joansanusi posted: " Happy New Year! May this new year bring us all more of the glory that is ours in Christ Jesus! Amen Endeavour this new year to be persistent in the pursuit of your God given destiny! Never forget your dreams, take steps daily, and persistently! You wi"
Happy New Year! May this new year bring us all more of the glory that is ours in Christ Jesus! Amen
Endeavour this new year to be persistent in the pursuit of your God given destiny! Never forget your dreams, take steps daily, and persistently! You will have testimonies! So shall it be!
"Dripping water hollows out stone, not through force but through persistence.
nemonemini posted: "I have tried for quite a while to critique the Marxist legacy from the left, along with its outcomes, Bolshevik, and in the Chinese case, and others. The realm of Marx had really bad luck, and the Bolshevik case (with the Chinese basically in that categor"
I have tried for quite a while to critique the Marxist legacy from the left, along with its outcomes, Bolshevik, and in the Chinese case, and others. The realm of Marx had really bad luck, and the Bolshevik case (with the Chinese basically in that category) produced a distortion that is almost impossible to deal with short of starting over with new and very careful use of terms. China emerged very closely matched at the start with Bolshevik then Stalinist thinking. It has always been so. It is time face reality: The CPC is a pseudo-communism, authoritarian, fascist, ethnocentric, neo-colonialist and racist, genocidal gangster operation tied to and strangely a colony of neoliberal capitalism. The left raised on Marxist dogmas cannot discriminate between interpretations of a 'shared' Marxist jargon universe. All we can do is leave the Chinese case behind and start over, however reluctant many would be to accept that. Here we have dropped for good the term 'communism' for neo-communism, to keep one step ahead of cognitive dissonance. The fault we must consider lies with the original Marxist corpus, mindful that can be unfair. And yet there is a vein of flawed thinking in the Marx legacy, which is depressing in its total failure to produce any successes. You may call this extreme, but what is the alternative? Communism in any real sense requires overthrowing the Chinese monstrosity and starting over. As we have noted many times, part of the problem is the use of slogan nouns, like socialism, undefined and which then refer to doomed realizations. We must have a new and rigorous terminology. Part of the problem lies with 'stages of production' theory, which prophesies communism to come after capitalism. But the historical theory behind that is not science in any sense, and it has led to a complacency about the inevitability of postcapitalism when the stark reality is that an intelligent left of some sort has to define what that means and do the job right, not so simple, and beyond the capacity of cadre Marxists who imagine solidarity with the CPC.
The world is waiting anxiously and short of conviction for a new path to socialism. But that is not so simple given monstrosities like the CPC and its Bolshevik sources.
Within and outside DSA, many on the Left have aligned themselves with the Communist Party of China (CPC). Guest author Travis S. submitted this piece to Tempest in the interest of furthering debate on the question of how the left should relate to the CPC. He explores the contradictions and implications of tying the Left to the ruling party of China.
John Ward posted: " It's odd, is it not, that one emerges from various amorous calamities not just with yet more wisdom stored away for future use, but also various mementos and keepsakes. The best of them all was a delightful portrait of a giraffe following a fun few w"
It's odd, is it not, that one emerges from various amorous calamities not just with yet more wisdom stored away for future use, but also various mementos and keepsakes. The best of them all was a delightful portrait of a giraffe following a fun few weeks with a Finnish lady, because she knew it to be my favourite animal. A Vietnamese Parisian (as adorable as she was unpredictable) pressed a brilliantly designed bloke's shoulder bag into my possession. Russian Olga donated a business card that declared her to be a Tractor Martekeer - too close to Kompeer the Meerkat for comfort. An Irish lady in Portugal donated a pair of very dark reading glasses which, it seemed to me, she had been using to frame her CNN view of the world for far too long. A British girl gave me a disposable toothbrush entirely in keeping with the nature of our very brief encounter; and more recently, a Mystery Woman of complex nationality gifted me a Smartphone she didn't want....
I can only surmise that she did so because, like her, the phone is an enigma I have yet to unravel. It didn't help that the charger, the pc connection cable and the user manual were absent from the gift package. But it has been useful in once again confirming my insistence that no pointy-headed geek should ever be allowed anywhere near the marketing and explanation of hitech products.
