WE ARE ORLANDO!!

Hey, there, High there, Ho there! 
Oh, it's been awhile!  Sorry for not checking in sooner but it has been a somewhat grueling week so far!
Ugh.
Look, I am not going to rant on about what happened in Orlando this weekend.  As much as I would like to pen a SCATHING commentary on Americas PATHETIC desperate grasp on the 2nd amendment, to the point of the idiots at the NRA and their ilk crying FOUL whenever actual SANE people try and discuss the possibility of maybe, just possibly, we MIGHT want to consider enacting more stringent rules for WHO can go out and buy a gun, and the fact that MAYBE hunters DO NOT need a gun that can fire off 40 plus round a minute!
(Seriously?  Are the bloody deer manning a fox hole with a bloody Vulcan in it?!)
I mean...lets just TRY and think RATIONALY about this.  If someone has made REPEATED threats against America, is reported to be INTENSELY homophobic, has been investigated by the FBI TWICE, has had SEVERAL reports made to the police that he beat his wife, AND has a father who host an INTENSELY anti-American, Pro Taliban show....MAYBE, he may NOT be the one you want to give a gun license too!!!
I am JUST SAYING!!
It is WAY past time that we actually start being SMART!
GOD!
Anyway...
it was a long weekend.  I was awake Sunday morning when the story flashed across the computer.  I thought "that's HORIBLE!" but made no more connection to it then the mourning of another "sick and tired of this crap" American.
Until....
A VERY dear friend of our family...scratch that...he IS family!  All our children know him as "uncle Daniel" was at that club...that night.  Thankfully, good fortune smiled down upon him, and even though his friends urged him to stay for "one more drink" he opted to head back to his hotel.
....less then five minutes before it all began.
He hdn't even reached his hotel room when he first heard the shots.  When it was all over, he lost five very close friends. 
The sad reality of all this is, the more we allow this to continue, the more lives will be lost, and the more the living who remain, will be touched by it, directly in some way.  All the fighting about the cause, whether it by "homophobia" or "anti-American" or "Islamist Extremists" is just irrelevant.  It's all of us, sitting on our asses saying "oh...that's horrible" then just excepting it as the status quo.  All our ineffectual politicians with the graft jutting from their wallets from "NRA Lobbyists" telling us to "pray for the victims" while they sit on their thumbs and do NOTHING rational to stop the spread of violence because their coffers will be lighter, and all the idiots chanting that GOD AWFUL phrase "you'll get my gun when you pry it from my cold dead hands"....hmmmm? THERE'S A THOUGHT!!!  For a second I challenge you (because I NOW KNOW what it feels like to sit up all night and day, waiting and praying to hear from a loved one who may or MAY NOT have made it out alive because some crazy asshole with the "Florida Stamp of Approval" took his recently purchased, military grade rifle and mowed down a large group of people because he just didn't agree with their lifestyle, religion or political believes!) to sit and SERIOUSLY consider...what if it were YOUR wife, or husband or child or parents that were at that club, or mall, or movie theater, or college, or grade school?  Would YOUR belief that everyone has the "right to bear arms" hold up to the realization that if they JUST RAN A REALISTIC BACKGROUND CHECK your loved one would still be alive?! If after that, you STILL support this antiquated ideology...you're just a sick, twisted individual that holds NO value in your family OR human life!
Okay...I guess I did rant! 
But I ain't ashamed!
Enough is ENOUGH! 
Anyway...
I'm stepping down off my soapbox, whipping it off and putting it away...
for now.
Hopefully, this will be the LAST time any of us have to talk about this!
*sigh*
For now, once my ire has died down, I'll cover shop biz later.
Good night.