Friday, January 30, 2009
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Monday, January 26, 2009
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Amidst seemingly thousands of driving montages, “Barking Water” has potential. It’s the kind of movie you cheer for, despite its flaws. Because at the heart of the tale is the overwhelming power of love to redeem. I know that sounds totally corny, and it’s not the kind of thing I would normally write as a positive, but in such a small budget, sincere little film such sentiments seem much more valid. Shot with a tiny crew and a cast that mostly consisted of non-actors, it appears that director Sterlin Harjo did his very best to enlighten. Using non-actors for “Barking Water” is what contributes most to the independent feel of the film. I believe the choice is largely positive. After all, a seasoned filmmaker like Gus Van Sant uses non-actors all the time to achieve this raw affect. There is something about emotions displayed by someone who is not Oscar-bound that I really appreciate. And I don’t think a, say, Richard Gere could pull off the role of a dying old guy quite like Richard Ray Whitman can. Well, plus Gere isn’t a Native American… That said, there are some problems with characterizations that I found distracting. Take, for example, the young’uns that Irene and Frankie hit up for a free meal. Adorning gold chains and huge pants, and so stereotypical as to use the phrase “butt hurt,” these boys – and other caricatures like them – bring the film down to a cheap comedy level. Likewise, the aforementioned driving sequences. Literally clocking in at 978 (million), these montages (set to beautiful but overused music by artists like Samantha Crain, Paleface, and The Everybody Fields) are such a copout way to fill 30 minutes of an 85 minute film. But what is independent cinema without at least one driving montage? Don’t get me wrong. I liked “Barking Water” – for what it’s worth – I just wish some of the clearly precious resources for the film could have been used on just a little fine-tuning. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Saturday, January 24, 2009
Is this guy for real???
Matthews: Palin’s book will do well “if she can read”
posted at 9:00 pm on January 23, 2009 by Allahpundit
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I don’t think he meant it the way it came out, but Politico does. And I concede, I have no alternate explanation.
Maybe he meant “if she’s developed a compelling narrative voice from years spent poring over the classics”? Help me out here.
Obama May Carry Top-Secret P.D.A.
By SAM GROBARTUpdated 5:50 p.m.: Removed references to the Freedom of Information Act, which does not apply to the President or his immediate staff.
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Nobody’s saying anything official or on the record about this, but reports popping up allacross the Web indicate that while President Obama may be able to keep a mobile phone/e-mail device while in office, that device may be something more exotic than a BlackBerry from Research in Motion.
(Cue James Bond theme.)
The nation’s e-mailer in chief may be carrying something called a Sectéra Edge, which is made by the military contractor General Dynamics (you know, thesubmarine people). The product description reads: “Developed for the National Security Agency’s Secure Mobile Environment Portable Electronic Device (SME PED) program, the Sectéra Edge is certified to protect wireless voice communications classified Top Secret and below as well as access e-mail and Web sites classified Secret and below.”
The Sectéra looks like most P.D.A.’s, and operates like one when in normal mode. But a press of a button on the front of the device engages “classified mode” (for added effect, the screen background turns red when this mode is activated). It works on GSM and CDMA networks (AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint support the device, according to the company’s Web site), and will be able to get on Wi-Fi networks sometime in the third quarter of this year. It operates on a Windows Mobile platform.
For there to be secure communications between two parties, both must have a device that conforms to the necessary encryption protocols. That can include portable units like the Edge, but also landline phones and computers. Mobile calls or e-mail messages between Mr. Obama and Michelle Obama’s civilian P.D.A. would most likely have to take place in nonsecure mode, as family members of the president rarely have the necessary security clearance to warrant such a device.
Another thing that makes the Sectéra Edge fairly thin on the ground: each unit costs $3,350. It is unclear if its price drops to $19.99 with a two-year contract, but it seems unlikely.
Friday, January 23, 2009
Ethan Mayfield and Austyn... both won at the pinewood derby tonight...
I will have to ask Tammy for the story... again.. Grandpa was not listening very well I guess.. but it is a great one, I do remember that!!!
Thursday, January 22, 2009
So... You think racism is DEAD? READ THIS LINK... not for kiddos..
jay z rap he preformed at Presidental Ball... way to go Jay Z...
