1.  One can go low-carb and substitute roasted eggplant slices for sheets of pasta and make a killer lasagna.  Secret ingredient?  NUTMEG.  Put it in the ricotta cheese and egg mixture.

2.  As promised, I received the legal documents and I don’t think that failure to appear will generate a bench warrant – probably just a summary judgment.  Nuts.  I was REALLY looking forward to having a bench warrant issued on my white bootie.  I was walking around all week saying “Bench Warrant Barnhardt, Bench Warrant Barnhardt”.  Patience, Grasshopper.  Patience.

BUT – you’re going to love this.  The homeowner’s association where my old office/condo in Colorado was is suing me for unpaid charges and they fined me $200 per month for having the chalk Epiphany Blessing over my front door.  Here is a picture, and as you can see, it is extremely offensive.  And impossible to remove – oh wait.  It’s chalk, so it could have been removed at any time with – literally – a WET SPONGE.  Yeah.

Oh, the horror! The HORROR!

For those of you who don’t know, the Epiphany Blessing is an ancient Catholic sacramental tradition in which the head of every household makes an inscription above every outside door at Epiphany with chalk that was blessed at Epiphany. This inscription is small and subtle, and marking the door frame harkens back to the Passover in Egypt wherein Israel marked their doors with the blood of the Passover lamb. You would have to consciously look at the top of the door frame to see it. It is all but invisible to anyone walking by. Here is the text of the instructions and prayer that I received and used:

The blessed chalk is taken home and then the father or senior member of the family says the following prayer once at the main entrance of the house, and that door is marked as follows. Then the family members should accompany the father as he goes from outside entrance to outside entrance and marks this over each door:

Hear us, O Holy Lord, Father Almighty, Eternal God, and send Thy Holy Angel from heaven to watch over, cherish, protect, be with, and defend all who live in my house. I call upon Thy Saints Gaspar, Melchior, and Balthazar to protect my family and my home from every harm and danger, and I place the marks of their holy names over the doors of my home to remain there as a constant reminder to us and to all who enter here that my house is truly a house of the Lord. O God, make the door of my house the gateway to Thy Eternal Kingdom. I ask these things in the Name of Jesus Christ Thy Son. Amen.
20 + G + M + B + 13

So, yeah.  First Amendment? Free exercise?  Freedom of religion?  Not so much.  ‘Merika.  Land of the sheep, home of the slaves.

I have handed my last dollar over to attorneys and accountants, and therefore won’t even respond to this, so I’m sure the HOA can look forward to getting a lien against my real property.  Oh…wait. I don’t HAVE any real property anymore.  BWA-HA-HA-HA!  Oh – but they could get a lien on my vehicle.  Oh, wait.  I don’t OWN a vehicle any longer.  BWA-HA-HA-HA!   Oh – maybe they could get a lien on my personal property.  Oh, wait.  I’m down to a few outfits, coats and shoes, and the shoes stink, the coats are missing buttons, and the shirts are rocking some mildly awesome pit stains.  BWA-HA-HA-HA!  I’m tellin’ ya kids, this business of having no estate is TEH AWESOME.  May I be permitted to paraphrase Spoon Boy?

Spoon Boy: Do not try and seize the estate. That’s impossible. Instead… only try to realize the truth.
Neo: What truth?
Spoon boy: There is no estate.
Neo: There is no estate?
Spoon boy: Then you’ll see, that it is not the estate that is seized, it is only yourself.

That’s deep, Brah.

Anyway, this is just another example of how it is now illegal to be a practicing, believing Roman Catholic in the Iniquitous Gutter Republic.

3.  Thanks to one and all for the emails regarding the 777 and Vinegar Fan piece.  The mail fell into two categories.  The first was tinfoil hat wearers deriding me for not being… schizophrenic, apparently.  This is awesome because it allowed me to set up dozens of email blocks, which will help with the inbox management significantly.  The second class followed the following outline formula:

– Hi
– I have never written to anyone on the internet before.  Please understand that I’m not the kind of person to write letters to perfect strangers that I see on the internet.  Seriously.
– Thank you for saying what you said about the conspiracy nutters.
– I know that the financial system, government, Church and/or the world in general is severely messed up like never before in human history.
– Every time I try to go to a meeting of some sort, it is always ruined by some nut who stands up and starts railing about contrails or underground civilizations or shape-shifters or Planet X.
– The consistent presence of these nuts around any serious prepping, “Tea-Partyesque” or Traditional Catholic gathering sometimes makes me question my own perception of what is happening.  What the hell am I doing around these people?
– I worry that I may find myself in a foxhole next to some guy who, when I ask him to cover me, will start spraying vinegar over my head instead of shooting at the bad guys.
– No one ever stands up to these nuts because crazy people are kinda scary.
– Thanks for saying what you said.  You made me feel a lot better, and it’s good to know that I’m not alone.

No prob, kids.  It’s mah job, yo.

4.  Ace of Spades posted the following stats last night:

Russia vs. USA

1. Total Population: 142,517,670 – 313,847,465
2. Manpower available: 69,117,271 – 142,212,012
3. Military reserve: 20,035,000 – 1,458,000
4. Total aircraft strength: 4,500 – 15,236
5. Navy ship strength: 224 – 2907
6. Submarines: 58 – 71
7. Total helicopter strength: 1,635 – 6,665

My comment?  Since the Former U.S. will never, ever, ever, ever use any of those assets, they are all utterly worthless and it could therefore be defeated by ONE UNARMED MAN.

In fact, it already has.

Dear ‘Merika: You got your ass kicked into non-existence by THIS. Please form an orderly line as you come forward on your Wal-Martian electric scooters for the morbidly obese to collect your “participation” trophies.  Spasibo and Xiexie.