The Greatest Generation-Revisited

Part of my volunteer work over the past few years has been to meet with World War II veterans and talk about their experiences.

I've described those conversations many times on this blog spot.

Over time, the men with whom I had these conversations died or moved to other locations so for the past couple of months I haven't talk to anyone.

Recently however I was asked to meet with two men at an assisted living facility.

One is a WWII veteran of the U.S. Navy who was at Pearl Harbor on that fateful day. He is 97 years old.

The other served in an artillery unit with General Patton from D Day to the end of the war. He is 88 years old.

I am going to be meeting with these two men on Tuesday afternoons and because they each have so much to say, I'll be meeting with them separately for about 45 minutes each.

So stay tuned for some interesting stories.

What is it about my hair?

My grand children seem to have a weird fascination with my hair--such as it is.

Brooke and Courtney are always trying to give me a mohawk or put it in curlers or comb it in different styles which as the years go on is more and more difficult and now Cole has joined the fun.

Yesterday, for example, we were playing and he suddenly stopped and began to closely examine the top of my head which with the exception of a few stray strands is pretty much bare.

He looked at it for a while and finally said, "I like your haircut, grampy." I of course didn't get a haircut. In fact I need one but Cole wasn't looking at the sides of my head or the hair around my ears and neck. He was looking directly at the top of my head.

I explained to him that I didn't get it cut. It was falling out on its own. He pondered that for a while but still thought it was nice.

I wonder what he'll say when I actually do get it cut this weekend!

Life with grand children. It's always an adventure.

Have we learned anything from history?

It has been reported that since our involvement in Libya's civil strife, the rebels who are fighting against Gaddafi have become completely reliant on western support.

Senator John McCain supports our involvement and criticizes Obama for not having done something sooner but I wonder if this is wise. We're already stretched thin around the world.

Is it our role to be involved in every country's business?

Witness Viet Nam & Iraq. Haven't we learned anything from history?

Children and their games

Children never cease to amaze me. My two grand daughters, ages 4 & 7, are constantly making up games.

Now, their cousins, my two grand sons ages almost 2 & 3 are following suit.

For example for the last few times I've been baby sitting for them, they've been playing a game 3-year-old Cole made up. It's called police station.

The way it works is that I am a police office, Nicholas is my assistant and Sadie, the dog, is a police dog.

The way it's played is Nicholas, Sadie and I sit in the living room which is the police station with the double doors closed. Cole plays the part of someone seeking assistance from the police.

Cole knocks on the door and when I answer it, he reports that there are foxes all over the house. It's our duty to round them up and lock them into an imaginary cage somewhere. The problem is no sooner do I pretend to lock the door, then they get loose and start running all over the house.

Other variations to this game are Cole knocks on the door and reports that he's lost. As a police officer I of course offer to help him. When I ask him if he knows where he lives he says 24 Charter Bridge Rd. Actually, he lives on Charter Ridge Rd. but it's a small difference so I don't make a big deal of it.

And so it goes. One problem after another. Sometimes it's someone else who needs help. In that case, we all help.

Even 2-year-old Nicholas is into the game. As soon as I get there in the morning, they want to play 'police station'.

It's great fun but I can't help but wonder what's next!

Crimes in Wisconsin

What's happening in Wisconsin is nothing short of criminal-period. I am sick to death of public employees taking the brunt of the blame for a particular state's insolvency. It has to stop.

Republican Budget Proposal

This looks fair to me. How about you? (Click here to enlarge)

What Global Warming? Who needs science?

All winter long as the snow fell harder than ever and meteorological records were shattered we could hear our republican friends and their fan clubs, conservative pundits, rant about the fraud of 'global warming'.

They used this unusually difficult winter as evidence that science and its own fan clubs, liberals and democratic politicians, was a bunch of bull.

With their comments dripping with disdain and contempt for the scientific community, the newly elected republican Congress decided that one of the things that should be cut from the budget is government grants to all things scientific.

What a pack of idiots! They give the concept of ignorance new meaning.

Either they haven't bothered to research the issue enough or they simply don't care but if they did, they would discover that one of the most well established causes of dramatic climatic changes is exactly the thing they dismiss--global warming.

The key is 'global'. That's exactly how you have to think. It requires people to adopt a world view but they don't understand this. They continue to live in their little, narrow minded, myopic worlds.

This nation will pay big time for the mistakes made in the last election!

Celebrating Read Across America Week

In honor of Read Across America Week I herewith present my choices for the best children and adult books I've ever read.

It was more difficult than I thought coming up with this list. There are so many great books out there.

On top of that consider the many genres available: historical fiction, science fiction, mystery/thriller, adventure, fantasy, romance, etc.

Picking the children's books was difficult too. After all books for a four-year-old would certainly not be appropriate for a ten-year-old.

Nevertheless--and for what it's worth--here's the list.

How many have you read?

Children’s Books (Adults would enjoy these too)

The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
Charlotte’s Web by E.B. White

Winnie the pooh by A.A. Milne

Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak

The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Seuss

Adult Books

Animal Farm by George Orwell

Catch 22 by Joseph Heller

The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck

Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twan

Killer Angles by Michael Shaara

Moby Dick by Herman Melville

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Roots by Alex Haley

To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Stop the Madness

Message to all networks and tabloids: STOP, STOP, STOP.
Don't you realize every time you put a microphone in front of Charlie Sheen, he gets worse? You're not helping him. You're making money off his lunacy thereby making yourselves as bad as him.

Why do I watch? I'm trying not to but every time I turn on the TV or even the radio at pretty much any given time, there he is (along with his two goddesses!)

Every time I look at a newspaper or scan the cover of those sick magazines stacked up as I'm waiting to check out at the grocery store, there it is.

Enough already.