JDMCQ's Garage

Thanks Tom. Just takes a few pictars and I'm good

 

In case you haven't seen this yet....

http://www.tacomaworld.com/forum/site-news-announcements/302287-tw-upgrade-new-forum.html

 

On day three of our burn

 

The pics just made it easier for you. You are as smart cookie and would have figured it out.

 

Thanks Susan. Gonna tell my buddy; he has a Tundra and I'm always telling him about how helpful, as well as entertaining, TW is for me.

 

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch, be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

 

first snow expected today

 

For all the Vets and active military in this thread THANK YOU

Hush and be quiet.

 

I'm MC'ng a Vigil tonight at the Crosses of Lafayette Irag and Afghanistan War Memorial, we do this every Veteran's and Memorial Day. I wrote this up this morning to read, to remind us all that we all have jobs to do. Have a good Veteran's Day everyone.

Throughout history the lives and duties of the professional soldier have not changed really. From the fields of Thermopolis to the gates of Carthage, from the constant harassment from Spanish rebels whom the Roman Army never could extricate from the mountains of the interior to the outposts along Hadrian’s Wall or to the Eastern Frontier along the Danube. In more recent times the sheer scale of slaughter as military tactics forced to shift away from Napoleonic Era of set piece engagements to trench warfare following the most incredible advancements in our ability to kill after the onset of the Industrial Age. From the bloody sands of Io Jima to the frozen hell of Inchon, from Khe Sanh to Kandahar, and from thousands of places with no names, places known only to those who lived, fought and died there. The life of the professional soldier has always carried with it one very basic tenement: that is, to do your job.
It is not his job to understand fully why he is doing what he does, it is his job to maintain discipline and follow orders. It is not his job to hem and haw in the halls of power as to why he should or should not be there, nor would he really think about that because the reality of being shot at and the political fervor it takes to get a nation to put him there are two completely separate things. He will care much more about the survival of himself and his brothers than he would about the ideals represented by the patch on his shoulder.
And here, today, we reflect of the job these folks did for us, we will speak of God and country, honor and sacrifice, but they will speak as just having ‘done their job’. Well they did a great job from the terrible circumstances that we put them in. Anyone who is will to serve for me and mine is deserving of our utmost praise and respect, for all time.
But like the professional soldier has a job to do so do we. As a democratic republic it is the leaders we elect that hold the power to wage war in our name. It is our job as citizens to make damn sure that the professional soldier is called upon only for the rightest of reasons and as the absolute last option. For in doing so we ask our men and women to sacrifice everything including possibly their very lives.
Those is power will talk of the greater good and the need for war, beating the war drum as it were to whip their people into a mass hysteria. That is what’s required to get a tribe, a kingdom or a country to go to war. Serbian TV and radio was filled his hate for several years against those who eventually became the victims of genocide. Pax Romana is the concept of Rome’s greatness to its own people who are willingly oblivious to the human toll required to achieve and maintain that ‘greatness’. These concepts have nothing whatsoever to do with the terror and tragedies experienced by the professional soldiers sent by then men who beat the drums of war. This Memorial stands as a stark example of what that hysteria results in. It is not a number on a page, it’s a cross on a hill, it’s 5000 families shattered and trying to move on after having lost someone who selflessly answered our leaders call. Those boys didn’t question the motives behind that call, they answered the call and did their job.
Eisenhower, in 1961, speaking about the rise of misplaced power and influence within the American government said; “Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals”
That is our job as citizens, that is what he was talking about. So on this Veteran’s Day let us reflect and honor those who served and continue to serve for us but more than that we need to honor them by doing our job as citizens better.

 

^^^^

Very nice and well written, Chris.

 

Not if there is a strong root system.

 

Yard is going to be just fine.

 

Well done.

 

How's it going Weesa?

 

Hope the cold goes away real soon. Get it out of the way now

Car's doing good. Starts right up Going to find a rebuild kit and re-build the old one and then I'll have a spare....