Allow me to enlarge upon a view I have been expressing with some passion for more than sixteen years. The phone is an RMX 3363, and the internet will tell you everything about the bloody thing from its OS to number of Gs, the range of colours available and where the best price deals are....but not how it works, why it won't send emails, how model numbers fit into a ranging nomenclature of 1 to 5 and how to download the RMX 3363 manual.
"Dare to leap" demands the corporate strapline. It's a challenging suggestion to make when the customer might be leaping into a cave full of vipers, a shallow bucket of shit or a giant vat of steaming Heinz Rats-Arse soup . Anyway, I've just posted onto their Twitter page asking why they imagine their Mission Statement is to confuse the crap out of everyone. This usually has the desired effect; but if it doesn't, the RealMe Sooperfone is going into the recycling bin.
Whatever the Hell happened to elegant simplicity? It is, I know, a rhetorical question - for it was replaced with jargo-bollocks designed for folks with heads so far up their GI tract, they could clean their teeth internally. It's why people tolerate it that mystifies me: but further to yesterday's Slogpost, ours not to be mystified or reason why...ours just to do or die....onward, onward rode the 1in8.
50,000 workers in key health and other vital positions are, as I write, self-isolating at home.
So much for the official garbage.....now for the Real McCoy.
50,000 important infrastructure workers are throwing a sicky because an utterly unreliable diagnosis system says they have a thing called "Covid" - which is, in reality, a pathetic last throw of the dice by a variant of Covid called Omicron that couldn't knock the skin off a rice pudding.
In fact, had it been controlled with management drugs from Spring 2020 and then left to its own devices, some 300,000 Americans would still be alive.
Events and time will not bring those responsible for this to justice; only a forensic piece of first class journalism tying the smears to the fears created by the Big Pharma peers in bureaucracy will nail anyone to the Cross they so richly deserve.
Now here's something shocking for you to consider: with just 2/179ths of the new year gone, the rate of goneness has doubled in the last twenty-four hours.
This is obviously a major emergency situation, and if left untreated will mean that we'll be in 2023 by the 8th of January. So 348 days will have disappeared, and you don't need me to tell you what an economic catastrophe that would be....we are losing days with no new days coming up to replace the days that never happened, and thus, by August 37th, everyone will be 94 years and 42 days old at least.
Accordingly, the Government has no choice but to lock down Time. We are appealing to everyone with a watch or clock to hammer nails into the hands on such devices. A NASA mission has already been launched to the sun, where special heat-resistant rope will be thrown round the star to slow down its passage round the Earth. In this endeavour, we are of course following the science as laid down by emeritus Professor Hillary Klingon, whose ground-breaking research has now shown conclusively that Copernicus was talking through his telescope.
Meanwhile, you must all continue to wear masks while standing up, wash your hands when sitting down, work at home in the office and get your booster boosted as often as possible.
kaksmhm posted: " Bellingham, WA ~ Date for a Wedding I am notoriously the girl invited to an event (wedding, baby/bridal shower, celebration, birthday) and always go alone. Whether it is in between girlfriends, just after a break-up, or I am dating someone that doesn'"
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New post on Kak's Mental Health Moment ~ You're Welcome.
I am notoriously the girl invited to an event (wedding, baby/bridal shower, celebration, birthday) and always go alone. Whether it is in between girlfriends, just after a break-up, or I am dating someone that doesn't want to do these types of things with me. I am the girl that goes "stag". Well, not this time. I have finally met someone that loves to be a part of my life and all that entails as much as I enjoy theirs. Chelsey is that person and she is flying back to WA solely to attend this event with me. Well, amongst other fun adventures as always. Here we go.
