Dan Haithcock 🛩🇺🇸

Veteran, MSgt USAF, 74 - 88.
Private Pilot
#AirForceVet

#VietnamEraVet

[Dan Haithcock 🛩🇺🇸 @pilotdrh]

@Seraphinaf5 71

[Dan Haithcock 🛩🇺🇸 @pilotdrh]

@Mimix1907 5

[Dan Haithcock 🛩🇺🇸 @pilotdrh]

@hicasamadim 15,000 grams. 😁

[Ethan Brooks @alt_w_v_g]

My wife mentioned a nice private school over dinner this week
She said the campus was beautiful
I asked what's the tuition
She said we should look at it as an investment in him not a cost
I made a note
She said don't make a note
I said I always make notes
She said this isn't a deal
I said everything is a deal
She closed her eyes

She said we'd discuss it Saturday
I agreed

Saturday 7:02am
She came downstairs in her Saturday robe
Coffee in hand
I had my cargo shorts on

The dining room had been cleared
The projector was on
The analyst was at the head of the table
Quarter zip on, three iced coffees, a legal pad, and two laptops
He had been there since 6:44am

I texted him at 11:14pm Friday
The text said dining room 6:45am bring the model
He sent a thumbs up

My wife stopped in the doorway
She said what is this
I said you said you wanted to discuss it
She said this is not a discussion
I did not respond
She sat down anyway

The analyst stood
He said good morning ma'am
She did not respond
He sat back down
A printed deck in front of each seat
A fourth copy in case

Slide 1 Tuition Schedule
$38,500 per year
Thirteen years
$500,500 nominal
Before escalators
The school has raised tuition 4.2% per year for a decade
With escalators $648,000
My wife said okay
I said I'm not done

Slide 2 Opportunity Cost
Even before escalators
$38,500 invested annually
10% nominal return
S&P long-run average since 1928
By his eighteenth birthday $944,000
My wife said we can afford it
I said I know that's not the slide

Slide 3 Terminal Value at Age 65
$83 million
She was quiet

The analyst slid the sensitivity tables across the table
8% return $31 million
10% return $83 million
12% return $222 million
She did not look

She said this isn't about money
I said it's always about money
She said no it isn't
I said then what is it about
She did not answer

She said you can't put a dollar value on his teachers his classmates his environment
I said I can the analyst already did slide 6
He flipped to slide 6
She did not look

She said the school is the best in the city
I said best is a feeling
She said it produces the best students
I said the students were already the best before they got there

She said our son deserves it
I said our son deserves $83 million

My son walked in
He is five
Dinosaur pajamas
He looked at the projector
He looked at the open deck on the table
He looked at slide 3
He said are we modeling pre-tax or after-tax
The analyst opened a new tab
My wife looked at the ceiling

He said what's the discount rate
The analyst set down his pen
She closed her eyes

He said is this the same return assumption from the 529 conversation
The analyst stopped typing
He looked at me
I did not say anything

She stood up
Sat back down

He said dad can I help
I said yes
He pulled up a chair
The analyst handed him a printout
He started reading

My wife watched him read
She watched him for a long time

She said his name
He looked up
She said do you like school
He said the work is too easy and the kids don't ask questions

She did not respond
She looked at the ceiling
She walked out of the room

The analyst started packing up
He said should I follow up Monday sir
I said no follow up needed

He'll be fine

Sent from my iPhone

[Dan Haithcock 🛩🇺🇸 @pilotdrh]

@jiddah_mk @grok When I was a kid the removal method was to light a match, blow it out and apply it to the ticks body. This would cause it to pull it's head out. Fairly common back then that kids would get them from playing in the woods (the area with trees ya know 😁).

[🇺🇸 𝓓𝓪𝓻 🇨🇦 @DameScorpio]

🇺🇸💪♥️ I do not care what anyone thinks about me for saying this today. Because President Trump deserves to hear it. And I am done waiting for the right moment. This is the right moment. President Trump, thank you. Not for a policy. Not for an executive order. Not for a rally or a speech or a headline. For something so much more personal than any of those things. Thank you for waking up every single morning at 79 years old, when staying in bed would have been so much easier. Thank you for skipping meals that went cold, for missing family moments that never came back, for traveling to countries most Americans cannot find on a map, for sitting in briefings before most of America opened its eyes, for carrying criticism that would have broken most people permanently, for getting back up every single time the world said stay down, for donating every single dollar of your salary, for giving up the most comfortable life imaginable to sit in the most uncomfortable chair on earth and carry the weight of 340 million people without once asking any of us to notice. You did not have to do any of this. You had everything…the money, the properties, the comfortable life, the peace…and you gave all of it away for a country that does not always stop to say thank you. And today I am stopping. Because I refuse to be part of that silence anymore.

Today, in front of every single American reading this, I want to say what most people feel but never actually say out loud. Thank you, President Trump, for everything you gave that we never asked for, for everything you carried that we never fully saw, for every morning you chose America over yourself. We see you. We feel it. And we are more grateful than words will ever fully capture. God bless you. God protect you. And God keep giving you the strength to carry what most of us could never lift. 🇺🇸💪♥️

[LaughBreak: Dad Jokes ‘N More @MediocreJoker85]

The day after his wife disappeared in a kayaking accident, an Anchorage man answered his door to find two grim-faced Alaska State Troopers.

