Basher51's Bluff and Bluster

Julie, I am so going to miss you!  You are a terrific reporter and your charm on the air makes even the toughest news palatable.  One thing that I always enjoyed about your health reports was the optimism that you brought to that area.  There was always hope in your voice.

So, what are you going to do with yourself without Fox6?

Farewell, and may the Lord of Heaven and Earth bless you richly.

A number of years ago the old Firstar Bank folks used to do "Firstar Eve", a series of family-friendly, alcohol-free New Years Eve parties about the town.  When Firstar sold out to USBank, those parties ended. 

Anyone know of any big-time alcohol-free News Years Eve parties?  Sure would be a nice idea if someone put these together again.

May God bless you in abundant and wonderful ways.

8And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. 9An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. 10But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. 11Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ[a] the Lord. 12This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger."

 13Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying,
 14"Glory to God in the highest,
      and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests."

 15When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let's go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about."

 16So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger. 17When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, 18and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them. 19But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. 20The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.

I found this over on AMSpec blog.  Quite an interesting post:

My friend Marty Beckerman calls attention to an ironic skirmish in the "War on Christmas":

"Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" caused a stir at a New Hanover County school. A parent complained about the song's religious reference and got it pulled from her child's kindergarten Christmas show at Murrayville Elementary School. The song was pulled "because it had the word Christmas in it," said Rick Holliday, assistant school superintendent. A Jewish mother, who didn't want her name published, objected to what she called "religious overtones" in the song. So the principal agreed to pull it from the program.

Irony? "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" was written by a Jew, Johnny Marks, who also wrote "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day," "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree," and "A Holly Jolly Christmas." As Beckerman notes, Jewish songwriters also wrote or co-wrote such holiday standards as:

• "The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire)"  -- Mel Torme and Bob Wells, both Jewish;
• "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" -- co-written by J. Fred Coots, Jewish;
• "Silver Bells" -- Ray Evans and Jay Livingston, both Jewish;
• It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" -- co-written by George Wyle, Jewish;
• "Sleigh Ride" -- co-written by Mitchell Parish, Jewish;
• "Let It Snow" -- Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne, both Jewish; and
• "White Christmas" -- Irving Berlin, Jewish.

Of course, none of these songs is as important as the original Jewish contribution to Christmas, but if the "religious overtones" of Johnny Marks' innocuous song are enough to shut down a kindergarten Christmas show, let's not risk an ACLU lawsuit by mentioning that whole Bethlehem-and-the-manger trip.

Big time congrats on a job well done by the WakeUp crew today.  Wow!  That was a long shift on-air.  Mark, Rob, Justin, Jeremy, Myra, Bob, Vince, and, of course, my dear, sweet Kim did yeomen's work in keeping us up to date and also letting us smile in spite us having to deal with a snowstorm.  I don't know how they could do 8 hours on air and still keep things interesting and fresh the whole time.

Thanks guys and, Love Ya Kim!

No, it isn't baseball season.  But "Who's On First" is a timeless classic.  Here's an interesting twist on it--a Shakespearian version that is absolutely hilarious.  If you are cabin-bound today, here's a laugh to make your day a little lighter:

My brother just sent this to me:

Green Bay Packers football practice was delayed nearly two hours yesterday after a player reported finding an unknown white powdery substance on the practice field.  Head coach, Mike McCarthy, immediately suspended practice while police and federal agents were called to investigate.

After a complete analysis, FBI forensic experts determined that the white substance, unknown to the players, was the goal line.

Practice was resumed today after special agents decided the team was unlikely to encounter the substance again.

This time of year when we hand out tips and gifts to those who've helped us, please don't forget the often overlooked guys who do a really disgusting job:  the garbage men.  These guys toil in all weather from the downright arctic to the oppressively hot. (and when the garbage really stinks!).  Often overlooked, they work their butts off to haul away our mess.

This Christmas, give them something nice and a big THANK YOU.  They deserve it.

Bernie Madoff is rightfully taking a perp walk for being the mastermind of a $50 billion Ponzi scheme that has defrauded some major players on the world financial stage.  One thing that you don't hear about Bernie Madoff is that he is a huge donator to the Democratic Party.    Not only has he donated heavily to the Democrat Senatorial Campaign Committee, he's given maxed-out donations to the Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY), Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY), Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), and others.  Indeed, he's given money to a few Republicans as well.

Now, if this guy had given as much money to Republicans as he had Democrats, that fact would have been mentioned multiple times in every story, wouldn't it?  Just as with the bulk of the Wall Street financiers, Bernie Madoff is a major player in Democrat funderaising.  For years upon years the financial world has been active Democrat politics.  I know, it seems to go against the grain of what we are told.  But the truth is there for anyone to see.  Check any web site on campaign contributions and you'll see that the biggest players in every one fo the failed financial empires has been a major supporter of the Democrat party.  Lehman, Merrill, AIG, the execs of all of them have given overwhelmingly to the Democratic Party.

Bernie Madoff is just the latest.  But you'd never know it unless you checked for yourself.

This time of the year I always remember an incident that happened so long ago.  It involved my daughter and her friend.  Both were probably 3 years old at the time (and are about 22 years old now).  A lady who lived nearby took care of my daughter on days that both my wife and I worked. That lady and her husband happened to be Jewish. 

One day about this time of December Marilyn called me and said that her daughter Rachel wanted to come over and play with my daughter Michelle.  Would it be okay to drop her off, Marilyn asked.  I said fine and in a few minutes Marilyn and Rachel were at the door.  As I let them in Rachel said:  "Merry Christmas Michelle!"  To which Michelle replied: "Happy Hanukkah, Rachel!"

