Happy Birthday from the land of guns & religion!  We're really enjoying the conversation!

The paper lost many subscribers specifically because of the article mocking the family of a well-liked and hard-working congressman, and they front-paged it because he's a Republican.  I'm pointing out that because of actions like that they lose subscribers, therefore lose advertisers, and are now scrounging for new revenue.  Not against honoring the memory of your pet, but an obit sounds like an obvious play by the paper to just generate cash.   

I suggest you set a good example for your younger relatives, and go.

Then come back & tell us all about it.

Alice Roosevelt: "If you haven't got anything good to say about anybody, come sit right next to me."

"Keep the world clean."  Isn't that what ethnic cleansing is all about?

How about Israeli-flag person handing Palestinian-flag person a book - "Teach the ignorant."

There's a new 'Literary Science' magazine, Nautilus - not funded by government but by the Templeton Foundation- that purports to tie together 'big ideas' of science, without bothering with those messy numbers & statistics - I wrote a little about it here -

http://ricochet.com/member-feed/The-new-online-science-magazine-Nautilus-and-its-Literary-Science

I'm too alarmed by that photo at the top of the post to think of a comment.

If his sons see it, that's several years of therapy right there.

Just saw it - classy guy.  I like when Jay asked him, "so who do you like in 2016?" and he quickly said, "Republicans."

If there's an especially wonderful teacher, maybe an extra note from you to the principal explaining how especially wonderful that teacher is?

Do you think people have a prejudice against CM because it's associated with a childhood memory of having to sit still & be quiet in a crowded auditorium?  Happily my town has excellent concerts for children where top-notch musicians stand on a stage closely surrounded by kids on a Saturday morning, and play short snippets of the pieces that they will play later that evening for crowds of adult concertgoers.  These artists explain simply how the instruments 'speak to each other' in the music, they tell funny and interesting stories of the composers and their careers, and even take apart their instruments for the kids to see how they work.  Before the last piece of the concert they tell the children to stand up near the stage, and ask them to interpret the music played in whatever form of dance the kids feel like expressing.  It. is. delightful.

There's a great James Bond Villain exhibit at the Spy Museum in DC right now, we saw it last week.  Many magnificent inventions like these, as clever as any Bond gadget, as well as things like: eyeglasses with a hollowed-out earpiece where a cyanide capsule could be tucked, so that an agent could chew on his glasses to swallow the pill; an inflatable fake jeep from WWII, hundreds of which were massed at Calais to fool Nazi pilots into thinking Allied troops would be landing there instead of Normandy (and it worked); and a car cutaway showing the hollow areas where people literally folded themselves up & hid to ride undetected through the Berlin Wall to freedom.

Photographie im Museum, natürlich, war verboten.

Would be funny if it weren't true,  she indeed fiddled while our countrymen gave their lives.  The 2 AM call came and no one at the White House was found worthy of their office.

This should be every network's file photo for any future Clinton story.

So, do you dry clean plastic?

or maybe soak it in 409?

We are missing an opportunity here.  Everyone of us should forward the video - 

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-may-13-2013/barack-trek--into-darkness

to a liberal we know and ask them what it says to them.  Let's not speculate how it affects liberals, let's find out.

 If they say it rattles their view of the administration at all, we should be tweeting it, FBing it, etc.  They may have handed us a gift.

. . . . which explains how these major media outlets are securely in the corner of this administration - or maybe that talking point should be edited to read

'securely in the back pocket of'  - no, maybe changed to

'securely in bed with' - no, perhaps revised to

'securely on the leash of' - not quite there, how about 

'securely in the tank for' . . . . well . . .

Ryan M - squashing someone's contribution to a conversation, as your friend did to you, is just rude, period.  Maybe if your friend tries it again you could say, 

"You know, my grandma says that same thing to me."

At first it sounds like you are humbly chiding yourself for speaking, but if anyone thinks longer about it, they realize your friend is acting like a finger-wagging granny. Might put a point on it if you almost address him as 'Gran-' the next time you turn to him in the conversation.  

If this comment happens, it's the first for me today, and I've been trying for a while.