Now we are right back to 1960's... we spent 40 years trying to get past that time and this idiot has put us right back in the middle of it...
Yes.. this is proof some mankind should not reproduce!!!
This link is not for kids... there is a video of it on this link but will not start till you tell it to... the lyrics are there as well. Keep in mind, one of those in the room when this was preformed live was our newly elected saviour.... who did not leave and has issued no statement denouncing this act!
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Monday, January 19, 2009
the crew...
doing what we do best at Birthdays!!!
Jake, Trisha and Isabella, Paul, Heather, Andrew and Madison, Ann and I, Marilyn, Great Grandma Moffat (Her and Marilyn were on their way to El Reno for a friend of Mom's and Family's 90th Birthday at Mt. Zion Church), Phil, Tammy and Austyn, and joining us too was Lawrence and Sharon Robinson (life long dear friends). We had a ball and ate and visited for a long time... wonderful to get family together for such occasions... never know when the next one might have someone missing ....
love to all, enjoy the moment!
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TAMMY... AND MANY MANY MORE ...
Wanted to take a second to wish Mrs. Tammy Moffat, one of the greatest teachers in the Stillwater Public School system, a very very Happy Birthday and many many more!
Tammy..... YOU ROCK!!!
Have a great, special and wonderful birthday!
Dad and Mom Moffat
Rich Man, Poor Man
The Story of Napoleon Hill
JM EmmertThe greatest achievers say that in a lifetime of setbacks and comebacks, the truest sense of accomplishment is not found in the realization of the goal, but rather in the will to continue when failure breeds doubt.
And so it was in 1927 when 44-year-old Napoleon Hill tried challenging himself to action. He struggled to shake off the “living death” that had enveloped him for more than a year and left him wondering whether to fall quietly into the abyss or rise again.
An assassination attempt in July 1926 had failed, but the fear it had instilled in him had been all encompassing, paralyzing him both physically and mentally. He had met disappointment and failure before and brushed them aside, racing furiously after the rainbow that he was certain would lead him to untold success. But this time, the man who had been in constant motion all his life found himself at a complete standstill.
Appalachian Childhood
Oliver Napoleon Hill was born in Wise County, Va., on Oct. 26, 1883. For young Napoleon, the wealthy industrialists he came to admire in later years were far removed from this primitive land where poverty, illiteracy and superstition reigned.
Nap, as he was called, was 10 when his mother passed away, leaving his father to care for him and his brother. James Hill was ill-equipped as a single parent and had difficulty in taming his son’s increasingly wild nature. Napoleon was enamored with the outlaw Jesse James, carried a six-shooter on his hip and went about the county terrorizing its citizens.
But James Hill soon remarried, and his new wife Martha quickly established herself as a force in the two-room log cabin. Napoleon, still pained from the loss of his mother, found a guiding light. Martha saw the boy’s potential and encouraged him. She told him he wasn’t a bad boy, and that he just needed to direct his energy toward accomplishing something worthwhile.
She suggested he use his overactive imagination to become a writer. When he welcomed the idea, the well-educated Martha spent the next year tutoring him. She promised to buy him a typewriter if he gave up his six-shooter. “If you become as good with a typewriter as you are with that gun,” she said, “you may become rich and famous and known throughout the world.” Napoleon agreed to the deal.
The Hand of Destiny
At 15, he landed a position as a freelance reporter for a group of rural newspapers, followed a few years later by a job with Bob Taylor’s Magazine, a popular periodical that offered advice on achieving power and wealth. His first major interview was with the then richest man in America—73-year-old Pittsburgh steel magnate Andrew Carnegie—and that interview changed his life.
Hill intently listened as Carnegie recounted his extraordinary accomplishments and proffered his theories on personal achievement. “It’s a shame that each new generation must fi nd the way to success by trial and error when the principles are really clear-cut,” Carnegie told him.
What the world needed, Carnegie suggested, was a philosophy of achievement, a compilation of success principles from the country’s greatest businessmen and leaders to show the commonality of their stories, and serve as inspiration and enlightenment to those wanting more in life.
He issued a challenge to Hill: Commit the next 20 years, without compensation, to documenting and recording such a philosophy of success, and he would introduce him to the wealthiest and most successful men of the time. Hill jumped at the opportunity.
