Yikes! Barack Obama Senior Moment

I'm an equal opportunity fairness doctrine gaffe sharer. At least John McCain has that senior citizen excuse going for him. I don't know what Barack Obama's excuse might be.

Yikes! John McCain's Senior Moments

Deadly Home Invasion in Blue Mound

It was strange this morning to see a long article in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram about the killing spree that took place in my old hometown zone a couple days ago. I blogged about that yesterday.

I don't know exactly what made it seem strange. Maybe it was reading place names and locations, with which I was quite familiar, in a paper where I don't expect to read news from what used to be local to me.

I more expect to read stories about horrible crimes that take place in this zone. Like a home invasion that turned deadly in Blue Mound early Wednesday. Blue Mound is a suburb in the northwest part of the D/FW Metroplex. The guy you see in the photo, with his kid, Keith Hoehn, was secure in his home with his, Kellie, when suddenly a 300 pound man with a shotgun and a lesser-sized accomplice burst into their house.

With the shotgun pointed at his wife's face, told not to scream, but she did scream. For her husband. Who came to the rescue. The shotgun was then pointed at Hoehn's face, but the wife grabbed the muzzle and a struggle ensued.

As his wife kept holding the muzzle, Hoehn saw that the gun-holder was pulling the trigger, to no avail. Because the safety was on.

Then Kellie let go of the gun long enough to grab a candle and whacked the fat guy on the head. Then she took off after the accomplice who had a handgun.

At that point their son grabbed his little sister and hid in a closet.

The shotgun got loose, just like in a Western, Hoehn grabbed it. The fight moved outside. Hoehn took the safety off and shot successfully at the accomplice with the handgun, John Garland Pierson, 25 of Haltom City, another D/FW suburb.

Then he fired at the fat guy, who had originally had the shotgun, Dakota Scott Benoit, 2o, from Richland Hills, that's another suburb. After the first shot, the fat guy got up. So, Hoehn fired again. This time killing the home invader.

The surviving bad guy is in critical condition. Police believe the pair had invaded a Fort Worth home on Tuesday.

Their home invasions days are now over. What a strange career choice.

Viruses, Noxious Weeds and Swimming

It's September 4 and things are looking good in Durango World.

The wind has stopped blowing after 2 days of the constant movement of air. The A/C has been turned off for over 24 hours with the windows open. The wind shooed away the vexing pollution that had the skies here a bit murky. This morning the sky is a fine shade of blue.

Overnight the temperature got down to a chilling 65.

So, this morning, at 7am, I thought I'd try and see if it was too cold to swim. It was a bit bracing getting in the water, sort of like a Washington lake in summer. But I quickly got comfy and swam around for a long long time.

I'd not been feeling too well since my return from Washington. Ironically, when I left here for Washington I was miserable too, with a strange sore throat and cough that I blamed on the pollution and the Level Orange Ozone Alerts. I figured it'd quickly clear up once I was breathing the clean Washington air, which ironically was not all that clear. It took about 2 weeks in Washington before the sore throat went away.

Which puts me in mind of viruses. I'm thinking sometimes you can have yourself a virus that's making you miserable or impacting you in a negative way and not even realize that it's a foreign object penetrating your space that's got you feeling yucky.

Or like you don't quite know why your garden isn't quite the lush thing you wish it would be. And then one day you realize it was a noxious weed that you thought was a flower that was making your garden be all sickly.

Anyway, it's a good thing to be back feeling good. I've got a real good anti-virus program running now and some topnotch weed killer. I intend to keep the invading pests at bay. Except I did have a slight sugar ant invasion this morning in the kitchen. Quickly controlled.

Sarah Palin Convention Speech

It is way past my bedtime. But like I said earlier today, as God was my witness, I was determined to remain awake long enough to watch Sarah Palin give her acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention.

I have successfully completed that task.

I am now a Sarah Palin fan.

I'm fickle, very fickle, but unless there is a major screw up I'll likely vote for John and Sarah instead of Barack and Joe. If only Barack had picked someone more interesting than Joe. Like a Dem version of Sarah. If one exists. My little sister was available. But she doesn't have as interesting a family as Sarah. She has poodles instead of kids. And an obsession with overwatering tomatoes.

Several watchable speeches tonight. Mike Huckabee was good. Rudy Gulianni was good. It was all good. Cindy's lime green dress was something I've not seen on a First Lady before.

I'm ready now for a cute Vice-President. But right now it's bedtime. Opinions likely to alter with daylight.

Sarah Palin's Republican Convention Speech

There seems to be a lot of hubbub about tonight's Sarah Palin speech. The numbers viewing are expected to be huge, possibly in the same record breaking numbers as Obama's acceptance speech last week. That I only managed to watch about a half hour of.

I'm determined that, no matter what, I will manage to watch Sarah Palin give the speech of her life tonight. No one will distract me. As God is my witness, I shall watch.

Gar the Texan says God is our imaginary friend we talk to and ask for favors. He's such an atheist.

