The USAF Band Holiday Flash Mob at the National Air and Space Museum 2013

Read all about it HERE

Memories of Past Thanksgivings - November 20013

Memories of Past Thanksgivings

I did this short story a few years back to bring back memories in my family of those good old days when we were all so young and the family was everything. Today I wish to share this story with you and those overseas doing this country so proud. Hope it helps bring back in you some of those good OLD memories about some of your past Thanksgivings with your loved ones...

God bless and Happy Thanksgiving to all of you...
AubreyJ.........

.Photo of my Grandparents old house - Photo taken in 2001 by Aunt Louise.

And so my story begins... from the eyes of an older country boy... ME!!!.

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.In this short story, I tried to bring back those good old days at Thanksgiving time. All that good cooking and eating that went on.... It's like them days had happened just yesterday!!!.

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I can remember dad driving up to the Big House and all of us kids jumping out of the car and making a dash for the porch. Just to be pulled back to help unload the car of all the food offerings that we had brought for the Thanksgiving feast.

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As we walk into the house, we're greeted by hugs and kisses from the Aunts and warm hellos from the Uncles. Smile at Papaw as we walk by and on to the kitchen and out to the back porch we go. After unloading all the food on the tables outside, it's time to go and get a big hug and kiss from Mamaw. Naturally we would always get the yes ma'am... no ma'am drill from her and after that all of us kids would take off in our own directions.

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Now as for me- I usually ran for Uncle Buddy and would jump up into his arms. We'd have a short man to man chat... and then it was off to Papaw. Oh yeah... That short dash, backward flip to a tail slide across the arm of the chair topped off with a good 10 point landing- down between the side of Papaw and the arm of the chair. Such perfection- I'd even managed to miss that big old cigar that was always in Papaw's mouth.

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"Hey Papaw.... Got you any wolves this week!!!" I sure did love getting up in that chair with Papaw. All the small talk that went on between us that only Papaws and their grandchildren can have and the smell of Papaw's cigar- Now how can any of us forget that!!!.After a short visit with Papaw, I would run through the house to see what all the cousins were up to. Shoot- It always seemed that by the time we could all get together and get some kind of game started, all through the house you would hear Mamaw calling... "Everyone come to the table- it's time to eat." Now you would think that all us kids would come a running!!! Well some of us would, yet some of us would not...

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Yes sir, some of us kids were a little hard headed. Figure that!!! We would give ourselves them excuses like- "If we hurry up- we can finish this game and then go eat." This never did work out, no matter what we were playing... A few minutes would pass by, then someone would come for us bringing major threats from our parents. Hard headed are not, we knew for our own self preservation it would be best to make a dash for the tables about this time...

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Now... Where you got to sit down and eat was all up to how old you was. When you came of age, you got to eat at the big tables. If not of age yet, you had to eat in the kitchen or on the back porch. (I thought on this for a little bit and came to this conclusion... If we were to have a family reunion this Thanksgiving... and everyone showed up, I'd still end up on the back porch or at best in the kitchen. Some things never change... Oh well...)

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After everyone got settled down in their chairs it would start to get real quit. That's because before we could all start eating we had to have prayer. There was always some praying going on but it was more on the lines of: "Lord, please don't let Aunt Alice say the prayer this year." Mother would have the food cold by the time she got done with the Thanksgiving Blessings. Yes sir... That woman could sure do some praying at the table!!!

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Anyway- after a good 5 minutes of quit time, we finally got to eat. A-Men!!! There's no need in going over the list of food again because we had it all and then some... I'd eat so much that there was no way in the world I was going anywhere near that dessert table. Well not for an hour or two...

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After the feast, all us kids would take off to play and the adults would clean up and then head for the living room to visit and watch football. Uncle J.P. and Dad would go outside and have them a smoke while Uncle Jack and Uncle R.V. headed for the back bedrooms for a short nap. After a while dad and Uncle J.P. would catch up with the men and us kids knew to play very quietly around this time. If we had awakened any of the men we would have all been dead meat!!!

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I could go on and on with this story but I think I'll end it here. Besides, I have so many fond memories about this time of the year that I'd have to write a small book to cover them all...

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Anyway, I truly hope that this short story has sparked a few fond memories in all of you and I'll end with this wish... May you and yours have a wonderful and memorable Thanksgiving and for god’s sake… don't burn the rolls up this year!!!

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Story by: AubreyJ.........