And so, for the next two decades, between numerous business ventures and starting a family, Hill went about fulfi lling the pledge. He met with Theodore Roosevelt, Thomas Edison, John D. Rockefeller, Henry Ford, Alexander Graham Bell, King Gillette and other contemporary giants.
Carnegie believed that “defi niteness of purpose” was the starting point for all success—that “the man who knows exactly what he wants… has no diffi culty in believing in his own ability to succeed.” The concept became the foundation for Hill’s later writing and professional focus.
A Fortuitous Meeting
In 1908, then living in Washington, D.C., Hill placed a personal ad in the paper seeking a young lady “for mutual friendship with the possibility of leading to matrimony.” A woman answered the ad and they arranged a meeting, but when he went to her house, it was this woman’s cousin who caught his eye. And he caught hers. Upon meeting Hill, Florence Elizabeth Hornor decided she wanted to marry him and, in June 1910, she did. Thirteen months later, the couple welcomed a son, James. Another son, Napoleon Blair, was born in 1912. A third son, David, was born in 1918.
"Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, the mind can achieve."
By all accounts, Hill loved his wife and enjoyed being a father. Yet, by late 1912, the growing belief that his fame and fortune still lay out there led Hill to move to Chicago, leaving his family behind. For the next 17 years, he spent little time with Florence or his sons.
In Chicago, he worked as an advertising writer, candy store owner and teacher of a correspondence course in salesmanship. When the United States entered World War I, he wrote to President Woodrow Wilson offering his services. Hill had interviewed him years earlier as part of his Carnegie research project when Wilson was president of Princeton University. Wilson took him up on the offer, putting Hill to work on a series of propaganda materials.
By the end of the war Hill was certain of his calling as a writer. He went to Chicago printer George Williams and pitched the idea for a magazine dedicated to a philosophy of success: Hill’s Golden Rule would be a blend of biblical psalms, gospel teachings and the lessons he had learned from his research. The magazine, written and edited by Hill, was an instant hit, and he began to receive the fame he had long sought.
Deadly Ambitions
In 1920, he embarked on a nationwide lecture tour. However, rifts in his business relationships led Williams to seize control of the magazine. As would become the hallmark of his career, Hill picked up the pieces and moved to New York. By April 1921 he found financial backing forNapoleon Hill’s Magazine, which became a bigger success than the previous magazine and firmly established Hill as “America’s resident philosopher-laureate of success and ethics.”
Unfortunately, his colleagues became embroiled in a bad business venture, which led to repercussions for the magazine. Advertisers pulled out, and Hill fell behind in payments. A few months later, the magazine folded.
Once again, Hill dusted himself off and started over. He moved to Ohio and purchased and operated a business college offering courses in journalism, advertising and public speaking. Then he met Don Mellet, publisher of the Canton Daily News, who persuaded him to write a book on the principles of success he had been compiling over the years.
About this time, however, Mellet learned that local police were turning a blind eye to Prohibition gangsters distributing narcotics and bootleg liquor to area schoolchildren. Mellet exposed the goings-on in his paper; Hill went to the governor of Ohio and asked for an investigation.
In July 1926, Mellet was gunned down outside his home. Assassins were also lying in wait for Hill. By sheer luck, his car broke down and he never went home that night. After hearing of Mellet’s murder and receiving an anonymous warning to get out of town, Hill fled to West Virginia.
A Pivotal Juncture
Hill fell headlong into the depths of despair. Although he had come back from failure throughout his life, this time he struggled for more than a year to find his way. His thoughts wandered back to that promise made to Carnegie and the book he had started with Mellet’s encouragement.
Finally, Hill committed himself to finishing the work he had started. Re-energized, he set off for Philadelphia in search of a publisher for the book he had long hoped to write. After numerous rejections, Connecticut publisher Andrew Pelton agreed to print the book. Hill’s eight-volumeLaw of Success debuted on March 26, 1928, offering the collective wisdom of the greatest achievers of the previous 50 years. His work became a sensation.
By early 1929, Hill was earning $2,500 a month. Florence and the boys finally joined him in a Catskill Mountains mansion he had purchased along with 600 acres where he planned to build a success school.