I listened to Rush Limbaugh again today. That's two days in a row. He was doing some good ranting about Sarah Palin and the attacks against her. Rush said the Democrats are upset because "they don't have a Sarah Palin. She's twice the man Obama is."

Yes, it's true, he said this.

Another Rush gem...

"Feminists may not be mad about sexist attacks on Sarah Palin, but the women who make America work are. Why's the media trying to drive her off the ticket, if she's so bad? Because they thought they'd killed conservatism. We're running against the entire Washington Government Machine, folks."

And this...

"Despicable feminist Sally Quinn slams Sarah Palin, and says a mother should put her kids first and be subservient to her husband -- which, Sally presumes to tell us, is what an evangelical wife is. Liberals like Sally and Soledad O'Brien can have kids and work, but Sarah Palin can't be a mom and govern."

And this...

"Governor Sarah Palin -- just in her being, just in her essence -- destroys every myth that the liberals have told us that they want in women. The feminists have set everything back to their mothers' generation."

I saw Sarah Palin during lunch, practicing with the teleprompters for tonight. She sure is darn cute. I don't know if I want a darn cute Vice-President, or President for that matter. That was my main problem with John Edwards, long before we learned he was a scumbag, he was just too darn cute to be President. A cute First Lady is a good thing. Like Jackie Kennedy. Nancy Reagan was cute for an older gal. Hillary had her moments. Laura Bush reminds me too much of someone who spanked me when I was too old to be spanked. And Sarah Palin's husband needs to lose that goatee thing he's got going on.

I'm done, I'm fresh out of pointless opinions.

Swimming Pool Cool Skinny Dipping

Fall seems to have fallen early here in Texas. It's only 71 outside right now. I've got the windows open. No A/C running.

Ever since I got back from the frigid Pacific Northwest I've been enjoying swimming at a new time. As in early. Before any eyes arrive to ogle me. I hate being ogled.

I figure I've got maybe 3 to 4 weeks to go before the pool becomes too cool. I hate it when that happens. Then it's clear til next March or early April that it warms up enough to be swim-worthy.

Last night, late, someone with good powers of persuasion convinced me to go swimming. It was a scenario similar to that in the video below. But without the beer drinkers. I enjoy living in Texas.

Six Killed in Skagit County Shootings

I check my old local papers online each morning. One being the Seattle P-I, the other being the Skagit Valley Herald. This morning I was startled to see a headline in the P-I saying "Deputy, 5 others die in shooting rampage, Suspect in custody; victims at multiple locations north of Mount Vernon."

Mount Vernon was the town I moved from when my exile in Texas began. I was back in Mount Vernon last month and blogged about it. I don't recollect there being a murder spree like this in the Mount Vernon/Skagit Valley zone before.

The only victim's identified by this morning are the Skagit County Deputy Sheriff, Anne Jackson. Another policeman, a state trooper, Troy Giddings, was shot in the arm and drove himself to the hospital.

The shooter's name is Issac Zamora. He began shooting people near Alger in northern Skagit County. One body was found near the dead Deputy Sheriff. Two construction workers were killed.

Zamora drove down Interstate 5 towards Mount Vernon, shooting at people as he drove. One of those driving on I-5 was among the 6 killed.

Interstate 5 was shut down as police chased Zamora. Zamora exited I-5 at Kincaid Street and drove to the Skagit County Sheriff's Office building where he turned himself in.

Zamora was on a police watch list and was known to have mental stability issues.

Read the Seattle P-I article here.

American Airlines Jet Lands Safely at LAX During Lunch

I turned on the TV during my lunch break. I thought I might get some Republican National Convention or Gustav news.

But instead all the cable news stations were excitedly waiting for an American Airlines Boeing 737 to land. The jet had blown a tire on take off.

It then circled around the LA area for hours dumping jet fuel while LAX emergency crews prepared for the emergency landing.

Those unlucky people on board had been expecting a direct flight to Toronto. Instead they got a long tour of the Los Angeles area. I don't know if the people on board got food and drinks during the ordeal.

Fox News had a copter in the air shooting video of planes landing. We got to watch a couple land while the news people pondered if this was the injured jet or not.

Very suspenseful.

And then the jet with the bad tire finally came into view. We watched live as it made a perfectly smooth landing.

And then the injured jet became non-news.

I've watched this type thing before where they'll break away right at the key moment so as to spare us viewers the horror of watching something horrible.

This time the camera did not blink. I don't know why.

I also don't know why they cover this type thing. Though it does make for some dramatic TV viewing, I guess. Somehow it seems sort of irresponsible to me.

Gustav Misses Fort Worth

It has been very windy and cloudy all day here in Fort Worth. I thought it might be Gustav related. But I heard on the radio, during a commercial break from listening to Rush Limbaugh ranting about something, that Gustav is dumping a lot of water in east Texas, southeast Oklahoma and southwest Arkansas.

But not here. That's my current balcony view, looking east, this afternoon. Even though that's looking east I don't think those are Gustav clouds.

I thought I'd finally get to experience at least the terminal part of a hurricane. The fully alive part of a hurricane, that I don't think I ever want to experience.