Stop and Pause – George Washington established Purple Heart 232 years ago today.

Today's Tids Issue 3,153

Opening Stuff:

 

I feel paranoid this morning that somebody in a store front in Moscow is watching me type.

 

A tip o the Tid’s hat to Diane Feinstein who is holding the Admin’s feet to the fire for their over-the-top redacting of the report on CIA activities during the Bush terms. One of the primary areas she, Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, is concerned about is the complete obliteration of the parts about which interrogation techniques produced valuable information. The entire committee is appalled at the reversal of the Admin’s position of being open with the public on the CIA activities including several Obama authorized torture events. And, the games continue

 

One of our more observant readers adds to yesterday’s “Q”, opining that you should never buy sushi in drug stores.

 

FaceBook keeps on sending me emails trying to entice me to open my account in hiatus so it can rack up more numbers for advertisers. Yesterday’s plea was, “A lot has happened since you last visited”. I agree…like the Russians who stole hundreds of millions of user names and passwords from social media sites!

 

The Question:

There are 5,000 new scrabble words. Name Ten.

 

The Headlines:
--Russia Bans US, Euro Food Imports; NATO Fears Russia Invasion Of Ukraine.

--GAO Says Obama Admin Failed To Properly Account For $619 Billion In Spending; Over $500Bil Of Money Spent By HHS; WH Spokesperson Says They Are Trying To Improve Data Reporting.

--Analysts Say That Sell-Off Due In Part To Dumping Of Billions Of New IPO Shares On Market And Funds Moving Money To Acquire.

--Hamas Emerges Weakened From Gaza Wars; Lost Attack Tunnels, 2/3’s of 10K Rockets. Hundreds Of Fighters.

--Australia Jobless Rate Worse In Three Years.

--Russia Gives Snowden Permits To Stay 3 More Years.

--Missing Oregon Mom’s Death Ruled Suicide.

--Obama Vows To “Scour” Law To Seek Possibilities For Legal Executive Action.

 

I have a tough time writing the words, “Senate ‘Intelligence’ Committee”. Is that the group in the Senate that won’t admit Harry Reid? Is that exclusion why Harry is so mad all of the time?

 

When you live by the shore, it’s always good to keep a bottle of “Wood Hardener” handy. Say, “Wood hardener handy” three times fast.

 

As I remember, there were no Taco stands in the fifties.

 

Let’s say you lived in Rhode island and said to your 8 yo kid, why don’t you walk to see your grandmother in Muncie Indiana. But, you don’t give the kid a map or food. How do he do it? Let’s say you’re living squalor in New Haven and a drug dealer says, “If you give me $10,000, I’ll take you in my pick-up to Muncie Indiana.” Squalor; $10K? This doesn’t sound to plausible, does it? So, who is funding the trips? Who is providing the maps and assistance along the way? George Soris? The HHS rainy day fund? There is something really weird going on.

 

Just in case you missed it, Hamas stopped fighting because they were beaten on the battlefield.

 

As I look around, it is obvious you can sell sports fans just about anything. Down in Maryland yesterday there was a mad rush by fans at the combined Redskins/Patriots practice session to buy $30 T-Shirts signifying the event. As Alan Iverson would say, it’s just practice.

 

The TV program, Tyrant – Tuesday at 10:00, Fx – is beginning to hit its stride, with some significant new complexities added this week. It was getting a little too weenie liberal for the good of the plotline, but that appears to have been entirely reversed.

 

I have noticed more and more companies with a wider variety of prepared meals in supermarkets and big box merchandisers like Costco and BJ’s. The TV dinner is finally coming into its own on a broader basis. Although, I always though Stouffers was as good as it gets.

 

Cronuts, a typical over the top NYC fad has worked it’s way up here and are sold under alternative names because of copyrights. As you may know the pastry is a combination of Croissants and donuts and people stand in line at NYC Soho’s Dominique Ansel bakery (Owner of the trademarked Name) to load up on calories. So, up here we have tasted several from different locales and shared with others and he opinion is, “What’s the Big deal”. Let’s hope Dominique is saving his windfall.

 

The Answer:

When you think about it, 5,000 new words is quite revealing, especially to those whos till have no command of the English language as it has existed for a thousand years or so. Of course, many of the newbies come from the advances in inane conversations revolving around smart phones and social media. Some are Selfie, Hashtag, Geocache, Beatbox, Bling, Bromance, Frenemy, Vlog, Chillax, Buzzkill, Dubstep, Webzine, Funplex, Texter, Mixtape and Meh!. Meh is an expression of ambivalence used on social media, and it may describe the attitude of many scrabblers to the new words. BTW, a lot of the 5,000 are Canadian and British spellings of USA words. “Spell-Check” has not heard of any of them! But I bet Dennis Miller has.

 

It’s easy to feel paranoid these days. Even the old Tidster – happy, upbeat optimistic -- falls into moderate despair at the consideration of all the people trying to scam me in one form or another – from the Government on down. So what do you do? You go to the most beautiful place you know -- the unpredictable unrelenting ocean, the majestic mountainside, the fields of wildflowers waving in the dawning breeze. You look up and feel the warmth of the sun caressing your body; you suck in the love of all the people who a part, big and small, of your life. You absorb the goodness in the world.

 

Have a positive day.