First things First
It is Thursday evening. I get to the airport early to pick Chelsey up just in case her flight arrives early. We have a double date tonight with our friends Timm & Christian. They are coming to our city to go see Halloween Kills with us at 8:20p. Her flight is supposed to get in at 7:25p. So much for wishful thinking, her flight is actually delayed! It is now expected to get in at 7:50p. This is going to cut things close as it is about 25-30 minutes to the theater from the airport. Her flight arrives and I finally see her coming up the elevator to baggage claim. As much as I want to ravish her there and then, I can't as we have somewhere to be, that will have to wait. I quickly kiss her and we make our way to the parking garage to get to our movie. We are en route to the theater and calling Timm to go ahead and just grab us food and drinks and meet us in the movie, he knew we were rushed and had offered earlier (he is so sweet like that!). They kindly did and we rushed to get there, making it just in time. The movie was decent, but the company was better! We love Timm and Christian and the time we spend with them and of course sitting next to Chelsey in the movie (rather than our FaceTime movie dates) was perfect! We laughed at how scared Timm was the entire time. He hates scary movies.
The movie ends and we head out to our cars, it is late. Timm says "Come to our truck, I have something for Chelsey". We trudge through the rain and puddles to his truck and there he hands Chels a Snapback hat with a rainbow Hurley emblem on the front. It was so sweet! She loved it. We said thank you for everything and hugged our goodbyes. It was time to head home.
The Planning Begins
We get home and get cozy then discuss our plans for the next couple days. This is a quick trip with A LOT of things to do so planning (my niche') is first on the agenda. Here is what needs to be done:
Sex first (duh) we miss each other as always so we need some closeness before anything
Morning coffee and a trip to my office so she can see where I work
Thrift Stores (My Idea, not hers) to look for a formal dress for this formal wedding. I will probably not wear it again so why not see if I can just get a cheap one to discard after (more to come on this)
Bellevue Square (if we can't find what we want at the thrift store)
Lunch (light) maybe at the mall
Nails (I need my nails done before the wedding) just painted, I don't do fake or lengthy
Ramen (we have both wanted to try Ramen at a restaurant)
Alone time at home before the busy rest of the weekend
The list has been set. Now to get some intimacy and rest so we can greet the day in a good mood. There is lots to do before Saturday and the wedding.
Friday ~ Dreaded Friday
What started as an exciting idea and day turned dreadful real quick! Let's start with the good first. COFFEE! Always a great start to any day. We drive to the Starbucks by our house and get our favorite coffees and something to eat. We head toward Bellevue, talking, holding hands, and just loving being together. We get closer to my work and I tell her "this is where I work"... We get out with our coffee in hand and head in, up the stairs, and to my office. We sit in there for a little bit just talking. Then as we leave, run into a coworker of mine and talk for a minute before heading back out in the rain. We start driving to where the GPS is telling me a thrift store is, only to find out that is has been closed down. So, enter a new address for another thrift store.... Aha, found it. We go to get out of the car and Chelsey says she has never been in a thrift store! What?!?! I tell her I used to make it a "Thing" to frequent thrift stores to find name brand stuff and then clean it up and sell it online for a profit. She looked at me like I was crazy. We head in and she immediately says, "Um, it smells in here!" mind you, she has a mask on! We venture over to the dresses and I start going through them pulling ones out one by one only to hear her say "nope, nope, nope, nope" to every single one. She says, "babe, let's go. We aren't going to find anything here!" So, off we go. I guess the "Thrifty" idea is now off the table.
Bellevue Square
We arrive at Bellevue Square Mall to try and find outfits that are suitable for this occasion which might I add is the next day. We go into so many stores, and then leave so many stores. In and out... nothing - nothing - nothing! OMGosh .. we are striking out! At this point the conversation has now turned to, "What do we have at home in my closet that will work?". Screw FORMAL... We can't find anything. Maybe we will just go with what we have, save some money, and call it a day.
Chelsey brought a nice new pair of plaid skinny pants that she recently purchased, so we just needed a sweater and some nice "mule sandal loafers" for her. I have a new sleek black Calvin Klein dress, still with the tags on it as have never worn it, hanging in my closet. If worse comes to worse I will pair it with some stiletto dress booties and a long cashmere sweater and call it "Fall Formal" I refuse to pay $149 for a formal dress that I can assure you I will never wear again. So I am over it and I am Hangry now, Chelsey notices and says, "babe, let's get you something to eat". I admit, I was a tad bitchy. I mean, I never see my girlfriend and I am spending an entire day shopping in a mall for clothes I won't wear again and money I don't want to waste. So my mood was definitely tell tale of all those things.