Aubrey J. Fawcett

Written back on November 15, 2002

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HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!

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Happy Veterans Day - November 11, 2013

- Happy Veterans Day -

About Photo: Scenes from Veterans Day 2011 at Arlington National Cemetery. President Obama at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier

Image by U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs

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On November 11^th of each year we have Veterans Day in which we honor and thank all who have served in the United States Armed Forces remembering that many gave the ultimate sacrifice.

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Happy Veterans Day

and Thank You
AubreyJ.........
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CNN: Obama Admin Trying To Silence Insurance Companies From Discussing O...

This video posted on YouTube by GOPICYMI

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Good to see at least PARTS of the MSM reporting the truth on Obama.....

AubreyJ.........

 

Jon Stewart Delivers Blistering Takedown of Obamacare Rollout: Dems Can'...

Curiosity's SAM Instrument Finds Water and More in Surface Sample on Mars

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Curiosity's SAM Instrument Finds Water and More in Surface Sample

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    The first scoop of soil analyzed by the analytical suite in the belly of NASA's Curiosity rover reveals that fine materials on the surface of the planet contain several percent water by weight. The results were published today in Science as one article in a five-paper special section on the Curiosity mission.

    "One of the most exciting results from this very first solid sample ingested by Curiosity is the high percentage of water in the soil," said Laurie Leshin, lead author of one paper and dean of the School Science at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. "About 2 percent of the soil on the surface of Mars is made up of water, which is a great resource, and interesting scientifically." The sample also released significant carbon dioxide, oxygen and sulfur compounds when heated.

    Curiosity landed in Gale Crater on the surface of Mars on Aug. 6, 2012, charged with answering the question: "Could Mars have once harbored life?" To do that, Curiosity is the first rover on Mars to carry equipment for gathering and processing samples of rock and soil. One of those instruments was employed in the current research: the Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) instrument suite, which includes a gas chromatograph, a mass spectrometer and a tunable laser spectrometer. These tools enable SAM to identify a wide range of chemical compounds and determine the ratios of different isotopes of key elements.

    "This work not only demonstrates that SAM is working beautifully on Mars, but also shows how SAM fits into Curiosity's powerful and comprehensive suite of scientific instruments," said Paul Mahaffy, principal investigator for SAM at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. "By combining analyses of water and other volatiles from SAM with mineralogical, chemical and geological data from Curiosity's other instruments, we have the most comprehensive information ever obtained on Martian surface fines. These data greatly advance our understanding surface processes and the action of water on Mars."

    Thirty-four researchers, all members of the Mars Science Laboratory Science Team, contributed to the paper.

    In this study, scientists used the rover's scoop to collect dust, dirt and finely grained soil from a sandy patch known as Rocknest. Researchers fed portions of the fifth scoop into SAM. Inside SAM, the "fines"—the dust, dirt and fine soil—were heated to 1,535 degrees F (835 C). 

    Baking the sample also revealed a compound containing chlorine and oxygen, likely chlorate or perchlorate, previously found near the north pole on Mars. Finding such compounds at Curiosity's equatorial site suggests they could be distributed more globally. The analysis also suggests the presence of carbonate materials, which form in the presence of water.

    In addition to determining the amount of the major gases released, SAM also analyzed ratios of isotopes of hydrogen and carbon in the released water and carbon dioxide. Isotopes are variants of the same chemical element with different numbers of neutrons, and therefore different atomic weights. SAM found that the ratio of some isotopes in the soil is similar to the ratio found in atmospheric samples analyzed earlier, indicating that the surface soil has interacted heavily with the atmosphere.

    "The isotopic ratios, including hydrogen-to-deuterium ratios and carbon isotopes, tend to support the idea that as the dust is moving around the planet, it's reacting with some of the gases from the atmosphere," Leshin said.

    SAM can also search for trace levels of organic compounds. Although several simple organic compounds were detected in the experiments at Rocknest, they aren't clearly Martian in origin. Instead, it is likely that they formed during the high-temperature experiments, when the heat decomposed perchlorates in the Rocknest samples, releasing oxygen and chlorine that then reacted with terrestrial organics already present in the SAM instrument.

    A related paper, published in the Journal of Geophysical Research-Planets, details the findings of perchlorates and other chlorine-bearing compounds in the Rocknest sample. This paper is led by Daniel Glavin, a Mars Science Laboratory Science Team member at Goddard.  

