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FOCM Member Card Ceremony

February 5, 2015

Internet News Release

Two people received their FOCM cards in a ceremony at TasteVin Wine and Cheese in San Carlos, CA.  The first, Cathy Allec has been a friend of mine since, oh do we have to get specific, well, okay, then probably since 1973.  Assistimos una clase de espanol con el ensenador Jaime Sullivan a la escuela secundario Kofa.

Lillian Lim received her card that night as well.  She is owner Sue Simpson’s irreplaceable wine manager.

The other picture is the FOCM window sticker in TasteVin Wine and Cheese at 890 Laurel St, San Carlos, CA as an indicator of their esteemed position on the FOCM Networking Recommended Businesses which includes a 10% discount for FOCM members.

TasteVin Recommendation
TasteVin Recommendation
Cathy Allec
Cathy Allec
Lillian Lim
Lillian Lim

Schooling a Smart-Ass

I am a bit of a smart-ass, a sarcastic sense of humor and enjoy humor out of people or things that I think take themselves too seriously.  Recently, I tried to search for and buy the Battle Flag of the Army of Northern Virginia (incorrectly, but commonly known as the Confederate Flag).  On that day, a Google search returned with “your search returned no results”, which angered me.  So I went to a Yahoo search and found a place that was selling them.  I ordered 24 bandanas and sent them to friends and family with a note that FOCM recognized their inner rebel with this bandana, long a symbol of southern pride, defiance and states’ rights.  A friend and fellow lover of American history and in particular the Civil War, mailed flag back to me with this note:

Dear Good Friend,

Thank you, Chris, for your generous gift.  In regard for your feelings however I find it better to return it to you rather than have it suffer the ignominious fate it undoubtedly would be subjected to in my hands. Besides, the flagpole in front of my house has room for only one flag.  It looks similar to your gift – it has bars and stars and vibrant red, white and blue colors.  But rather than stand for slavery, racism, rebellion and regionalism, this flag stands for something completely different.  It represents ONE country, One union, while respecting difference of opinion. More succinctly put into Latin: “e pluribus unum”. It represents constant effort (which during these political times seems a Sisyphean task) toward a more perfect union, conserving the noble foundations of this country while always progressing to be better. 

If your gift stands for any “heritage” it is this: Never in world history have traitors been welcomed so generously back into their country, who then treated that generosity with such disdain, arrogance and defiance. 

In friendship,

I truly appreciated this response and think it is a great one.  America is truly the greatest country because of its acceptance of freedom of speech which allows me to be a smart-ass, poke fun at others and to be humbled by a friend who points out the seriousness of America’s over-arching principles.

FOCM Remembers Peter Holthe

Today my friend Peter Holthe would have been 56 years old.  If you have ever read the “About FOCM” section, you’ll know how instrumental Peter was in this fun hobby of mine called FOCM Networking.  It was Peter’s idea – the name, the logo and what it could be and do.

One of the things Peter loved to do was to play practical jokes on people, especially people who he felt were too uptight or pretentious.  I wish I could remember some of the things he would do at his office.  Actually I think we wrote some of them up and I will find them and post them.

He would have loved this picture of some friends and I documenting our support of the 1st and 2nd amendments to the US Constitution, as well as the repeal of Prohibition.

 

FOCM Celebrates 1st & 2nd Amendment Rights
FOCM Celebrates 1st & 2nd Amendment Rights

 

 

 

 

 

Hate Crime Inconsistency

Let me see if I understand this correctly:

After Dylan Roof killed people at the church in Charleston, SC, investigation into his motive resulted in finding his “manifesto” in which he indicated he was inspired by the Trayvon Martin case and wanted to start a race war.  It was instantly labeled a “hate crime.”

When Vester Lee Flanagan killed the two news reporters in Virginia, investigation found in his “manifesto” that he indicated he was inspired by the Charleston shooting, including : “As for Dylann Roof? You (deleted)! You want a race war (deleted)? BRING IT THEN YOU WHITE …”  This still has not been labeled a hate crime.  Why not?

Both are: a man of one race, killing people of another race, documenting that he wants a race war.

Am I missing something?

Honest Cities

So the company that makes HonestTea did an interesting study.  In 27 cities, HonestTea stands were set out in public with a collection box and a sign $1/bottle honor system.  Atlanta was the most honest with 100% of bottles taken and a $ left.  It was nice to see that the national average was 94%.  The least honest cities are shown below: Providence, RI; Boston, MA and Tampa, FL take the top 3 spots.  In only one city was money missing and that was Washington, DC

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2015/08/24/honest-tea-atlanta-cities/32260581/

Least Honest Cities
Least Honest Cities

Imagine Bill Clinton as 1st Man

Picture this – Hillary Clinton is elected President and there’s a state dinner at the White House.  Bill will be playing the role of host, as First Ladies have done for 200+ years.  He will be hosting the spouses of dignitaries, of which a majority are women.  I can see the headline:

Bill Clinton – blurring the lines of philanthropy and philandering.

Broaden Your Media News Exposure

So, it finally happened to me – I got tired of watching Fox News for all my TV-obtained news.  I know my mother will never do this and please don’t tell her I did, she may disown me.  I know a lot of you will say, wow, you finally got it?!  Well it seemed to be unbalanced, like the media extension of the Republican party.  So now I’m watching MSNBC at noon, sitting in for Andrea Mitchell and am surprised to see that Luke Russert is doing a great job of delivering balanced news.  He was aggressive in talking with Hillary’s spokesperson about the email issue.  I was expecting to see news about Cecil the Lion and why we shouldn’t put criminals in jail, not putting murderers to death, allowing 3rd trimester abortions and supporting Jerry Brown’s banning of the word “alien”.

I know I will go back to Fox News but I will continue with adding in news shows from other networks.

What TV network news do you watch most?

Other news sources: I get probably 1/2 my news online.  Every morning I log on to google.com/news and read the news stories that way and on my Iphone I use Google News and USA Today apps.

Where do you get most of your news?

Book Title

Seen in my in-box from my brother but I took liberty to modify it slightly:

So, I was walking through the mall and I saw that there was a “Illegal Immigrant Bookstore”

I was wondering what exactly was in such bookstore so I went in.

As I was wandering around taking a look, the clerk stopped me and asked if he could help me,

I imagine I didn’t look like his normal clientele, so I asked, “Do you have a copy of Donald Trump’s book on his U.S. Immigration Policy regarding Illegal Aliens?”

The clerk said, ” F—k off, get out and stay out!”

I said, “Yes, that’s the one. Do you have it in paperback?