Viewsyoucanuse2

 I was a poor reader. In third grade Ms Cicchetto told my parents that my reading had gotten worse over the summer and I was reading at the second grade level. I tried to read more, but I just didn't care about reading. TV was much more interesting. Then Mom signed me up for the Library Reading Club. If you read ten books...any books...you got an award. So we went to the Library every Friday afternoon. I picked books that looked good. And I read Ten Books. The Library lady came to our school and to Ms. Cicchetto's surprise, I was awarded a Reading Club Certificate. This began my interest is reading. By 1960, we were living in Germany and I was reading paperback books when I found Dr No. It was a spy book about a British secret agent named James Bond. The author was Ian Fleming. Later in 1962, I saw the movie Dr No, with Sean Connery. I went on to read every Fleming book and those by Le Carre all the way to Brad Thor. On October 11, we go to see "No Time to Die at IMAX. CLI...

 No issue in the last 20 years has created more divisiveness, than Inequality . The idea that humans are NOT all equal in our income, careers, lifestyle and social interaction has consumed the progressive left. Bernie is an ardent outspoken critic of Inequality, specifically in wages. Even last evening, the Emmy winners were criticized because they were all white. The implication being, that others were not being treated fairly or equal. But reality tells us, we are NOT all the same and hence we are not all equal. Some of us are taller. Others are faster or stronger. Many are far smarter and some are far more lazy. Humans simply are NOT all Equal. Accept this as a fact. Our Egalitarian society doesn't really guarantee equality. We are told we have "equal opportunity". What we make of this opportunity is really up to us. We are created equal, but what happens next is largely our own responsibility. Income Inequality is really a comparison between to completely different jo...

 I listened to Joe today. He told me that Corporations pay zero income tax and the Billionaires pay a lower tax rate than Firefighters. He is correct. The implication is that this is a bad thing but it isn't. Corporate Tax is a hoax. Liberals do not understand how to manage a business. All cost to the business are bundled together and divided by the Units of products sold. This gives a fixed indirect cost to be added to the cost of goods in the establishment of a Unit selling price. A Simple Example : If a business has rent, utilities, cleaning services and taxes they add them up for the last year. Say these indirect cost total to $200,000. They look at sales and discover they sold 20,000,000 units or widgets or iphones or hairdryers, whatever. They divide the indirect cost by the total Units sold and find out that its 10 cents per unit. This ten cents is added to the direct cost of making and selling the Units or widgets. Get it? The combined indirect and direct cost are added t...

  The Answer: Gavin Newsom was not recalled. The Question : What happened? A few things are clear. First, Newsom has done a poor job as Governor. He operates like this position of California Governor is really just a temporary job waiting for the next step in his political career. He has not solved the California Wildfire crisis, or the Water crisis, or the Homeless crisis, or managed the Covid response well. Newsom's reactionary approach is, to have a meeting and form a committee to study the problem. Then hold a news conference to claim action is being taken. Meanwhile, wildfires burn and water is short. The Homeless flood the streets and California Lockdown almost crushed the economy. The Recall was justified. Second. Once the recall was approved the supporters stopped selling the Newsom Failure message. They assumed everyone knew Newsom was a failure and switched to supporting a candidate of their choice. This was the major mistake. Team Newsom converted the performance orient...

I have known Pam Olroyd for 27 years. We met in the Bermuda Onion in Urbana, Illinois on July 13, 1994. I thought she was the smartest person I had ever met. Then she agreed to marry me and I thought maybe she isn't as smart as I think. Turns out, she had a plan to fix my bad attitude and caustic behavior. Today we have been married 19 years. This is the longest I have ever been married. I owe it all to her. She has created our wonderful life, our family and my happiness. She believed me when I told her I would make a life for us together. She "ran away" to California with me and made our dream come true. I am the luckiest guy in the world.  

In the summer of 1949 my father was stationed at Elmendorf Air Force Base in Anchorage Alaska with the U.S. Air Force Security Service. The US had entered the Korean War and Elmendorf was a refueling and logistic stop for men and supplies flying into Korea. The base had been built in 1940 during World War II and it was primitive at best. Dependents, families, were allowed to live there but there was no base housing and no materials available to build new base housing. America was at war. Families could wait. My father and many other service men wanted their families with them. So, in the spring of 1950 my father flew to Scott Air Force base in Illinois to take us back to Alaska. He bought a new Chevy "Carry-All" the for runner of the Suburban and a 20 foot mobile home. We left in June of 1950 on our move with everything we owned. I was four years old and my sister was two. We drove the 4374 miles from Saint Louis to Anchorage. Driving during the day and living in the trailer ...

