Daily Archives: January 7, 2014

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Sunshine Award


Thank you slesser1013 for nominating me for the Sunshine Award. I’ve been nominated for this one before, but I’m always thrilled to get it, because I am enough of a hippy to be thrilled at the idea that my blog sends a bit of Sunshine into the World.

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Rules for Nominees

  1. Display the Award on your blog.
  2. Announce your win with a post and thank the blogger who awarded you.
  3. Present around 10 deserving bloggers with the Award – “who positively and creatively inspire others in the blogosphere.”
  4. Link your awardees in the post and let them know of their being awarded with a comment.
  5. Write 10 interesting things about you.

10 Interesting Things About Me

  1. I am an ashamed, proud ex-hippy
  2. I HATE the Cold
  3. I am, by nature, a night person
  4. Most of my friends are morning people (see # 3 — ugh)
  5. I’ve been a widow for 19 years
  6. I dislike hypocrisy, bigotry and ignorance, because all of them can be fixed
  7. I love Art of all kinds
  8. I am a photographer, a painter and a writer
  9. I a love music, I love performance art, live theatre, Opera, and ballet
  10. I am a Feminist and I am 100% devoted to the Rights of Women and Children.

My 10 nominees are:

  1. linne
  2. TersiaBurger
  3. Sue Dreamwalker
  4. Petrel41
  5. inavukic
  6. MsTranquility
  7. PrayingForOneDay
  8. Scottishmomus
  9. HuntForTruth
  10. Xena
  11. Godtisx
  12. Andrea
  13. BarbaraFranken
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Not Freshly Pressed


Thanks to Dr Rex for nominating me for the brand new: NOT FEATURED ON FRESHLY PRESSED

NotFeaturedonFreshlyPressed

This wonderful award, for those of us not in the “blessed” 1% on the Freshly Presssed list was created by DonCharisma.  Here is what he has to say about it:

This is a new award “freshly pressed” today.  No one else has these badges on their blog, so it’s EXCLUSIVE to DonCharisma.org.

The idea is entirely my own, I created the award because I’m not on WordPress’ Freshly Pressed (FP) and probably 99.99% of other bloggers aren’t either. Seems some are envious that they aren’t on FP, others couldn’t care less about FP. It’s seen as an elite accolade in WordPress circles, if you’re on it, you’re at the top table, you’ve made it, you’re in the VIP, “THE” clique. Others will certainly get on their hands and knees and pay homage to you, you clever so and so. Or NOT as the case may be.

To get “made” (reminds me of Goodfellas) as a “Freshly Pressed” blog, your post and blog have to pass human editors. I’m guessing their equation includes a fairly stringent politically correctness checks, moral decency checks and a popularity gauge. Viral posts will have more chance of getting onto FP. And of course there are some special sauce ingredients – I don’t know what they are, could be masonic handshakes or bizarre initiation ceremonies involving donkeys, for all I know.

Either way most of us won’t ever get on “Freshly Pressed”, so I’ve created this award for a little bit of fun, mostly.

I’ve freshly pressed you a new badge, well four in fact so you can choose, yay. They aren’t available anywhere else, so get them whilst they’re freshly pressed.

If you don’t accept Awards then please pass on to someone else who may like it or just know it’s the thought that counts.

The Rules:

Directions for you to accept the “The I’m NOT Featured On Freshly Pressed Award”

1. Select the blog(s) you think deserve the “The I’m NOT Featured On Freshly Pressed Award”.

2. Write a blog post and tell us the blog(s) you have chosen – there are no minimum or maximum number of blogs required- and ‘present’ the blog(s) with their award.

3. Include in your blog post a paragraph about why you’d like to be on WordPress’ Freshly Pressed OR a paragraph on why you couldn’t care less about Freshly Pressed. Up to you …..

4. Let the blog(s) that you have chosen know that you have given them this award and share the instructions with them – (please don’t alter the instructions or the badge!)

5. Come over and say hello to the originator of the “The I’m NOT Featured On Freshly Pressed Award” via this link: http://DonCharisma.org/2014/01/01/the-im-not-featured-on-freshly-pressed-award

6. And as a winner of the award- please add a link back to the blog that presented you with this award, and then PROUDLY display the award on your blog.

7. If you ever do get officially “Freshly Pressed” then take down this award badge and display the official “Freshly Pressed” badge instead.

This award is meant to be Fun and somewhat irrerevernt and I love it for that reason (as I consider myself to be fun and somewhat irreverant!).

I actually would like to be on Freshly Pressed, one day, because it’s an acknowledgement by WordPress’s administrators that my blog is what I meant it to be:  compelling, interesting and relevant.  It also would be a way to get my message of Peace, Creativity, Women’s Issues, Justice and Tolerance to a potentially new and wider audience, which is important to me not for egoistic reasons, but because I want to be able to help people and to help make the world a better place, and I have hopes that my blog can help to do that.

My nominees are:

  1. Valentine Logar
  2. CravesAdventure
  3. Crowing Crone Joss
  4. TersiaBurger
  5. Pat Cegan
  6. Petchary
  7. K.A.Brace
  8. Jackie Saulmon-Ramirez
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2013 in review


The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2013 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 20,000 times in 2013. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 7 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

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Leftover Lamb Pie


Yum

Rufus' Food and Spirits Guide

This is a great way to use up a large amount of leftover lamb. The dish is fairly easy and quick so it works well for a weekday meal also.

Lamb Pie

  • 1 small onion diced medium
  • 2 large turnips diced medium
  • 5 carrots diced medium
  • 1 cup mushrooms quartered
  • 2 tbsp chopped fresh sage
  • 3 1/2 cups diced cooked lamb
  • 1 14 oz can beef stock
  • 1/2 cup flour
  • 2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
  • 1 sheet prepared puff pastry dough
  • Salt/pepper
  • 2 tbsp butter

In a 12″ cast iron or oven safe skillet heat butter over medium heat. Saute onion until golden then add carrots and turnips. Saute until carrots begin to brown then add mushrooms, sage and lamb. Season with salt and pepper and add flour and stir to incorporate. Add stock and Worcestershire sauce and mix well. Cook filling over medium heat until thick and bubbly. Roll out…

View original post 29 more words

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Two-Thirds of Americans Live in the 4th Amendment “Exemption Zone”


Is big brother getting too big for his britches?

The Progressive Cynic

© Josh Sager – January 2014

Last week, Judge Edward Korman—a Reagan appointee to the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York—confirmed that federal authorities can search the electronic devices of any American within 100 miles of any border without the need to obtain a warrant.

The Abidor et al v. Napolitano et al case, which Judge Korman just dismissed in favor of the government, focused upon warrantless searches of laptops without suspicion at the border. In this case, an American student was stopped at the border after traveling to several Middle Eastern countries and was forced to unlock/surrender his laptop computer. Despite the fact that nothing illegal was found on the computer, it still took nearly two weeks for Abidor to recover his laptop (which held the only copy of his thesis paper).

While dismissing this case, Judge Korman conceded to the government’s assertion that…

View original post 886 more words