Category Archives: Mr. Boy

The politically-inspired food pyramid

Posted on February 14, 2012 | Comments Off on The politically-inspired food pyramid

“The food pyramid that was released by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) in 1992 quickly became a recognizable nutrition symbol for Americans. However, during the same period of the 1990s, Americans gained more and more weight. Is the food pyramid to blame?”

How could it not be, since it advises eating copious amounts of carbohydrates in the form of starches, grains and sugars? Moreover, it’s taught in the public schools. Mr. B. learned about it in second grade. He even had a test on it.

Via Instapundit.

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Posted in Blogosphere, Mr. Boy

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Time machine

Posted on February 6, 2012 | Comments Off on Time machine

Mrs. Charm is the television consumer at the rancho. Unless you count Mr. Boy’s periodic consumption of Sponge Bob. Her fave Roku show these days is Mad Men, a soaper return to the early 1960s urban advertising game, with lots of skinny ties, incessant smoking and martini lunches.

Also the girdled wives and girlfriends, which brings back some interesting memories I won’t mention (this is a family blog). This was back when women used hairspray but men didn’t. Instead, for us, it was grease or oil—Brylcreem or Vitalis, as I recall. Awful stuff, really, even the smell.

Supposedly, according to the show, throwing trash on the ground was also common. I don’t recall doing that, expect for one item. Pulling over to the side of the road to dump the car’s ashtray. How many times did I do that? Too many to count. Shameless behavior, truly.

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Posted in Library, Mr. Boy, Mrs. Charm, Scribbles

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Contrails

Posted on February 1, 2012 | Comments Off on Contrails

Driving Mr. B. to his scout meeting last night, I was startled when he suddenly said “Wow!” and pointed at the sky.

It was just after dusk and the sky was still bright enough to illuminate a dense crosshatching of airliner contrails (condensed water vapor) overhead—east, west, north and south. ‘Twas a busy evening up there, apparently.

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Posted in Mr. Boy, Science/Engineering, Weather/Climate

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Back to school

Posted on January 5, 2012 | Comments Off on Back to school

Whew. A few more days of winter break and… Well, nevermind. Mr. B. goes back to school today, in about twenty minutes in fact. Nor will he be around much this weekend, either.

It’s the Lumberjack campout starting tomorrow evening, where the boy scouts spend the weekend cutting down trees and building shelters on some nice person’s ranch out east of here. So, after two weeks of “togetherness,” things are about to return to normal at Rancho Roly Poly.

The bad part is that this will mean resumption of the homework wars.

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Posted in Mr. Boy, Rancho Roly Poly, Scribbles

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Headquarters unit

Posted on December 16, 2011 | Comments Off on Headquarters unit

First of several American war in Vietnam photos I’ll be running here. This is my old headquarters unit from RF-PF advisory days in 1969.

Guy on left is my RTO holding my M-79 while I take the pix. Next to him is Mr. B.’s future godfather in his younger days. I hope the rest of them also survived but, since I didn’t keep their names, I have no way of knowing.

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Posted in Mr. Boy, Rancho Roly Poly, Troops, Viet Nam

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Soaking rains

Posted on December 6, 2011 | Comments Off on Soaking rains

Our several long days of soaking rain, which ended Monday, have been really welcome here at the parched rancho. According to our amateur rain gauge we’ve collected a little more than two inches since the steady showers began at the end of last week.

Now Mr. B. has something extra to look forward to on his Boy Scout troop’s Hill Country camping trip this weekend: a camp fire for the first time this year. The rains most likely have been sufficient to lift the burn bans imposed in most parts of Texas this year.

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Posted in Mr. Boy, Rancho Roly Poly, Texana, Weather/Climate

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Thanks to all my ebook readers

Posted on December 1, 2011 | Comments Off on Thanks to all my ebook readers

I happily ended November with six more ebook sales for Alamo and Knoxville—including twice as many of the latter. Which brings that one to a total of 91 since its first month in April, 2010—finally edging in on breaking even for the cost of ebook formatting.

Hardly bestseller material here, these single-digit sales months. Haven’t had a double-digit month since 15 sold back in April. Record still 27 for Knoxville alone in August 2010, thanks to a plug from power-blogger Instapundit. It’s a nice lunch-money hobby, however.

Thanks to all my loyal readers, including those who promised reviews at Amazon but haven’t gotten around to it. Several have good excuses, including one in San Antonio who’s seriously ill. Best wishes to him, of course, for a recovery soon.

Still in the works: polishing a Vietnam War novel which loyal-reader Snoopy was kind enough to read and criticize, finishing a Civil War digital regimental still in blog form, and writing a memoir about growing up in the Cold War.

War-Is-Us, obviously. One of these days I may do something different. Meanwhile, coupled with new violin lessons and full-time parenting, I’m busier than before I retired.

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Posted in Blogosphere, Library, Mr. Boy, Rancho Roly Poly, Scribbles

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