Apple. Tree. Not far.

Last night, the Critter convinced us to play one of her games with her. I'm not even sure where she gets these kids games from. (If it was up to me, she'd be content with playing poker, like any normal 5 year old). This one's called "Traffic Jam", and consists of putting a bunch of cards with roads and roadblocks onto the table to create, well, a traffic jam. Because the game creators, they're creative like that. Except that there's virtually no way to win the game. There are way too many road cards, and not enough road blocks. Which I guess is supposed to be ok for a kid's game. But seriously. It gets old after playing it seven times in a row. The only good thing about the game is that the rules state you have to yell "Traffic Jam!" when you place a roadblock card down (which can be flooding, cows on the road, or roadworks: very British). Before we played the game, the Critter had hastily drawn up something in preparation for game playing time. To keep track of who was playing. And who was winning. And stuff. Uh-huh. Remember this?
Sometimes the Critter is frighteningly my child. But sometimes, you can clearly see my Bride's genes coming out. Now let me show you what the Critter came up with:
Look... her very first Excel workbook. My Bride didn't understand why I was laughing uncontrollably for the next half hour.
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A Call to Service

There's a lot about what Scott Ritter says that I don't agree with. I'm not anti-Iraq war (which makes me a super popular guy on my visits to San Francisco, let me tell you). But this article is worth a read. His points are salient and well constructed. Such as
  • The Impeach Now crowd is overreaching
  • You don't have to suppor the war to support the troops
  • You can go too far (e.g.: Cindy Sheehan)
  • The American people are woefully uneducated about the Constitution
  • National Service is a good thing and should be compulsory I don't agree with this last one (and I served five years in the Army to help make sure that you don't have to do likewise, if you feel your overwhelming ennui would get in the way of helping out your neighbor, because it's everyone's God-given right to be a lazy slob as far as I'm concerned.) But I like how this guy puts an argument together, even if I can't agree 100% with the position.
    I support the armed forces of the United States, and their mission of protecting America from its enemies. This does not make me pro-war, in the same way that supporting America’s firefighters in their effort to combat fire doesn’t make me pro-fire. However, many Americans fail to understand the difference between supporting a soldier’s mission and supporting war. I support firefighters, but hate fire. I understand that sometimes fires occur, and when they do I want a professional, highly trained, well-led and well-equipped firefighting team to respond to the situation. But I, as a citizen and a firefighter, also recognize that the best way to handle fire is to prevent fires from occurring
    Have a read of the whole thing.
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