Gahrie's Grumbles and Groans

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 15:53:00 +0000

The Next Iron Chef (10/18/09)

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 04:55:00 +0000

Chef Mullen wins. Chef Frietag comes in a close second.

Chef Farmerie and Chef Crenn were the bottom two. Chef Farmerie was eliminated.

(sorry..wasn't in the mood to live blog..none of them have caught my interest.)

At this point, if I had to bet an an overall winner, I bet on Frietag.

The Next Iron Chef (10/11/09)

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 04:06:00 +0000

The first challenge tonight forces the chefs to grab a unique cooking vessel and make a single pot meal served family style. When the challenge starts there is a rugby scrum at the table as they fight over the different cooking vessels, and then another one at the frig as they fight over ingredients.

Turns out the chefs are going to judge each other again. Some hardcore comments. Two of the women were particularly catty with each other. Chef Mehta was the clear winner and Chef Mullen was the clear loser. So Chef Mehta gets the advantage in the main challenge.

For the main challenge there are three cultures: Italian, French, and Greek. The chefs are each assigned a traditional recipe from one of these cultures, and they have to interpret it to make it seem new. They get an hour. Chef Mehta gets to choose his culture and picks Greek.

Chef Trevino had a dish that depended on grape leaves (dolmas) and Chef Mehta screwed him by taking all of the grape leaves. Chef Mehta gave Chef Trevino some of the leaves with less than fifteen minutes to go. Everyone is rushing around like chickens with their heads cut off.

The same three judges..so looks like it'll be them all the way through. Chef Mehta may have shot his own foot off by using Chef Trevino's grape leaves, because the two female judges made remarks about their unpleasant smell. Judge Steingarten, as usual, does a good job at pissing off the other judges, especially as they are women. It's looking at the commercial like it's coming down to Chef Mehta and Chef Mullen for last place.

This week, they don't announce the winner first, they announce the other survivors first. So they get down to three..one winner, one loser, and someone at risk. Chef Mullen ended up winning.

Chef Farmerie and Chef Smith were the two at risk. Chef Smith ended up losing. So there are only two women left.

You Have Got To Be Kidding Me!!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 09:45:00 +0000

Pres. Barak Obama, after nine months in office, has just won the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize, for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples and for giving the world "hope for a better future" with his work for peace and calls to reduce the global stockpile of nuclear weapons.

Excuse me?

This confirms for all time just what a joke the Nobel Peace Prize has become. It has been political for decades, awarded to various popular lefties...but up to now there has been at least a fig leaf for the committee to hide behind.

Not a single nuclear weapon has been destroyed.

Not a single conflict has been ended.

Nominations for this prize ended TWO Weeks after he entered office.

Look, even if you believe that Pres. Obama had actually has done something to deserve the Nobel Peace Prize...had he done it by his second week in office?

Update 3:23 AM: 205 people were nominated this year for the peace prize. Not one of them was more deserving of the prize? Not one? Unfortunately we are going to have to wait 50 years to get an official list of the other nominees. Brian Kilmeade, a Fox News host just had the definitive line about this....Pres. Obama has just become the third person to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for "Not being George Bush", joining Al Gore and Pres. Carter.

Update 3:52 AM: This award is simply embarassing. It is beyond a joke, it is insulting. It insults all the previous winners over the years, and the thousands of previous nominees. At least Pres. Carter and Al Gore had DONE SOMETHING. All Pres. Obama has done is give a bunch of speeches (many overseas) where he has praised and appeased our enemies, insulted and offeneded our allies and denigrated our country's history. I believe a sound and rational argument can be made that Pres. Obama's actions and speeches have actually lessened the chance for peace in the future and made the world a more dangerous place.

The Next Iron Chef (live blog 10/4/09)

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 04:22:00 +0000

Tonight was the first episode of the second season of The Next Iron Chef. Iron Chef America is one of my favorite TV shows. However my least favorite Iron Chef is the chef who won the first competition, Michael Symon.

