Why would people put themselves through this experience?

Mediaite and Daily Mail have numerous reports and examples:

•In Virginia customers stabbed their way to parking spots.
•In Philadelphia a woman used a stun gun to secure her rights to a TV.
•In Chicago the police ended up shooting a customer as he scuffled with Police.
•In Las Vegas a flat screen customer was shot in the leg for his purchase.
•In Puerto Rico The stampede was uncontrollable by police.

Guest post by Zurich Mike

Today is August 15, the Feast of the Assumption of Mary into heaven. It is an important holiday in the church year for Catholics and Orthodox Christians, who celebrate this holiday two weeks later using the Julian calendar. Orthodox Christian call it the Dormition of the Theotokos (Mother of God). If you search for those terms (Feast of the Assumption, Dormition of the Theotokos), you will find plenty of information.

 We believe that Mary died and was assumed into heaven body and soul, befitting the Mother of God, she who is higher than all the angels (and as the Archangel Gabriel said, she who is the most highly favored daughter, and who all nations shall call blessed). No, we do not worship Mary. That is reserved alone to Jesus Christ in the Trinity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We revere Mary, and exult as the angels did when she accepted the task of bringing Christ into the world as a human. We ask for her protection and intercession.

 ZurichMike is very devoted to the Blessed Mother, as is his mother. In that spirit, I would like to offer some Marian-themed music to you. (more…)

The Last Refuge – officially, The Conservative Treehouse – celebrated its second anniversary on February 1, 2013.  Now it’s time for another celebration (and we love celebrations) as we welcome our 10,000,000th visitor today!

The Hampton Coliseum Spring Carnival was cancelled a week early due to a gang related shooting which resulted in the death of Ralphael Davis Jr.  In addition to the deceased, four other teenagers were shot.  One remains in critical condition.

A 15-year-old male and 17-year-old male were arrested and each charged with one count of murder, four counts of maiming and five counts of using a firearm in the commission of a felony, according to Hampton Police.  (link)

The local progessive-sympathetic Virginia Pilot newspaper, which refused to fully report on the threats and black mob violence perpetrated in the name of Trayvon Martin against two of its own reporters in Norfolk, Virginia in 2012 again doubles down on living the lie by refusing to fully and honestly report on the events that led to the early cancellation of the carnival. (more…)

Today we celebrate a very special day, the birthday of our own dear Puddy. We don’t know which of her nine lives she’s on (that’s catfidential information) but we wish her the very best. Puddy has many important functions here in the Tree. She and her sidekick Wee provide the highest form of comic relief. That we can never do without. She brightens our day, brings us our smiles, and makes us belly laugh. Her wit is famous and unequaled in all the world. However, her roles behind the scenes make the Tree function smoothly and with a professional touch unique among blogs. She is the producer, director and artistic consultant on many Treehouse productions. Her talents, humor and giving spirit are a big part of what has made this Treehouse a virtual home on the internet for the wild and woolly crew we have assembled.

News of this event has spread far and wide. We have plenty of extra kibble, cake, and of course, our own spirits, brewed just for Puddy on a moonshiner’s ridge in the Georgia hills. Puddy has friends in all the good places!

She was also a hired assassin for the world famous Mossad in one of her past lives, and this year they offer her birthday cake for our celebration! (more…)

One year ago today, the world was made a little brighter by the birth of a special little girl named Sadie. She arrived on a blustery early spring day, staring intently, if not quite focused, at the window full of strange people waiting to greet her, family members from both sides, and many friends as well. Held in her father’s arms, she watched as we danced around, angling for a better view, what seemed like dozens of cameras making the first pictures. That was the start of a love affair that will last my whole life long. No matter what happens, Sadie owns a piece of my heart, and she always will. I was unprepared for the blunt force of love that hit me when Sadie was born. I had always thought that one of my gifts was my ability to love, and to love well and faithfully. Along came Sadie, and I learned that love cannot be contained, and it cannot be measured. A life and a heart filled with love can expand and grow, infinitely, as love comes from the one who is love.

Being the mother of sons, it was a new and wonderful experience for me to have a little girl to enjoy. It wasn’t too long before she learned to smile, and she does it with a radiance that lights up her whole body. When she smiles, she glows, and she smiles all the time. She laughs with her whole little body. She seems to have been crafted from pure joy, and every moment is sunshine to her. From her silky blond hair and shiny blue eyes to the tips of her tiny little toes, she is a blessing, a gift to be savored, loved, treasured as the greatest of gifts from God above, the gift of love. (more…)

   By Elvis Chupacabra

The old timers said that a dry, chill wind was blowing out of the northwest, right from the heart of the Commancheria, that dawn of March 6, 1836. It ripped the palls of black smoke billowing from the old Alamo mission into ragged tendrils and hurled them away, as if trying to clear the air of the sickly sweet smell of burning flesh and the acrid stench of gunpowder. By the time the sun broke above the horizon and cast a golden light over the old mission-turned-fortress, gunshots still sporadically rent the air, but the main sound was that of an enraged mob. (more…)

HERE’S the link to USTREAM. (I took down the live feed due to the incessant auto-play ads. Thank me. 😉 )

Texas Independence Day

March 2, 1836

    By Elvis Chupacabra

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When I was a mere lad, Texas Independence Day was celebrated in schools with patriotic songs, readings of the Declaration by schoolkids and grave lectures on our role as Texans by our teachers. Even the Mexican kids participated, because anyone who’d read the  hallowed rolls of the Alamo and Goliad dead knew that there were plenty of martyrs with Spanish surnames. We also knew of Lorenzo de Zavala and Juan Seguin, both Texian heroes of the Revolution.

It was understood by the youngest of us that Texas went from being just the mostly empty northern part of the Mexican state of Cohuila-Texas to the independent Republic of Texas with the signing of this document. Like the beloved United States, from whence the spirit -and some would say impetus – of revolution had come, we won our right to be free through the force of arms, wielded by brave and bold men. Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, the despot which our Texas Forefathers overthrew was ever bit as evil and prone to predations as Britain’s George III. His one saving grace, that he invented that most American of oral fixations, chewing gum, was more than off-set by his cruelty and duplicitous nature. The self-proclaimed Napoleon of the North, he boasted an army well-officered and well-equipped that had spent the past couple of years putting down rebellions in Mexico. It wasn’t just the Texians who longed for the return to a government who respected the liberal Constitution of 1824.  (more…)