Merry Christmas to All!

Humpty Dumpty

The heart of the matter is that our Humpty Dumpty culture has taken a great fall.  Like an iceberg, we only periodically see the psychotic manifestation, the tip of our shattered culture, but what lies just beneath the surface is a gigantic cultural cancer that is rotting America from within. The ugly and dangerous truth is that we live in an embarrassing, politically correct culture that exalts and rejoices in the bizarre; aggressively promotes an “anything goes” value system; and vilifies, condemns and mocks traditional societal values and customs at every opportunity. We’ve embraced a culture of contempt that attacks the very institutions that make for a healthy and strong society, and then we’re shocked when it spirals out of control. The only thing I’m shocked about is that anybody is shocked.

---Ted Nugent

Samsung Galaxy Note 2

I got my Christmas present a little early.  It is a Samsung Galaxy Note 2 smartphone and I absolutely love it.  1.6GHz quad core processor, 2GB RAM, Android 4.1 Jelly Bean and a beautiful 5.5 inch AMOLED screen.  This thing has the same power as my laptop.  It has a small blue missed call or notification light on the top which is something I have sorely missed since my Blackberry days.  The thing is lightning fast and has every feature I could possibly want or think of.  It is big but for me it is great.  It is too big to carry in a pocket but I have never done that anyway.  I value screen real estate and this device is, to me, the perfect compromise between the larger size of a tablet and the smaller portability of a phone.  In the past I would travel with an IPad or Google Nexus, a smartphone and an e-book.  Now I will feel comfortable traveling with just this phone.  The screen is big enough to comfortably browse the web and the extended battery life (much better than any smartphone I have used before) will make the device fine for reading e-books.  Now a one device travel world for me.  I can't say enough about the Samsung products.  As a former IPhone user it is my opinion that Samsung has left them in the dust and Android is a well tuned system as far as I have experienced.  I have never had one problem, hangup, reset, etc, with my use of Android and the integration with my Google account is perfect.

The first pic is the Samsung Galaxy Note 2, the Samsung Galaxy S2 and the IPhone 4S.

The second pic are my devices stacked.  From the bottom up are the IPad, Google Nexus 7, Kindle Paperwhite, Samsung Galaxy Note 2 and Samsung Galaxy S2.

(the quality of the pictures is lousy.  Sorry about that but I was in a hurry)

7 Day Forecast

Damn!  I just got a new promotion, a new phone, some new clothes and now I see this weeks forecast.  Friday looks bad but Saturday looks worse.  I forgot all about the end of the world.  I don't know why I got the oil changed in the Jeep this week.

Where in the World is Tom?

Wow, over a month since I last posted.  Life has been hectic/stressful.  I got swept up in a job promotion and after three grueling interviews I was given the green light.  I can't believe I have gone from a voluntary jobless state where I could concentrate on 'homesteading' around here, to working a few days a month, to working full time and now to a management position.  I DON'T like the fact that I have had little time to devote to my home and plans for this place to be more or less self sufficient.  I also DON'T like that I have not had the time or state of mind for my photography.  Oh well, just a temporary suspension of activities.