Unrest in the Middle East

I've been reading about the unrest in the Middle East, it's spreading from country to country, the protesters, and the violence. there is one thing I notices in all of these reports from 'reading between the lines;' NONE OF THE PROTESTS ARE ANTI-US! Those of us that have been around for a while are pretty shocked that none of these protesters have been blaming the United States for their problems.

So why aren't these protests anti-US? After all we supported almost all the regimes that are being ousted.

Perhaps its because of the success we had in developing democracy in Iraq! Perhaps, this might be a crazy idea, that by invading Iraq and setting up a democracy, other Muslim peoples realized that this could happen and what was going on in their country for years was wrong. Perhaps seeing all the development in Afghanistan has motivated the middle east to a better way of life. Perhaps this is also why we are staying out of it, we lit this fuse - and so far it seems to be a good thing, but only time will tell. Now if they will only get rid of Hezbollah.

Oh another thing, if you are a young 100 lbs, 20 something female reporter- do not let your boss deploy you to report from the middle of a middle eastern protest. Nothing good can happen. Men should be weary also. Here is a news flash- the people in the rest of the world cannot identify Katie Curic! They care about America's CBS news as much as America cares about the BBC and soccer. The rest of the world will treat Katie Curic just as they would anyone else.

Chishis

I made my fist set of Chishi last night. Very easy construction. I had an old rake handle that I split in two, put some concrete screws at the end, then set that handle and screws into the concrete. this morning the concrete is still green and they will need a few more days to harden.

The larger one is about 35 lbs, the smaller about 25 lbs. I need to make some more with some less weight for the girls and wrist training. Because some of the exercises are pretty tough when using even a 25 lb chishi.

Next I need to make some makiwaras. I would like some to mount to the basement floor, but I haven't found any steel floor mounts yet.

ICE STORM!

So wasn't that Ice storm nice yesterday?

After having about 20 inches of snow on the ground, we had to add another 3 inches of ice and slush. At least here in southern Rhode Island we were not like the rest of the state with flooded roads due to blocked drainage. However, my driveway is a sheet of ice.

My driveway sucks. It's crushed asphalt about 125 feet long with a 30 degree grade hill. So needless to say, if there is a little bit of ice, I'm not getting up to the house. So last night when I was returning home from karate, I turned to get up the driveway (thinking that it hadn't iced over yet) and slide right back down into the road. So here I was stuck perpendicular on the road, the backend of the truck stopped in a snow bank. After about a half hour of shoveling and some wood under the tires, I got freed.

Luckily the house is located on a dirt private road with only 5 homes.