We settle on Auntie Ann's pretzel bites to share to get us by until our Ramen date later. I then took Chels down the escalator to the Frango's kiosk https://www.macys.com/shop/gourmet-food-and-gift-baskets/all-gourmet-food-and-gifts/Brand/Frango (type in Frango Chocolate in the Macy's website) and let her pick the kind she wanted as she has never had them before. She played it safe and got the box of assorted Then off we went. I love Frango's at Christmas time and of course Macy's is selling them 2 months before.
We head off toward Zara to buy a sweater for Chels and just browse around to see if there was ANYTHING that I liked which I didn't other than this cute little button down dress (very short) that I hope to get into by spring (it's a little snug and short) but I plan to lose some weight and for $25 why not? Other than that nope, I found nothing. Chels found a sweater so that was a win. We then waited in the extremely long line to pay for our two items and vowed to head out, but first the candy store, Lolli and Pops. https://www.lolliandpops.com. I love this place. I needed to pick up some Butterbeer for my son for his birthday and some candy too, plus we got a couple sweets for our roadtrip to Bellingham tomorrow. All done now and time to go find Chelsey some shoes at Nordstrom Rack near Factoria.
Factoria ~ Nordstrom Rack
Still feeling hopeful that maybe there is a dress that will work for me, I peruse the racks and find nothing. Chels, thankfully, found some cute black mules to wear while I grabbed some Sebastian hair spray and we were off again. Short trip in and out, I was glad because honestly I was burned out from trying to find a dress. I was going to resort to what I already have in the closet and call it good. Now, to get my nails done. I didn't schedule an appointment and it was last minute, but I tried calling them anyway. I said I needed them painted for a wedding tomorrow (they thought it was mine, who am I to correct them) and they made room for me to come in. We looked at the time and decided we had just enough time to go eat Ramen and then get to the Salon by our house to finish the night.
Ramen
Chelsey found this place in Issaquah for us to try, Orenji Sushi & Noodles, https://www.orenjisushinoodles.com/ . We sat down and looked at the huge menu and as tempting as it was for Chels to order her fave, Sushi, we agreed that we came for Ramen since neither of us have eaten ramen out at a restaurant. We picked out the Ramen we wanted (mine with beef, spinach, and an egg *don't do the egg:( yuk) and Chels had beef with a tempura shrimp). We sat and talked about the clothes we thought we were going to wear, what time we should head out, and how much fun we were having together even though I was being Hellstar because I was tired of shopping. Food was great, although like I said, I didn't like the hard boiled egg sitting in it but otherwise it was really good and filling. We would give it a 4 star... The waitress was a little scattered and didn't come back at all.
I am going to fast forward a little at this point to save you the boring nail salon visit, trying on of clothes, and bedtime shenanigans (Chels tooted for the first time.... It's a blog, in all honesty, you know it is bound to happen) and tried to pass it off, but I knew! Anyway, the rest is quite boring so we will fast forward to the trip to Bellingham for the Wedding of my cousin Vanessa.
Bellingham, WA ~ Wedding Bound
Well the morning has come and we are up and all ready in our dressy clothes (not formal and we don't care) and heading out to Bellingham, which is an hour an 40 minutes north of us near the Canadian border. She decided against the sweater from Zara so I will take that back later this week. She chose a blazer and a v-neck sleeveless crossbody tank of mine to wear instead. We decided this looked nicer and also would be a cooler for her in case the venue was hot. I chose the black classic Calvin Klein dress, black tights, short stiletto booties, and a long sage green cashmere sweater to wear. She did her hair straight and I wore mine slightly curled and down. We looked good ~ We did not look formal. However, what does formal look like really? Ball gowns, no thanks.
