Daily Archives: June 30, 2014

Strangers in Good Company – Octagenarian chick flick

Posted on June 30, 2014 by | 4 comments

http://youtu.be/hxrDtnB4VnU

Hi readers.  One hell of a fine movie streaming on Netflix.

Strangers in Good Company 1990PG 100 minutes, Eight elderly women are left stranded in the wilderness with only their wits, their memories and eventually some roasted frogs’ legs to sustain them. More Info, Starring: Alice Diabo, Constance Garneau, Director: Cynthia Scott
 
A nun, a lesbian, a grandmother or three, artist, birdwatcher, farm girl.  They talk about life, death, love, fear, war and death again as they struggle to catch fish, frogs, find sustenance in the wilderness long enough to survive.
 
*****, Five Stars is how I rate this movie, how tickled I am to have overcome my male prejudices against chick flicks and watched it.
 
Jack

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WWI was NOT an unmitigated blessing

Posted on June 30, 2014 by | Leave a comment
Museum and Memorial Museum and Memorial Built By Kansas Citians, Embraced By the Nation Soon after World War I ended, Kansas City leaders formed the Liberty Memorial Association (LMA) to create a lasting monument to the men and women who had served in the war. In 1919, the LMA and citizens of Kansas City raised more than $2.5 million in just 10 days. The equivalent of roughly $34 million today, this staggering accomplishment reflected the passion of public sentiment for the Great War that had dramatically changed the world. “The National World War I Museum at Liberty Memorial inspires thought, dialogue, and learning to make the experiences of the World War I era meaningful and relevant for present and future generations.” - Mission Statement, National World War I Museum at Liberty Memorial http://theworldwar.org/explore/museum-and-memorial

Museum and MemorialBuilt By Kansas Citians, Embraced By the Nation
Soon after World War I ended, Kansas City leaders formed the Liberty Memorial Association (LMA) to create a lasting monument to the men and women who had served in the war. In 1919, the LMA and citizens of Kansas City raised more than $2.5 million in just 10 days. The equivalent of roughly $34 million today, this staggering accomplishment reflected the passion of public sentiment for the Great War that had dramatically changed the world.
“The National World War I Museum at Liberty Memorial inspires thought, dialogue, and learning to make the experiences of the World War I era meaningful and relevant for present and future generations.”
– Mission Statement, National World War I Museum at Liberty Memorial
http://theworldwar.org/explore/museum-and-memorial      

Hi readers.  Thanks for coming by for a read.   Janne, her son Michael, and I are going over to that WWI National Museum and Memorial on Wednesday.  Wednesdays, instead of it costing $16 to see it, a person can fork out $7 and still experience the full value of it.

Even though the coincidence of the 100th Anniversary of WWI beginning and the 4th of July, 2014, might leave a person thinking otherwise, WWI did have a downside.  The end of Russian rule by the Romanovs, for instance was mitigated somewhat by the rise of Communism, in the opinions of some scholars. 

And there was the 1918 Influenza epidemic, which arguably mightn’t have happened without WWI.  Sure, WWI gave us tanks, warplanes, better artillery and machine guns.  And we’d have had one hell of a time having WWII without having WWI first.

But it can still be argued that a lot of things about WWI could have been better.  Could have made WWII, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, Grenada, the Cold War, and the various Gulf Wars and Afghanistan adventures better.

The simple truth is nobody.  NOBODY won WWI.  Damned thing might as well not have been fought at all for all the good it did.  But acclimated everyone to the concept of fighting the bloodiest wars in human history, conceding the illusion of victory, and walking away losers. 

The USSR was briefly the big winner of WWII, along with West Germany and Japan.  The losers?  Britain, France and the US.  If you don’t believe it, take a look at the US economy, GNP and industry.  Then let your eyes gaze on a world map so’s you can examine the French and British empires today.  Compare that  to Germany, Japan, Korea, any AXIS power except Italy.

So while you’re celebrating the 4th of July and the beginning of WWI this week, do some thinking.  How can you do it better this time around?  How can you keep the losers from winning it?  Resign yourself you will repeat history.  And next time, try using your heads.

Old Jules

 

 

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Curtain Raiser

Posted on June 30, 2014 by | 3 comments

A lot more needs to be thought and said about WWI than is being thought and said, generally. Wesley’s taken it upon himself to think and say some of it: J

CollTales

The Myth of an Endless War, Colltalers

There was a common denominator in most stories about the 100th anniversary this past Saturday of Archduke Franz Ferdinand’s assassination, by a Serbian teenager, which sparked the beginning of World War I a month later, on July 28th, 1914: few can point exactly why it happened.
The war that’s only identified as the first now because it was followed shortly after by the second, turned Europe into cinder, killing over 8 million and wounding another 20 million, and changed forever the continent’s inner borders, while erasing entire empires from its map.
As it was not restricted to Europe, it’s ironic that such grim milestone happens just as pressure for a third military intervention in one of those countries it indirectly ‘bred,’ Iraq, is being rehashed by Pentagon and congressional hawks as the only response to recent events on the ground.
More of Iraq…

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Posted in Adventure

I’ll call your walking machine and raise you a bicycle

Posted on June 30, 2014 by | 5 comments

Hi readers.  Thanks for coming by for a read.

I’m sure those nurses down at physical therapy intend the best.  I’ve no doubt when they hector me about the settings on those machines they only have my best interest at heart.  But I still try to cheat and occasionally succeed, steal a few MPH, or a couple of minutes than they said was okay.  But my time’s running out with them anyway.

I’ve got to find some other exercize, might buy a membership at the new community center here, though it’s a tight squeeze in the dollars department.  And yesterday Jeanne’s son, Mike, was over, said he had a Raleigh mountain bike sitting over there not being used. 

So I briefly borrowed the one he was riding, took it up the block to the blind school, or deaf school, whatever, and back.  Just a block, and I was breathing hard, but not too hard when I returned.  Defibrillator didn’t kick me in the chest.  And I didn’t fall off the damned thing.

So I’m going to borrow that bike from him if he’ll loan it to me.  Begin riding it around Olathe, Georgia, Kansas, whereever this place is, dodging automobiles, shaking my fist at drivers who want to share a piece of the road.  Shouting threats and curses.

There are plenty of places I might be able to go to in this town that I was reluctant to try to walk because I run out of steam after a block or two.  But a bicycle!  A hotdiggedydamn Raleigh bicycle with about 90 gears on it, that’s a different herd of sheep entirely.

Gonna be a man about town.  A man to be reckoned with. 

Old Jules

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