eyes open, and lets all do what we need to return this country to its roots. Of, by, and for the people is what this country was founded on, and until we all remember that, and return to that most basic of beliefs I think we are doomed to keep repeating our mistakes.

Gerg