The first challenge was to cook a "memory" recipe that was then judged by the other competitors. The winner gets an advantage in this week's elimination challenge. It was a good challenge with a huge variety of dishes. You could see the chefs already jockeying for position and making political calls. Chef Garces won this challenge handily, getting half the votes.

The second challenge was to get a mystery ingredient and make a dish out of it, while being"fearless". The only ingredient I would have had a chance with was the duck's tongues..I would have made a meat loaf and a pate. To make things worse, they only got an hour and fifteen minutes. I was totally impressed..I wouldn't have known even where to start with some of those ingredients.

The only judge I like is Jeffrey Steingarten, but he is the only one I know really well, so maybe the other two will grow on me. During the judging of the first set of dishes things went pretty mildly. No big confrontations or outright disgust. But the teaser for the commercial seems to hint that things will heat up with the second set of dishes.

A little more heat from the judges during the second set of dishes, but nothing hair raising.

Now the judges deliberate. Most of the heat was the judges attacking each other.

Decision time.

They talked to each chef individually. Chef Appleman won with his unlaid eggs. They started with the winner, then worked their way down the survivors. They made a big point the whole time about fearlessness, much moreso than taste. The final two chefs had grasshoppers and sea cucumbers as their ingredients. I don't know if I could eat either one, let alone cook with them. The first chef eliminated was Chef Greenspan and his grasshoppers.

Huckabee

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 06:58:00 +0000

OK..I'm NOT a big Mike Huckabee fan....but......watching him play bass with Alabama tonight was definitely way cooler than Pres. Clinton playing the sax on late night TV.

Pres. Obama and the Olympics

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 18:33:00 +0000

OK, first, yes I confess to a good dose of Schadenfreude over the results in Copenhagen this week. Not so much because it was a personal defeat for Pres. Obama, but because it was such an obvious display of incompetence. There is no way that either he or his wife should have gone unless Chicago getting the Olympics was a sure thing. Pres. Obama put political capital and prestige on the line and lost. I would have hated to be one of those responsible for going on that trip on the flight back. I think it is also another example of this administration's complete incompetence in international relations.

However I am disappointed that the USA lost. I never like to see my country lose. On the other hand, the prospect of an Olympics in Chicago is simply frightening. The corruption and graft that would have accompanied the building of the Olympic venues would have been monumental.

Now, some on the left are attacking those on the right who are celebrating Pres. Obama's failure. This is hypocritical to say the least. The left would have done at least as much if it had been Pres. Bush who failed to win the Olympics. Hell some, including Sen. Burriss, are blaming THIS failure on Pres. Bush.

But even worse, some are saying that if Pres. Obama had not gone to Copenhagen, the right would be blaming him for the loss. My response is why? Why would we expect Pres. Obama to interject himself? No president has before. There might have been some comments made about the president's hometown failing, but no one would have laid it at the president's feet.

Do We Really Want The Government To Run Anything?

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 10:35:00 +0000

I was laid off as a teacher at the end of the last school year due to budget cuts. (Don't cry for me...I have 39 months of rehire rights and the district not only has to hire me as a sub, they have to pay me my last year's per diem to do it. Because I will work more days this year, I will actually make more money this year.)

I filed for unemployment June 18. I was granted unemployment, and filed my first claim the first week of July. My last day of work was June 17, I had to wait a week, and then I filed for the last two weeks of June. When I hadn't heard from the Employment Development Department (EDD) (that's what California calls their unemployment department) by July 22, I sent them an email inquiry per their instructions. On the July 29, a week later, I got a reply saying they needed to conduct a phone interview, and that I would receive the information in the mail. So I waited, and subbed some summer school at $20 an hour.

I had now gone a month with no income. ( I wouldn't get paid my meager sub earnings {less than $500} until Aug. 9) Thankfully, I had paid off all my debts so I only owed my mortgage and my monthly bills. I had also managed to put about $8,000 away in savings last year. (yes..I saw both the economic downturn and my layoff coming) But what if I hadn't? How was I supposed to survive for a month if I had been the typical irresponsible modern consumer? What if I was leasing a new car every other year, maxed out my credit cards, and back in 2007 I had refinanced my house to take out the $250,000 dollars in paper equity? I'd be screwed that is what, and probably pretty hungry.

