three countries in one

None of the leaders of the western world liked Russia after its revolution.  When Hitler rose in Germany his men were always fighting street battles with the commies, and he was always trash talking them, and the western guys weren't all that worried about his military buildup because they thought he would be fighting Russia, and nothing could make them happier than seeing those two countries at war with each other.

So it was a big shocker when he signed that agreement with Russia.  Communist parties in the United States and Europe lost a lot of their members.  Nobody knows for sure why Stalin signed.  Some think he was playing for time.  Maybe he hoped Germany would exhaust itself fighting Europe and then Russia would stand preeminent on the continent. 

I remember when I was a little kid and the men would withdraw from the women after the holiday meal and smoke their pipes and cigars, the talk would be of the recently fought war, and it was always agreed that Hitler's downfall was invading Russia.  It's the opinion also of books I've read since then.  Well all the generals told Hitler not to try to occupy the Rhine, or to swallow our homeland, but he went ahead and did it anyway and got away with it, so I guess he thought he could get away with anything, so that when his generals advised against invading Russia he brushed them aside.

I think all countries think that they are the center of the universe regardless of whether or not they have Beaglesonian climates.  China famously thought it was too good to soil its robes dealing with other countries.  Americans are famous for not being able to locate France on a map. 

What's a Fusileer?  Is that a fancy old timey word for rifleman?

I don't think we want to take a page out  of Iraq's book, they are not very successful if you hadn't noticed.  It was talked about towards the beginning of the kerfuffle, and now is being brought up again, that maybe instead of Iraq it should become Sunnilandia, and Shitelandia, and Kurdlandia.  The US has been against this because it would make it look like our 'intervention' had been unsuccessful and we had broken Iraq.  But what the hell?  See if we just get out at first it will look like the great sunni/shite war, which they have been itching for, is about to begin.  But it won't be long before they start turning on each other and having these balance of power treaties, and they'll have some kind of uneasy peace.  Or maybe they will have the great war they have been dreaming about.  In either case our boys will be at home with the only thing to worry about being if they get KP, and we will have lots more money in the treasury.

I used to try not to have usual suspects when I was subbing, because in high school I was generally the usual suspect.  I used to get quite irate when I was accused of something I didn't do, but then there were so many times I got away with something that I guess it all evens out, though I didn't feel that way at the time.

Once when I was sitting in a bar in Austin Texas with one of my Champaign buddies and his Texas wife, the three of us struck up a conversation with a girl from Pittsburgh.  Afterward me and him commented on what a thick accent she had, and his wife commented that she thought she didn't sound that much different than us.  My family lived briefly in Chattanooga, and all the neighbor ladies loved to talk with my mother because they loved to hear her accent.