How about my road trip. started about 4:30 am on my bday Sunday and flew to Chicago and connected to Moline and drank beer the rest of the day. Monday was the Memorial Day presentation in the high school gym, and American Legion honor guard, then more beer... oh yeah the road trip started Tuesday morning when we took off for DC, stayed a few hours in Buckeye Lake, Ohio, then arrived at the Tyson Corners Holiday Inn in Washington DC, probably spend every evening in O'malley's Irish Pub there until we leave Sunday night. If you're around we'll see you there, or else send me a message for anything else happening around there!

I'll have some lit candles at home in the evening, but I found these Roman candles in a hurry .

Let us not be stopped by that which divides us but look for that which unites us

(Global Manifesto)

If we could reduce the world’s population to a village of precisely 100 people, with all existing human ratios remaining the same, the demographics would look something like this:

60 Asians	12 Europeans	5 US Americans and Canadians	8 Latin Americans	14 Africans

49 would be female	51 would be male

82 would be non-white	18 white

89 heterosexual	11 homosexual

33 would be Christian	67 would be non-Christian

5 would control 32% of the entire world’s wealth, and all of them would be US citizens
80 would live in substandard housing
24 would not have any electricity (And of the 76% that do have electricity, most would only use it for light at night.)
67 would be unable to read
1 (only one) would have a college education.
50 would be malnourished and 1 dying of starvation
33 would be without access to a safe water supply
1 would have HIV
1 near death
2 would be near birth
7 people would have access to the Internet

If to take a look at the world from this condensed perspective,
the need for acceptance, understanding and education becomes evident.

Think of it!

If you woke up this morning with more health than sickness,
you are luckier than the million that will not survive this week.

If you have never experienced a war,
a loneliness of an imprisonment,
an agony of tortures
or a famine

You are happier, than 500 million persons in this world.

If you are able to go to church, mosque or synagogue without fear of harassment, arrest, torture or death,
you are happier, than 3 billion persons in this world.

If there is a meal in your refrigerator,
if you are dressed and have got shoes,
if you have a bed and a roof above your head,
you are better off, than 75% of people in this world.

If your parents are still alive and still married,
then you are a rarity.

If you have a bank account,
money in your purse
and there is some trifle in your coin box,
you belong to 8% of well-provided people in this world.

If you read this text, you are blessed three times as much, because

Someone has thought of you;
You do not belong to those 2 billion people which cannot read
and... you have had your computer!

Someone has told once:

Work like you don't need money,
Love like you've never been hurt,
Dance like nobody's watching,
Sing like nobody's listening,
Be surprised, like you were born yesterday,
Tell the truth and you don't have to remember anything,
Live like it's Heaven on Earth.

This is your World!

And you are able to make changes!

Hasten to do good works!

Think of it!

http://users.gazinter.net/melan/Warn/Warnenu.htm

Here's a treasured New Year wish
sent specially to you.
I wish you joy beyond compare,
success in all you do

I wish you goals within your reach,
friendships true and strong.
I wish you gracious wisdom,
forgiveness when you're wrong

I wish you days of glorious peace,
nights of wondrous rest.
I wish you strength and courage,
persistence to be your best

But most of all I wish for you,
more love than most will find,
the grandest love in all the world,
the everlasting kind