Well I kept waiting. In the meantime the middle school school year began on July 28, and I began subbing for $120 a day. After 21 days this became $347.70 a day, and was retro. I have since learned that very few of the laid off teachers are taking advantage of their ability to substitute for their per diem...which I simply don't understand.

When I hadn't received my telephone interview or notice by August 15, I sent a second e-mail to the EDD. They responded on August 24, 9 days later, with the same reply they sent me on July 29.

So, just to review, I was now up to two months with potentially no employment, (I didn't have to sub, and as I have stated, many other laid off teachers didn't) and no income.

Finally in the mail, I receive a notice that I am scheduled to have a phone interview to determine my unemployment eligibility on September 22. Not only is this three months after I first filed for unemployment (and was sent a claim form) but it is a week day, which means that I have to spend a work day waiting for a phone call between the hours of 10:00 AM to 2:00 PM. I take the call. We talk for less than 10 minutes. I am informed that I qualify beginning with the second week I intially claimed, and the check would be in the mail.

Yesterday, Sept. 30, I got a check for $295.

The one thing this experience has done is to reinforce my knowledge that you cannot depend on the government for anything, and if you do, you are screwed.

I am eternally grateful to my parents that I was raised to be an ant rather than a grasshopper....but I am damn tired of carrying all the grasshoppers on my back, and pissed off at the government's attempts to turn me into a grasshopper.

Why Can't We All Just Get Along?

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 05:53:00 +0000

Right now I am in a state very close to despair. A friend of mine, who happens to be a very intelligent, highly educated, hard working and successful black woman wrote:

Prhofessor Tiffany is thinking we are not too far away from the antics that took
place during the Jim Crow era. Are we going backwards? Stupid bigots, racists,
followers...who are the real extremists?

Really? The only Black person actually harmed at these townhalls so far was a Black man beaten up by union thugs who support Pres. Obama.

The signs calling Obama a NAZI are being carried by supporters of Lyndon LaRouche, a far LEFT wacko who has run for the Democratic nomination to be president the last seven times.

Can you be opposed to Pres. Obama without being a racist?

If we are going backwards in race relations, let me submit to you that it is NOT due to the actions of White people.

The most egregious case of racially motivated voter intimidation during the last presidential election was committed by three Black men brandishing weapons and making racist statements and threats at a polling place. The cases against them were inexplicably dropped when the Obama administration took over the Dept. of Justice.

There is no channel called White entertainment television. There is no magazine called Ivory. There is no White Miss America pageant. There is no National Association for the Advancement of White People. There is no White Congressional caucus. There are no professional organizations dedicated to the advancement of White people.

On college campuses, yes the dorms are being re-segregated. But not by Whites, but by Blacks. The Greek system has now become almost totally segregated. There are Black student unions, but no White student unions. There are schools of Black studies (or African American studies) but no schools of White studies.

In recent years we have elected a Black president and had two Black Secretaries of State. Since 1984 we have crowned at least 7 Black women Miss America. Our sports heroes are largely Black. (Tiger Woods, Le Bron James, Kobe Bryant, Manny Ramirez, Adrian Peterson) The most influential and wealthy television star is Black (Oprah Winfrey) Black stars dominate the radio airwaves. Of the last 8 Best Actor Oscars, three were won by Black men. Halle Berry has recently won an Oscar for Best Actress.

Everywhere you look, White children are emulating Black culture......many successful Black children are attacked for "acting White".

Is racism dead? Of course not. But I submit to you that it's existence today is at least as much the fault of the Black community as it is the White.

In the last election 94% of Black voters voted for Pres. Obama. If 94% of Whites did ANTHING it would be seen as de facto racist behavior. Yet no one attacks Black voters as racist.