    Glavin notes that SAM has the ability to perform another kind of experiment to address the question of whether organic molecules are present in the Martian samples. The SAM suite includes nine fluid-filled cups which hold chemicals that can react with organic molecules if present in the soil samples. "Because these reactions occur at low temperatures, the presence of perchlorates will not inhibit the detection of Martian organic compounds," said Glavin.

    The combined results shed light on the composition of the planet's surface, while offering direction for future research.

    "Mars has kind of a global layer, a layer of surface soil that has been mixed and distributed by frequent dust storms. So a scoop of this stuff is basically a microscopic Mars rock collection," said Leshin. "If you mix many grains of it together, you probably have an accurate picture of typical Martian crust. By learning about it in any one place you're learning about the entire planet."

Above is a Mosaic Image of Curiosity

Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Malin Space Science Systems

- Nancy Neal-Jones and Elizabeth Zubritsky
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
301-286-0039 / 301-614-5438
nancy.n.jones@nasa.gov / elizabeth.a.zubritsky@nasa.gov

- Guy Webster
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-6278
guy.webster@jpl.nasa.gov

- Mary Martialay
RensselaerPolytechnic Institute
518-276-2146
martim12@rpi.edu

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Now THAT is some cool stuff!

AubreyJ………

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Remembering those killed and wounded in D.C. Navy Yard Mass Murder

Taking a moment to remember those that lost their lives and the ones wounded, in Monday’s senseless shooting that killed 12 innocent, hard working people.

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In our prayers all… along with their family and friends.

AubreyJ………

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9/11 How Soon We Forget - September 11, 2013

.Note: This video will only be up on YouTube until 9/15/2013… Then I’ll be taking it down until I bring it back again around this time next year.

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9/11 How Soon We Forget

-- VIDEO NO LONGER UP --

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I made the above video/slide back in 2004 on the events of 9/11 the day… and as time slowly passed, up to one year later.

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I would first like to tell you how this video came to be…

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I was running down some music to use on my family website that I use to have up… and at the time was looking in a place I used from time to time that had GREAT midi files that a very talented man name Dan West wrote and composed.

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That’s when I ran across his latest work that he had written and composed himself in memory of the victims of 9-11. His song was titled “Heartbreak Blues” and Dan had put it up on his website for all to listen too.

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Anyway… to make a long story short… Dan’s music inspired me so… that I wrote him and asked his permission to use his music in a video/slide project I was wanting to work on and he was kind enough to say OK. And that I still thank him for.

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Ok then… About the video. The very first part is put together pretty much in a perfect timeline as the events unfolded that tragic day on 9/11/2001. Then I go back and forth in time with the rest.

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The 2^nd part, “Goodbyes”, after the credit roll, starts off at the footprints of the Twin Towers, one year later. It was early that morning on 9-11-2002 and the family members of the ones that lost their lives along with others came to say goodbye one more time.

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The morning went from a calm clear morning at first then to being very windy and a dust storm whipped up. Some of the family members who were there said it was as if their loved ones had come down from heaven to say their last goodbyes too. Many said a chill was in the air and that a strange calm came over them.

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After the first few pictures I move back and forth in time from days after 9-11-2001, as people from around the world mourned the dead and this tragedy to one year later, back at the footprints of the towers.

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Why did I make this video some might ask? Well… I mainly made this video for my family and friends to watch once a year... and being you are reading this right now… you MUST be one or the other!!!

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So again… this video/slide that I made is actually a 2-parter. The 1st part I call “9/11… How Soon We Forget”. Then after the credit roll is the 2nd part that I call “Goodbyes”. So be sure to watch it to the end.

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Now for the record… I could have gone very graphic with this and almost did at first… but in the end I keep away from doing so for I wanted it to be able to be seen by both adults and children alike. Regardless, I still made it strong enough to get the point across as to just how violent and emotional of an event this really was.

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9/11, how soon we forget

No other words needed

AubreyJ……….

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In memory of all those that lost their lives that tragic day...

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Paul Simon Performs 'The Sounds of Silence'

At Ground Zero during the 9/11 Anniversary, 2011

Tribute at 9/11 Memorial... 9/11/11

This Video posted on YouTube by djbuddyboca

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Not to be forgotten…

The One Year Anniversary

Of The Benghazi Terrorist Attack

In memory of those too that lost their lives that tragic evening, one year ago today

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