We get to Bellingham and I have to pee... Bad. I drank liquid all the way up there so of course I would have to go, but with COVID laws, this task can be a challenge. Chels starts looking up restaurants near us as we thought maybe we could stop in for a drink since we had about an hour to kill before we needed to be there. We stopped at a little Mexican Restaurant and ordered a Margarita each and a chicken burrito to share. We weren't sure what the food situation would be like and neither of us had eaten. Good choice of places, it was actually really good!!! I went to the bathroom as did she and we enjoyed some quiet time before the ceremony. We love these little quiet moments at random locations (insert AWWW here). Honestly though, it's the memories we continue to make at a moments notice that we remember more than anything. Spur of the moment memories. Priceless.
Wedding Venue
We have arrived at the venue and have chosen a parking spot where we backed in and were able to people watch. We were most curious to what "Formal" looks like before we got out... as if we had some magic formal wear tucked inside the car to change into. I think we just wanted to ensure a little more confidence in our attire before walking in. We saw everything from long dresses and suits and ties to Boho chic attire and everything in between. We got this. We fit in perfectly. The evening wouldn't be complete without us video recording ourselves doing stupid shit.. boy did we get a good one! Smiling big mouth filter on Snap video of us.... hysterical. We were both crying then used a box of Kleenex in the back seat to dry our tears, but they were Vicks Vapor Kleenex so then our eyes were burning which made us laugh even more! Telltale of our relationship and the fun we have. There truly is never a dull moment.
It is time to get out and head in. We walk in, sign the guest book, see my dad's best friend Bernie and his Wife Jan and make our way over to where they are sitting. My brother and his family showed soon thereafter and sat directly behind us and we waited for the wedding to begin. The wedding was good and then up the stairs to the reception. I cannot tell you how nice it felt to have Chelsey by my side. To have her fly back out to WA to attend a wedding of someone she doesn't know, meet members of my extended family, and just be with me.... I couldn't feel more blessed! We get upstairs to the reception and find our table, grab our drink glass, and head to the alcohol table to grab a drink. The night was great, we drank, ate, she met my extended family, we danced, and we took pictures (the picture at the top of this blog is us at the wedding). All in all, it was a great evening. We decided to leave the wedding venue around 9p as we knew we still had another hour and a half of driving and the sad reality of her leaving back to Missouri in the early morning:( I wanted to spend as much time with her as I could and in the car doesn't count. Although our car trip back was.. hmmm... amazing. I will let your mind wander there as well to keep this PG13.
Home and Leaving
We are finally home and have peeled off our dressy clothes to get cozy. We hop in the shower, slip into our cozies and settle in. We crawl into bed to watch some TV and just be close. I am already in tears. I hate goodbyes so much. We again talk about this all being temporary for now and how eventually we will be able to bridge the gap, but for now it is what it is. The plan was for me to go back to Missouri for Thanksgiving, but airfare was over $1000 and we aren't willing to spend that when I could go the weekend of Dec. 2 for $210 round trip. This also means that we are going to have to go over a month without seeing each other, 41 days to be exact and that doesn't make this goodbye any easier.
The morning has come and it is time to get packing and head to the airport. I lay in bed teary eyed and sad for a bit. I tell her how much I love her and how hard these goodbyes are and that everytime she leaves she takes my heart with her. I hate being away from each other, I want to see her everyday. We discuss making the firm decision for her to move here March 1st. I feel better with a date set and agree to that day then decided to get up and get moving. I grab snacks for her carry on and she gets her other bag packed. We load the car and head out. The plan this time is to just pull up to departures and get out to kiss her goodbye rather than park and walk in. The goodbyes are so hard when I have to leave her at TSA and walk the long walk to the garage alone crying. Wanted to try this instead, perhaps it would be a little easier. I was wrong. Just as hard. I drop her at the airport and hug her one last time. I kiss her goodbye and watch her walk away.... with my heart.
Next time I see her will be in 41 days when I fly into St. Louis to see her and meet her mom and then her family! Stay tuned ... Trust me you won't want to miss this one.. YIKES!! Next chapter is coming soon: My New Journey: To Love. Chapter 9: Missouri ~ Meeting Chelsey's Family. What will her mom say? Will she say anything? Check back soon... and as always....
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Then off we went. I love Frango's at Christmas time and of course Macy's is selling them 2 months before. 