In the last election, a higher percentage of Whites voted for Pres. Obama than for any Democratic nominee since Pres. Carter. So why are White people being attacked as racists?

Now for a little history lesson.

Can anyone tell me which political party wrote, supported and enforced the aforementioned Jim Crow laws? Let me give you a hint...Bull Connor and Orval Faubus were NOT Republicans.

Which political party wrote, passed and enforced the 13th , 14th and 15th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution (collectively called the Civil Rights Amendments)?

Which political party led the defence of slavery in the United States?

Which political party was formed primarily in support of abolition?

Which party tells people that the most important thing about them is themselves as individuals not their race, and that anyone can succeed through hard work and determination?

Which party tells people that they are foremost members of an identity group and promotes an ideology of victimology?

Give The Man Some Cowbell!

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 21:12:00 +0000

Christopher Walken, one of America's greatest actors, turned 66 today! Happy birthday Chris!

Happy Birthday Coca-Cola!

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 00:01:00 +0000

On this day in 1886, the first batch of Coca-Cola was brewed up. Now Coke is one of the great American success stories, sold all over the world. I'll hoist a Cuba Libre tonight in your honor. Here in honor of rule 5 Sunday are some Coca-Cola models to help celebrate this day.

Surely This Must Be A Sign....

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 07:37:00 +0000

of the Apocalypse!

First we are given the horrific specter of Paul Krugman being in demand on the talk show circuit. It seems to me that Krugman has been studying at the feet of David Brooks and has decided to adopt a similar tactic, only from the Left. And as to Krugman's ideas, all that needs to be said is that he thinks the government has not intruded enough into our economy. Not only is he a crapweasel, he's a socialist crapweasel!

But the true horror comes when we learn that someone has created a music video asking why Krugman is not a member of the Obama administration! Seriously, someone created a music video praising Krugman!

If that is not a sign of the end times, I don't know what is.....

Tons O' Titanium!

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 05:31:00 +0000

In the bottom right hand corner is one of the bags from my bank with 40 Titanium bars, forty Titansteel bars and 296 Titanium ores. If you don't know anything about WoW..that's a lot.

The Good And The Bad

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 23:34:00 +0000

Well, the good news is CNN is going to finish in third place this month in prime time for the first time ever. The funniest lines in the article are the attempts to brand CNN as a neutral news source. The problem with CNN is that they are just more of the same leftwing MSM as the network shows. There is no incentive to switch away from CBS, ABC or NBC. Another problem is their hosts. They've come along way from the days of Bernie Shaw, and not in the right direction. C'mon admit it, the only CNN personality you can name is Anderson Cooper, and then that's only because he is the gay son of Gloria Vanderbilt.

The bad news is that MSNBC has taken second place, largely due to the pyschotic rantings of Keith Olbermann and the only success story to come out of Air America, Rachel Maddow. I remember Keith from the old days when he was a local sportscaster in LA, who basically stole Fred Roggin's routine. Give Olbermann his due..he saw a void and filled it. Too bad he lacks the talent of either O'Reilly or Hannity.

Of course Fox News is far and above the winner of cable prime time. They draw more than CNN and MSNBC combined. Besides providing an alternative to the leftwing media, Fox is smart enough to give us eye candy. Gentlemen, I give you the women of Fox News.

P.S. Submitted for Rule 5 Sunday.

Health Care

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 15:39:00 +0000

I just saw a Business show on Fox (Cashing In) and there was a debate on Pres. Obama's health care plan. Everyone (including me) is pretty sure that his plan will be for a nationalized plan run by the government. During the debate the point was made that Pres. Obama believes that there is a right to health care provided by the government, as does some of the guests on the show.

This is repetitive, but important:

Where does this "right" to health care come from?

If we get a "right" to health care, what will the Left demand next? Because you know they will move on to a new "right" that the government must supply. I've already predicted that it will be Internet access. Hell, we're already giving out government coupons so people can buy digital decoder boxes, I assume there is a "right" to watch TV.