Before the end of that year, however, the Great Depression brought Hill’s glory days to a crashing end; the fat royalty checks dried up, the home in Catskills was gone and so was the dream of a success school. Napoleon Hill was destitute.
Yet the evangelistic spirit still burned inside. He was passionate about spreading a “gospel of hope.” When President Franklin Delano Roosevelt asked Hill to join the staff of his National Recovery Administration to help inspire public confidence, he accepted. But this meant leaving Florence and the boys again. This departure, however, closed the door on the marriage. In 1935, they were divorced.
In the next two years, Napoleon eked out a living in Washington as he fulfi lled his obligation to FDR’s administration. Among his contributions is said to be one of the president’s most famous lines: “We have nothing to fear, but fear itself.”
Think and Grow Rich
When his duties ended, Hill returned to the lecture circuit. In early 1937, while in Atlanta, he met 29-year-old Rosa Lee Beeland. They married a few months later and she labored with him on his next manuscript, a work he tentatively called The Thirteen Steps to Riches. After months of editing and rewriting, he showed the completed manuscript to his publisher, Andrew Pelton, who initially balked, saying it too closely resembled Law of Success.
“Every failure carries with it the seed of an equivalent advantage.”
At Rosa’s insistence, Pelton gave the manuscript a more thorough reading. He finally agreed to publish it, with one condition—that the title be changed to Use Your Noodle to Win More Boodle. How that title came to be changed again is not known, but apparently wisdom prevailed and the new book went to press as Think and Grow Rich!, which became Hill’s greatest work.
Think and Grow Rich! sold out its first print run in three weeks. By the time the Depression was over, more than 1 million copies were sold. Today, it is considered the greatest self-improvement book of all time, with more than 30 million copies sold worldwide.
The true impact of the book was in the immediate call to action it offered millions of Americans devastated by the economic and agricultural disasters of the early ’30s. Here was the American Dream—their American Dream—elegantly wrapped in ribbons of wisdom and circulated as a currency of hope.
“If you can conceive it and believe it, you can achieve it.” In that one short statement, Hill laid down his philosophy for personal achievement and set in motion a success movement that inspired millions for generations to come. The man who had spent the better part of his life chasing an elusive rainbow had finally found his pot of gold.
In 1940 Hill was reportedly worth more than $1 million. He and Rosa spent lavishly on homes, cars and the trappings of wealth. In a short time, though, a chasm developed between the couple and a divorce followed. A prenuptial agreement gave Rosa virtually all royalties for Think and Grow Rich!. After a lifetime of work, Hill was left with nothing.
Trying again to start over, Hill went to South Carolina at the request of college president and publisher William Plumer Jacobs, who asked him to create a self-improvement course. The work would be a printed 16-volume set called Mental Dynamite. But with the onset of World War II and the rationing of paper, production was halted.
Positive Mental Attitude
For most of his life, Hill had lived with the conviction that every failure carried with it the seed of an equivalent advantage. That belief developed after the death of his mother, when his stepmother entered his life; it was sustained throughout his business career by the opportunities that opened up after his failures. Now, on the heels of his latest disappointment, he met a woman who would help him in business matters and be a companion through the end of his days.
Hill developed a friendship with a highly educated woman who worked for Jacobs Press. Annie Lou Norman, 47, lived with her sister and nephew in the house where Hill was staying. The friendship blossomed, and in 1943 they married. The couple moved to California, and Hill took to the lecture circuit again.
One lecture took him back to Chicago, where the president of Combined Insurance Company of America was anxious to meet Hill. W. Clement Stone had been struggling through the Depression when he had picked up a copy of Think and Grow Rich! Stone was so inspired that he bought books for each of his salesmen. In a short time, his company and coffers grew exponentially, and Stone went on to amass a fortune.
After their serendipitous meeting in Chicago, Stone thanked Hill for his work and the pair developed a friendship. In 1952, at 69, Hill entered into a partnership with Stone. Together, they produced a host of books, courses, lectures and radio and television programs. In 1954 they published Success Unlimited, the predecessor to SUCCESS magazine, offering inspirational messages similar to those Hill had distributed through Hill’s Golden Rule and Napoleon Hill’s Magazine.