   My first experience with an auto dealership was in 1952. Our family had been living in Anchorage , Alaska and we were moving to Texas. Dad had driven us to Alaska two years earlier and pulled a motor home [trailer] all the way from St. Louis Missouri to Anchorage. That is another good story. He decided to sell everything to some new serviceman who wanted to move his family to Anchorage but not go through the drive. So we sold the trailer and our 1949 Chevy Carryall. We took a ship from Seward, Alaska to Seattle, Washington. At the Seattle dock, Dad found a cab and told him to take us and our luggage to a Mercury Dealer. Mom and Dad walked around, looking at cars and they bought a brand new Mercury Monterey for cash. We all jumped in the new car and drove to Texas. It was a fun road trip. We stopped at Yellowstone along the way. Dad loved the new car after driving a Chevy truck for the last two years. The Mercury had a V8 and it was exciting. As a kid, my dad would take me e...

  For the last five years I have been going to Jax Donut,  in Brea, on Friday morning to buy a dozen doughnuts for our weekend breakfast. This began as a one time treat and then it grew. For two years it became a Wednesday & Friday Morning event for me and my son, Jack. Wednesday is "late start" at Brea Schools and the kids show up because their parents, who go to work, drop them off. Jack started buying a dozen doughnuts on Wednesday morning to take to his friends. Jack and I got to know the owner, Tracy, from Cambodia. Then Covid hit. Nobody was going to work and Tracy's simple little business, like others, lost almost all her customers. On a Friday in March 2020, I showed up to buy doughnuts. Tracy was sad. Nobody had come to buy doughnuts yet that morning. So as a lark, I paid her $100 for a dozen Doughnuts and told her it would get better. The next Friday, it wasn't better, so I bought another dozen for $100. Through April, May and June of 2020. I bought over...

 It was Monday, September 10, 2001. Roger Mucino, Jack King and I were going to Vegas to look at food processing equipment at the Equipment Show. Pam Olroyd was meeting me there so we could all go out to dinner. At LAX, Roger and I were told we could not carry on our pocket knives which we had done many times before. We returned them to the car and caught our flight to Las Vegas. Looking back, this TSA limit of pocket knives seems to be a foreshadowing of things to come. We got to Vegas in 50 minutes and checked into our rooms at the Venetian. Roger, for some odd reason, was given a massive upgrade to a huge suite. After getting settled, we all went to the bar for drinks. It was just another evening in Vegas. We met Jack King and his wife for dinner and planned to meet in the morning to attend the Equipment Show. Pam had an early flight out of  McCarran to Boise. She got up, dressed and was gone by 6:00 AM. It was Tuesday, September 11, 2001 . At 6:30 Pam called my mobile phon...

  My family is from Belleville, Illinois. We moved all over the world because my father was in the military. We always considered "St Louis" home in spite of never actually living in St Louis. In 1976 my father had retired from the military and had returned to living in Bellville when he had a heart attack. I was working in Gunnison, Colorado at the time. My mom asked me to move back to live closer to them and in May of 1976, I moved to St Louis. I wanted to be close but not too close to my parents and crazy sister. St Louis was 30 minutes away from Belleville and in another state. It was perfect. I lived in and renovated three different homes on Russell in the Shaw Neighborhood in South St Louis City. St Louis is really a city, a county, and a Regional MSA  [ Metropolitan statistical area - Wikipedia ]. People refer to it all as St Louis in spite of living in Hazelwood or Fenton. I lived in the City. St Louis is unique in that it separated from St Louis County in 1877 to bec...

At the time, way back in 2001, I said this was a bad idea and it would not end well. I expected a short invasion and then a defeat much like Britain and Russia had experienced. Clearly, I underestimated the stupidity of Federal Government.  George Bush started this mess but the blame is shared by others. Obama could have stopped this and didn't. Trump said he would, but like everything else, he never found the time. Both US political parties supported ongoing funding and deployment of forces. In the end, it was all for nothing. Voters accepted the War because we were sold on "False Patriotism". If you don't support our troops you are unAmerican or a traitor. The Pentagon spent over $125 million dollars supporting false patriotism at sporting events over the 20 year period. This does not include the cost of military aircraft and flight crews for ceremonial fly overs. Americans were sold the military and the war just like they are sold Budweiser. In the end, neither wer...

On September 15, Pam Olroyd and I will be married for 19 years. A lot of other people have been married longer. 19 years is no real milestone. But I haven't done well at marriage and for me this is a big deal. I met Pam Olroyd on July 13, 1994. She was interviewing for a job with our company. I was there to really size up the search criteria we were trying. After 10 minutes, Pam and I connected. It was "best friends at first sight." That was 27 years ago and Pam is still my best friend. Over the years I have become an old man. I'm not cool, funny or good looking. Pam has become a mother, MBA Graduate, cancer survivor, and Corporate executive. She is far smarter than I ever was and I have no idea why she continues to put up with me. I work every day just to not disappoint her.

A NEW BEGINNING After years without a Blog, in which I put almost everything in Facebook NOTES, I am back to Blogging. Facebook decided to end their NOTES section and with it went all my pithy comments for the last 6 years. Google however, kept my old blog here:  http://viewsyoucanuse.blogspot.com/ . So I have begun a New Blog at:  Viewsyoucanuse2  and will post ideas and comments here. Let me know what you think.