WoW update 3/27/09

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 14:59:00 +0000

We've actually managed to raid more than 1 day this week! In fact we have gone into OS/Naxx with a full raid, or close to it, on Tues, Wed. and Thur.! As a result we have managed to down five new bosses this week...Gothik, The Four Horsemen, Patchwerk, Grobbulus, and Gluth. Hopefully tonight we will be able to go in and finish off 25 man Naxx.

Basketball Pools

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 08:50:00 +0000

Well, I was eliminated from Brendan Loy's NIT pool on Wenesday. No three-peat for me, I can't even finish in the top five. shucks. The best I can do in the NCAA Men's is finish second, and in the Women's NCAA I can finish no better than fourth.

In the ESPN Men's pool, I am in two groups. I'm leading one and have a good chance to win it, and I am in third in the other and have a pretty decent chance to win it.

Responsibility

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 00:22:00 +0000

You know what two terms you hear the most out of Pres. Obama's mouth, including tonight's press conference?

"before I got here" and "that I inherited"

Pres. Truman famously said: "The buck stops here".
Pres. Obama says: "the buck stops with that other guy".

NCAA Update 3/23/09

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 09:41:00 +0000

OK, a this point the news is mixed.

In my three ESPN brackets, I'm in first in one group and tied for third (the first two entries are the same person) in another. Not so bad.

In Brendan's pools the news is not so good. In his NCAA Men's pool I am already elminated as a winner, although I have a very slim chance of finishing as high as second still. In his Women's NCAA pool I am in the middle of the pack, although Tennesse's loss hurt. (should have hurt almost everyone though) In his Men's NIT pool I am currently in second place and I have a great chance to win it for the third year in a row.

Too Many People!

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 08:37:00 +0000

There is a twit in the United Kingdom named Jonathan Porritt, who unfortunately appears to be an advisor to the British Prime Minister, that is apparently channeling Sir Paul McCartney:

He wants to cut the population of the United Kingdom in half, down to 30 million people. This would drag the population back to that of the Victorian times. (And we all know how pleasant that period was for the majority of the British people) He's going to make the case this week at a conference held by an organization called the Optimum Population Trust. Imagine the hubris involved merely to imagine that you could even figure out what an "optimum population" is. Why merely roll back to 30 million? Surely 15 million would be even better? Twice as better?

Our own population crazies, Zero Population Growth (ZPG) have apparently changed their name to Population Connection. (They've apparently changed their name but their URL is still ZPG.org) Even they are only crazy enough to want to stabilize current populations. I wonder how long it will take them to pick up the banner that Mr. Porritt is raising?

At this time, solely due to immigration the population of the United Kingdom is due to rise to 71 million by 2031. The actual birth rate in the United Kingdom is below replacement rate at 1.91 per woman. (replacement rate is set at 2.1 by most demographers) with the birth rate of foreign born women higher than UK born women. Millions of people are moving to the UK (mostly non-European), while at the same time millions of British are moving out. Right now there are over 5 million British born living abroad. Anyone want to be me that this conference and organization is almost (if not totally) exclusively White and European?

What Mr. Porritt and his ilk are unwilling to face (or at least admit) is that the United Kingdom is in the process of changing from a first world European nation to a third world, non-European (and largely Muslim) nation. This new population of the United Kingdom has explicitly proclaimed their intention of replacing the European population and culture. Just how does Mr. Porritt expect to convince these people to reduce their population?

Congratulations!

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 05:10:00 +0000

One of my regular (daily) reads, Althouse has just hosted an announcement that the author and host has become engaged to get married to one of her regular readers/commenters.

It's a funny world sometimes. Given the fact that she lives in Madison Wisconsin and he lives in Cinncinati, Ohio they would have never met except for her blog.

Best wishes to both of them, and now we'll see what effect this has on her blog.

Do We Really Want National Health Care?

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 04:05:00 +0000

Today a young woman named Jade Goody died of cervical cancer at the age of 27. Certainly a personal tragedy to her family, and because of her fame, a national one for the United Kingdom. Her story shines a light on one corner of the darkness of nationalized health care.

