~ The Perfect First by Maya Hughes

(Fulton U #1)

Fulton has delivered an outstanding book on his experiences in helping to shut down a group planning to start a war against the government. Working undercover, Fulton may have saved several lives. Google "Shaeffer Cox" and you will find lots of information. But....read the book and you will be enthralled with the behind the scenes action. I won't go into the entire story, it would ruin the book. Instead, I offer a very brief synopsis, and then some parts of the book that really impressed me. An Army veteran, Fulton left the military after being injured. He opened an army surplus store in Alaska. He employed a lot of other down-on-their-luck veterans. He discovered that he was good at helping people. Fulton was approached by a very far-right group to supply weapons to kill Federal Judges and law enforcement. To reveal anymore would spoil the book. Fulton reveals several great insights throughout the book. I applaud his reasoning, here discussing one of his employees, "being depended on again made him dependable. And it didn't happen from a therapy session or a new med-it was being part of something again, being of use. And being around a group of guys who didn't judge. Guys sitting around a fire has been some pretty legit therapy since there were guys and since there were fires". Brilliant! On the reasoning of the far-right..."We were on a steady march to a police state, and it was only a matter of time before they came for everyone's guns...I'd heard this a million times. Fear is a motivator, and people...use the fear of gun confiscation, the fear of government threat, to increase membership in militia groups". Man, does this speak to a large group of people I know! "And it reminded me that in a war, both sides believe equally that they are right". "Some dentally challenged lunatic who was mad he had to live by rules and pay some taxes and not get to do whatever the (...) he wanted. Some (....) "patriot"". "I could tell there would be no turning her. She was one of those "I've made up my mind, so don't confuse me with the facts" people. There were too goddamn many of those people." Don't we all know those people, on both sides of the aisle! And finally....."the political right wing has built a mythology: in order to be a patriot and a good American, you must embrace the military-industrial complex that has become our government and the (......) of foreign policy it has created....if you don't support everything we do militarily, then you aren't a true patriot.....patriotism is more than a bumper sticker on your car, or drinking a Budweiser and waving a flag....true patriotism means serving-actually doing something for you country and the people in it because it's the right thing to do." I will probably be flamed by trolls for this review. Before you do, do not write Fulton off as a left-wing ideologue. He is probably more conservative, and has done more to serve his country, than 90 percent of the rest. And before you claim that I am a liberal, know that I served my country honorably for 28 years, and my conservatism is rock solid. "The truth of the matter is that you always know the right thing to do. The hard part is doing it"...Norman Schwarzkopf.

It seems appropriate that I finished reading this book on the day that I received certification in Level 1 Reiki.

This book was recommended to me during a session with an animal chaplain after the unexpected death of my youngest cat, Teddy, due to an aneurysm. I was asked by my work volunteering with shelter animals and Rev. Nancy Schluntz suggested that Reiki might be useful to my work in that environment. She recommended that I start by reading this book.

Honestly, I was almost immediately overcome by a sense of both calm and urgency to begin doing this work myself during the time I read the text. Authors Kathleen Prasad and Elizabeth Fulton, both Reiki Masters, share their experience working with pets, wildlife, rescued animals in sanctuary, and their own growth as practitioners as a result.

This book is a loving look at the benevolent healing properties of Reiki and how it benefits our animal friends. Interestingly enough, it was also the first book on Reiki that the Master who trained me read, and she was led to begin training herself as a result.

Highly recommended for those who want to learn a new way of healing.

Published May, 2015.

I’ve read recently a 2012 Forrester report where it’s stated that out of 156 senior IT decision-makers with cloud responsibilities, 98% had major cloud application management issues, and 90% believed that managing the transition of critical business applications to the cloud was a major challenge. What does this tell us? It simply tell us that there’s still a lot to do. This was true in 2012, and it’s still true in 2015. It goes without saying that underneath all the pomp, organizations are implementing cloud services without the appropriate due diligence to adapt their existing governance and management capabilities to support cloud services.

What are the consequences of not having a proper CGMS (*) and ITSM in place? The consequences are so huge that thinking about not having it it’s just a mindboggling thought…Perish the thought! If the issues are not addressed, at best they become the norm, i.e., they become a normal, more costly, and less effective way of doing business.

In some of the Companies I know of, the norm is to allow the technology adoption to move at a brisker pace than process adoption, thus increasing the risk of the cloud implementation failing altogether.

Fulton’s book has a very sensible approach to cloud governance adoption, instantiated through the use of three frameworks: CobiT 5, ISO 38500:2008, and Peter Weill and Jeanne W. Ross work done at the MIT Sloan School of Management (their work was published in “IT Governance: How Top Performers Manage IT Decision Rights for Superior Results”; incidentally Weill and Ross’ book is one of my IT “Bibles”.

The rest of this review can be found elsewhere.

Created as a radio series in 1982, this humor filled, fast paced, outer space, sci-fi adventure really jazzed up my daily commute. Ruby the Galactic Gumshoe is hired to find out who’s been manipulating the media on the 6-mooned planet Summa Nulla (crossroads of the galaxy, highpoint of nothing), and she’s just the dame for the job. Savvy, tough, and with a well developed sense of irony, none of the weird planetary inhabitants faze her--not the mustachioed informant with tentacle appendages who wants to shake “hands”, not the pun-loving mole creatures who excavate ancient underground cities that keep caving in whenever she’s around, and not the sexy android who sicced slimey genetically engineered assassins on her. Actually Angel Lips (the sexy android) and the slime assassins do exasperate Ruby, but Ruby handles them all with her usual sharp witted determination.

There’s about  three hours of audio story with very cool high-tech sound effects, stunning other-world “visuals”, occasional musical interludes by the Android Sisters, and witty repartee worthy of a movie comedy from the 1930’s-40’s. It’s broken up into 3 or 4 minute sections and there’s sometimes a little repetition of plot points since it was originally broadcast in a serial format, but if you also have to keep your mind on something else--like driving--that’s actually an advantage. The Adventures of Ruby the Galactic Gumshoe and its nine or so sequels(!) are available on the ZBS website and Audible.