Michelle McIntosh

I’ve noticed this year that we have gone straight from Halloween to Christmas! Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday and I think it deserves a little more attention! : )

I work downtown and on my way to work the Monday after Halloween, I saw Christmas trees in store windows and couldn’t believe it. I was disappointed again the following week when several neighbors had Christmas lights and trees up. The home owners association gives us a certain date that the lights have to be taken down but can’t they be put up too early?

This year I saw no turkeys, no pilgrim hats or feathers. Jack-o-lanterns turned into Christmas trees. I absolutely love Christmas but my family will continue the tradition of putting the Christmas tree and decorations up the weekend after Thanksgiving.

Living in Las Vegas I became used to seeing homeless people. They have an area off of highway 15 north that we call Tent City. You can see the small tents that they live in. I got used to seeing dirty people on the corner of a busy intersection holding their sympathy signs about how hungry or stranded they were. I used to look the other way and roll up my windows, I’d even lock the door. It became such an everyday occurrence that I became desensitized to it and was able to look them right in the eye with my window rolled down and tell them “no”. Then one August day, in walked Mr. & Mrs. Hurt.

I was at work when a couple walked in. I greeted her but she didn’t respond in any way. I brushed it off and waited for the man with her to come in the door. She stood quietly and patiently until he came in and walked up to my desk. He took out his pen and paper and told me that he was deaf and obviously couldn’t speak. In a series of quick notes back and forth I learned that he and his wife were displaced from hurricane Rita. They drew social security but were currently homeless. The police picked them up the night before at a Waffle House and put them up in a motel for a night. As kind as that was, they had the same problem at check-out time, back on the streets.

My place of business has nothing to do with providing help to homeless or any kind of aide. My best uneducated guess was to call the Salvation Army. They had room for the couple! I was proud to tell Mr. Hurt that I had been able to help them. He shook his head and then wrote that his wife was deaf and blind. They had been married for 25 years and he would not go to a shelter unless they could be together because she could not communicate and they didn’t want to be apart. I could feel the tears well up but I held them off so I could make more calls. After an hour and a half, someone finally suggested that I call the First United Methodist Church. The associate Pastor there was able to help but he didn’t have a vehicle available to come get the couple. I volunteered to take them to meet the Pastor at the motel near his church. I took all of our notes and put them in an envelope to help the Pastor make sense of what was going on. A co-worker and myself helped them to my car and we took them a mile away to the motel.

In between my phone calls to churches and charities and and my notes to Mr. Hurt, I saw him communicate with his wife in such a loving way. It was just sign language but I could tell that he loved her so much. Without a single word, this couple, Mr. & Mrs. Hurt, managed to touch me in a way that I will never forget. I will continue to keep them in my prayers.

A great cause that helps the members of our military and their families is Cell Phones for Soldiers. Their website provides a free shipping label or you can find a drop off location in Tulsa. Cell Phones for Soldiers send the phones to ReCellular, which pays them for each donated phone – enough to provide an hour of talk time to soldiers abroad. They have distributed more than 500,000 prepaid calling cards to soldiers serving overseas.

Help protect your Second Amendment and join the NRA.
Free membership includes:

• 24/7 Defense of your Firearm Freedoms
• NRA’s Freedom Times Monthly E-Letter
• Your NRA Membership Card and Decal
• Savings on Hotels, Rental Cars and More
• Invitations to “Friends of NRA” Dinners and Celebration of American Values Special Events
• Free Admission to NRA’s Show With Over Five Acres of Guns, Gear and Outfitter Displays (with current membership) in Phoenix, 2009 – Charlotte, 2010 – Pittsburgh, 2011

As of 4 Feb 09 Facebook made a change to it’s user terms that reads.

“You hereby grant Facebook an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to (a) use, copy, publish, stream, store, retain, publicly perform or display, transmit, scan, reformat, modify, edit, frame, translate, excerpt, adapt, create derivative works and distribute (through multiple tiers), any User Content you (i) Post on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof subject only to your privacy settings or (ii) enable a user to Post, including by offering a Share Link on your website and (b) to use your name, likeness and image for any purpose, including commercial or advertising, each of (a) and (b) on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof.”

So everything you add on Facebook will be archived and kept indefinitely! They can use anything they want to promote Facebook such as your family photos or private posts.

You can delete your profile but the data has already been saved and will be property of Facebook!

Source: FoxNews

Recently my husband and I visited Ft. Sill with my in-laws. It was so warming to see the base housing with the flags flying outside the homes. Here are ten guidelines from the VFW on how to fly your flag.

1. The flag should be hoisted briskly and lowered ceremoniously
2. The flag is never allowed to touch the ground or the floor
3. When hung over a sidewalk on a rope extending from a building to a pole, the union stars are always away from the building
4. When vertically hung over the center of the street, the flag always has the union stars to the north in and east/west street, and to the east in a north/south street
5. The flag of the United States of America should be at the center and at the highest point of the group when a number of flags of states or localities or pennants of societies are grouped and displayed from staffs
6. The flag should never be festooned, drawn back, nor up, in folds but always allowed to fall free
7. The flag should be displayed at half-staff until noon on Memorial Day then raised to the top of the staff
8. Never fly the flag upside down except as a signal of distress in instances of extreme danger to life or property
9. The flag is never flown in inclement weather except when using an all-weather flag
10. The flag can be flown every day from sunrise to sunset and at night if illuminated properly

In my opinion Bobby Rush is a dumb ass! I saw him on Fox News last night saying that Roland Burris being turned away yesterday was a racist move. What nerve! I am also tired of any anti-obama person being accused of being racist. Are we going to have to hear this every day for the next 1,474 days that Barack Hussein Obama is in office? I don’t care if he’s purple, I don’t like him and think he’s a sham. Would it be fair if I accused all of the black people of being racist that didn’t like Bush? It never entered my mind.

I have been wondering how we know that Roland Burris didn’t buy his seat. I guess we don’t know and never will.

Reid vowed to block the appointment because of allegations that Gov. Blogojevich tried to sell Barack Hussein Obama’s seat.

Reid was quoted as saying, “We are not making a judgment about qualifications of the appointee, but about whether the appointment itself is tainted by fraud. This is like judging the integrity of an election, free from fraud or corruption. It’s the process that lead to the appointment, not the appointee’s qualifications.”

I haven’t talked to my Chevy loving husband about this yet but, I am thinking a Ford may be my next car purchase. I see tweets and blogs about boycotting GM and Chrysler and I have mixed feelings about it.

However, if the Ford Motor Company is going to try and make a go of it without a bail out, I think I need to support that.

Read The Ford Story

Do you all remember the woman that gave Mike Huckabee the wedding ring in lieu of money while he was on the campaign trail?

It took him a year to find her and he had her on his show tonight. When he asked her how she could give up her wedding ring, she said that she only had $40 and her husband didn’t want to give it up because that was all they had to last until payday in 2 weeks. Her ring was all she had of monetary value and she wanted to donate to a cause she really believed in.

Huckabee’s wife returned her simple gold band to her and then the Huckabee’s gave her an envelope containing $1000. Huckabee said he hoped that the money would help with Christmas.

That is the true Christmas spirit. This poor woman gave more than she had to give and it came back to her plus a lot more.

Way to go Huckabee!