Here in the United States, it is recommended that young women get tested for cervical cancer by the age of 21 or within three years of their first sexual intercourse if younger. The test is commonly known as a pap smear. This is because cervical cancer happens to be one of those that can be detected very early, and if treated is very survivable. It is quite common for teenage girls to get pap smears.

Things are quite different under the National Health Care systems in the United Kingdom and the rest of Europe.. In most of the United Kingdom, women CANNOT get a pap smear until the age of 20, and since 2003, in England until the age of 25. When confronted about it, British NHS officials bragged that in other parts of Europe women have to wait until the age of 30 to get a pap smear.

Next factor in the fact that here in the United States it is recommended that women receive a pap smear every year until at least the age of 30 and three consecutive clear smears, at which point they recommend every three years until the age of 70.

In the UK they only provide pap smears every three years between the age of 25 and 49, and then every five years until the age of 64.

Early detection is vital in curing cervical cancer. In fact in countries without access to pap smears, cervical cancer is a leading cause of death among women.

When do you want your daughters, sisters, mothers and wives to have their first pap smears? How often do you want to get them? Do you want some government bureaucrat telling you that you cannot get tested? This is just one small fragment of the tragedy of nationalized health care. Imagine this spread across the whole medical realm.

Remember this when the Left starts extolling the benefits of nationalized health care and just say no.

The Nolan Sisters

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 13:17:00 +0000

My heavy metal cred took some serious hits when I was growing up. First there was the fact that I actually admitted to dancing to disco. But the hardest thing to explain away was my love for the Nolan Sisters. What can I say, I was a horny young man.......

Now before the attacks rain down...

1) These videos are from 1979 and 1981..long before MTV...spare me the comments about the production values.

2) They use the word "shant" in the lyrics..how great is that!

Update 03/22/09 6:51: I've been linked! Now my fiendish plans to try and take over the world can begin...

And for those of you who don't remember the Nolans, they were an Irish band who made it big in the UK and Japan, but never really caught on here in the States.

Tax RevoltTea Parties

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 09:18:00 +0000

Just about one month ago Rick Santelli gave his famous speech from the floor of the Chicago Stock exchange:

Future generations may know this man as "The Sam Adams of the 21st Century" All over the country people have been spontaneously organizing Tea Party protests over the actions of Pres. Obama and the Democratic Congress.

The only thing more amazing than the rapid spread of this grassroots movement across the country is the complete lack of coverage of it from the MSM. Literally dozens of articles and reports have been made about 40 people protesting outside the homes of AIG executives yesterday. By most accounts the protesters were heavily outnumbered by the reporters. This protest was all over cable and network news. Where is the coverage of the tea parties?

I am starting to hear suggestions that a big nationwide event is going to happen on April 15. I certainly hope so. If we don't see any improvement soon, I have two suggestions for next year.

First, if possible, change your withholding to "0" as soon as possible. This reduces the amount of interest free loans we give the government, and if enough of us do it, will probably affect the government's cash flow. Simply take the amount you used to send to the IRS each month, and put it in a savings account. Thus you get the interest payments on your money the government isn't giving you, and when your taxes are due in 2010, you have the money on hand.

Second, don't file your taxes until April 14 or April 15 next year. You will have to wait longer for your refund, but if you follow my suggestion above, the government won't owe you a refund. The impact this would have on the IRS is immense. They depend upon the fact that people start filing their returns on January 1.

Protests are good. But it is time to go to the next step. If we can convince millions of Americans upset with Pres. Obama and the Democrats to follow my two suggestions we could really shake things up in Sodom on the Potomac.

Whether the Future?

noreply@blogger.com (Gahrie) — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 10:46:00 +0000

One of my current daily reads (The Other McCain) has posted a set of rules and guidelines designed to garner your blog a million hits. They aren't actually that hard to follow. The question is, do I go for it? It will require a little more attention and dedication to this blog than I've been able to muster at times. Maybe I will just ease my way into it.