Stone and Hill also co-authored Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude, which in 1960 became an instant best seller.
As his life neared its end, Hill’s greatest desire was in perpetuating his life’s work. Upon his death in 1970 at the age of 87, Annie Lou Hill appointed W. Clement Stone the executive director of the Napoleon Hill Foundation. Stone had lived by Hill’s principles and stood as a shining example of his success philosophy. Now he would be charged to lead the effort of ensuring that Hill’s writings would continue to be shared with future generations around the world.
A Challenge Fulfilled
Some six decades earlier, Carnegie had issued this challenge to Hill: “I want you to write very slowly and take down this formula,” Carnegie had said. “Here it comes: ‘Andrew Carnegie, I’m not only going to equal your achievements in life, but I’m going to challenge you at the post and pass you at the grandstand.’ ” Napoleon had thrown down his pencil and protested that it was not remotely possible. Carnegie nodded and locked eyes with the young man. “Of course I know you’re not going to be able to do that… unless or until you believe it. But if you believe it, you will.”
Napoleon Hill never accumulated Carnegie’s vast fortune. But if the effects of his messages of inspiration were tallied in gold, he did indeed pass him at the grandstand. His enormous wealth lay in the millions of people he helped find themselves, believe in themselves and live the lives they never thought possible.
Martin Luther King ... said... I heard this speech when he made it.. and it still means the same today to me!!
“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.”
Friday, January 09, 2009
from Heather this note.. and video of deer...
Heather says"My friend Kristen sent me this video today..words can not describe seeing this in real life.."
Thursday, January 08, 2009
Randy Travis - Raise Him Up... have you heard this tune? awesome!
When I first met his momma
She was just 19
Couldn't say for certain who the father was
I have known him since he was a pup
And I'm gonna raise him up
If you never knew your daddy
Like I never knew mine
It feels like everybody knows you're fatherless
This boy may not be blood of my blood
But I'm gonna raise him up
I'll provide for him
Walk beside of him
I am strong enough
Cause it's time he knew
What a son can do
With a father's love
He can change the world
Ya'll may have to look at joseph
A couple thousand years ago
When he held a newborn baby he named jesus
He said he may not be blood of my blood
Still I'm gonna raise him up
I'll provide for him
Walk beside of him
I am strong enough
I will show him too
What a son can do
With a fathers love
And he will change the world
33 years later
When the son was in his grave
Broken and abandoned by a world he came to save
His real dad said he's mine
Blood of my blood
And I'm gonna raise him up
I'll provide for you
Walk beside of you
I am strong enough
I have seen from you
What a son can do
With a fathers love
One man changed the world
And he can change your world
But you gotta raise him up
Raise him up
She was just 19
Couldn't say for certain who the father was
I have known him since he was a pup
And I'm gonna raise him up
If you never knew your daddy
Like I never knew mine
It feels like everybody knows you're fatherless
This boy may not be blood of my blood
But I'm gonna raise him up
I'll provide for him
Walk beside of him
I am strong enough
Cause it's time he knew
What a son can do
With a father's love
He can change the world
Ya'll may have to look at joseph
A couple thousand years ago
When he held a newborn baby he named jesus
He said he may not be blood of my blood
Still I'm gonna raise him up
I'll provide for him
Walk beside of him
I am strong enough
I will show him too
What a son can do
With a fathers love
And he will change the world
33 years later
When the son was in his grave
Broken and abandoned by a world he came to save
His real dad said he's mine
Blood of my blood
And I'm gonna raise him up
I'll provide for you
Walk beside of you
I am strong enough
I have seen from you
What a son can do
With a fathers love
One man changed the world
And he can change your world
But you gotta raise him up
Raise him up
forgot these photos were on my camera... these are an important item...
my lovely bride of 37 years had a 62nd birthday New Years Eve and we had a family celebration of this great event with most family attending.. after all, how many times does one turn 62... (I hope only once, haha....)
and there was a knock on the back door and our dear friends Craig and Missy Hannan appeared with a "care package" for the birthday lady.... and they "HIT the NAIL on the HEAD"! Her gift from them was the needed essentials to get through any day at work for Ann... Diet Coke, Cheetos, and Hershey's.... ummmm goodddddd!!! and they are disappearing daily... haha..
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