Now, why can't we be more like that?

Come on, folks!  As I drive around I see a lot of houses with snowy roofs that haven't been raked.  You'll regret that later, maybe even next week!  Lots of snow and gutters clogged by ice and snow allows the thawing snow to back up under the shingles when it refreezes.  Raking that lower part of the roof prevents these ice dams.

Roof rakes are cheap, if you can find them, and raking a roof is a moderate workout. 

Don't believe me?  Ask Tami Hughes.  She had ice dams last winter and water leaks all over the house as a result.  Could have been prevented by raking the roof.

I inspect property for insurance companies.  I've inspected everything from  a ramshackle hunting cabin to mega-mansions to the old Pabst Brewery offices to the City of Neenah Sewage Treatment plant.  There's a lot that I've seen and wish that I hadn't seen. In the latter catagory I'll place a strip club in northern Wisconsin that doubles as a whorehouse. I've inspected a few strip clubs in my day.  The folks who run them are a strange breed to say the least.  Most of those guys, and gals, are at once shrewd business folks and wry comedians.  They don't take much very seriously--unless it is making money for them.

More and more I'm finding myself focusing on residential insurance inspection work.  The commercial stuff will drive you nuts as most of the policies are custom-designed for the particular business.  So, even if you are doing two identical businesses for the same insurer, the inspection requirements can be radically different.  But residential work is about pretty much the same criteria across the board from the worst dump in town to the best mansion.  I love the job because the folks you meet are quite interesting, as most people are, and their houses are pretty interesting , too.  I once did a very wealthy family's "man cottage" on a lake up north.  The house had every technological wonder that you could image.  It also had a urinal in the bathroom.  "It's more of a statement than a plumbing fixture," explained the wife.  The house was incredible with a full commercial kitchen and a full commercial bar.  Last week, while doing exterior inspections on houses in the Barrington, IL area, I was cruising through neighborhoods which could haveq been the setting for "Christmas Vacation".

A lot fo folks just don't understand what I do.  Two comments that I hear most often are  "But I gave my agent all that information" and "I've had the same homeowners policy for 35 years.  Why do they want an inspection now?"   If the job is an interior inspection (only about 10% are) I call and make an appointment.  I once had a guy on the phone who just grilled me about what I wanted to inspect.  He ended up refusing the interior inspection.  Two days later I swung by the house to do a quick exterior inspection (we often do those even if the interior can't be done) and the I saw the cops raiding the place.  Sorta tells me why he didn't want the interior inspected. The insurance inspector is the eyes of the underwriter.  An underwriter is what happened to the guy in high school that was pantsed and thrown into the girl's locker room.  They are afraid of their shadow and get paid for it.  They don't trust insurance agents and they don't trust the insured.  Both of those folks have a financial interest in the policy.  I don't.  I get paid to inspect and I'm not employed by any insurance company.  I'm an independent contractor paid by a reporting company.  All of that information that you gave to the agent goes to an underwriter whose response is "I'll bet."  I go out there to verify and also look for hazards that the insured and the agent have not told the company.  Then sometimes underwriters just get a bug in their tail.  "All of these folks have been insured by us for 30 years and we don't know if they are an acceptable risk anymore."  So, the underwriter puts together a list and off I go.  Or an underwriter sees that the company has paid out claims for fires in side-by-side duplexes in a close group of zip codes.  Off I go to inspect all of the side-by-side duplexes in four adjacent zip codes.  In times like we are in now, these "underwriter projects" make up the bulk of our work.  That's what I'll be doing in the northern burbs of Chicago for the next few months.

As I say, it is fascinating work.  It's very detail oriented, requires a trained eye, a fanatical devotion to detail, and the ability to talk yourself into and out of situations.  But overall it is fun.  I really love working the inner city areas.  I've met some of the nicest folks there, real sweethearts with real Christian love and charity.  I've also met some adorable goofballs who just kept me in stiches and still do.  Yes, I've encountered some gangstas.  Most of my encounters with them, in fact all of my encounters with them, have involved a young man politely asking me what I'm doing.  When I tell him, he replies that they just were curious and then leaves.  I've NEVER been hassled in the inner city and only once did I refuse to inspect a house because that "sixth sense" told me that the characters lounging ont he front porch were up to no good.

But overall it's a great job.  I'm my own boss, set my own schedule and can pretty much make all the money that I care to make.

Let's talk jobs!  Post a description of what you do for a living.

I may never be able to watch the E-Trade baby commercial without thinking of this. I suspect some of our Air Force folks have a bit too much time on their hands.

Yesterday's newspaper reported that the Supreme Court refused to hear the case about Obama's birth certificate and him not being eligible to become president.  Now, I'm a conservative.  I most certainly didn't vote for Obama.  But people--Give it up!  The man is a US citizen!  The media, though they admit that they dropped the ball in scrutinizing Obama's record, would not have missed this.  And they didn't.  The LA Times has had records experts check the original Obama birth certificate from Hawaii and determined that it is real.  There is an announcement of his birth in an original copy of a Hawaiian newspaper dated on the day after his birth.  Give it up!  The guy is a US citizen and eligible to be the US president!

There certainly are a lot of things to scrutinize in Obama's upcoming presidency.  This ain't one of them.  Get real!  He's the next president.  He won and McCain lost.  Life is tough all over.