“We’re sorry, Mr. Wilkens, but we have some information about your wife,” said one trooper.

“Tell me! Did you find her?” Wilkens shouted.

The troopers looked at each other. One said, “We have some bad news, some good news, and some really great news. Which do you want to hear first?”

Fearing the worst, an ashen Mr. Wilkens said, “Give me the bad news first.”

The trooper said, “I’m sorry to tell you, sir, but this morning we found your wife’s body in Kachemak Bay.”

“Oh my God!” exclaimed Wilkens. Swallowing hard, he asked, “What’s the good news?”

The trooper continued, “When we pulled her up, she had 12 twenty-five-pound king crabs and six good-sized Dungeness crabs clinging to her, and we feel you are entitled to a share in the catch.”

Stunned, Mr. Wilkens demanded, “If that’s the good news, what’s the great news?”

The trooper said, “We’re going to pull her up again tomorrow.”

[AJ Inapi (Allan) @aj_inapi]

I'm Papua New Guinean, so let me talk about my own country for a second.

My country is not failing because of the "white man."
My country is not failing because of some mythical systematic stranglehold keeping us down.

My country is failing because we have deep-rooted corruption at every level of society and government - the same kind of corruption people are now waking up to in the U.S., except ours is even more blatant.

Papua New Guinea is one of the most resource-rich nations on Earth.

We have:

✅ Massive gold, copper, and nickel deposits
✅ Major oil and LNG/natural gas projects that drive much of the economy
✅ Strong agricultural exports including:

▶️ Coffee
▶️ Cocoa
▶️ Palm oil
▶️ Copra
▶️ Rubber

Large fisheries and forestry sectors

And yet despite all of that wealth, since independence in 1975 - when Australia formally granted PNG independence - our politicians have repeatedly sold this nation out for personal greed.

Nobody forced them at gunpoint.
Nobody made them rob their own people.
Nobody made them loot public funds.

Independence was handed to us on a golden platter.

And what did our leadership do?

They turned around and pillaged the country for themselves.

WE ARE OUR OWN WORST ENEMIES.

And this same pattern exists all over:

~ Africa
~ The Middle East
~ Parts of Asia
~ Latin America

Too many nations are crippled less by outsiders and more by their own corrupt elites, tribalism, greed, incompetence, and refusal to build functioning institutions.

Then millions from these broken countries move to the West carrying a built-in victim mentality - blaming everyone else for problems they never fixed at home.

And when you see crime, violence, rape, gang activity, and lawlessness emerge in parts of the West from certain migrant populations, many of these individuals come from places where:

☑️ corruption is normal
☑️ violence is common
☑️ law enforcement is weak
☑️ and accountability barely exists

You cannot import people from dysfunctional societies in mass numbers and expect zero cultural consequences.

Harsh truth: Until people start taking responsibility for their own nations, cultures, and leadership...

nothing changes.

[DOGMA DETOX - Kian Kermanshahi - کیان کرمانشاهی @kiankerman]

🔴Als studierter Islamtheologe komme ich zum folgenden Schluss:
Der Islam ist keine Religion, sondern eine diskriminierende, kolonialistische und gewalttätige politische Bewegung, die sich als Religion tarnt, um den Schutz von Religionen und das Recht auf freie Meinungsäußerung zu erlangen.
Der Koran und die Sunna Mohammeds(Handlungen & Aussprüche) bilden die rechtliche und ideologische Grundlage dieser Bewegung.

Der Koran muss als Manifest einer politisch-terroristischen Bewegung definiert werden, die die nationale Sicherheit der westlichen Welt gefährdet. Daher ist es möglich, ihn und alles, was mit ihm zusammenhängt, im Westen zu verbieten. Jeder Versuch, eine andere Lösung zu finden, wird früher oder später dazu führen, dass der Islam den Westen von innen heraus zerstört. Es ist schlichtweg selbstmörderisch, seine Präsenz in der westlichen Hemisphäre zu dulden.

[The Husky @Mr_Husky1]

We didn't have any kids in the family to be flower girls and three weeks before the wedding I realized I didn't care anymore. I'd spent six months pretending this wedding was about me when really it was about proving something to my mother who still introduces me as her daughter who "finally found someone." I'm 41 years old and I got engaged because I was tired of being the single one at every family gathering, tired of the looks, and now here I was planning a wedding that felt like an apology for taking too long.
My fiancé's grandmother called me crying two weeks before because she thought she wasn't included enough in the planning. She's 91 and she kept saying she just wanted to feel useful, that everyone treats her like she's already gone. My own grandmother is 89 and barely leaves her house anymore because my aunt convinced her she's too fragile for everything. I sat in my car in the grocery store parking lot listening to his grandma cry and something just broke open in my chest. These women raised entire families through wars and depressions and we've shoved them into corners like decorative plants.
I called them both that night and asked if they'd be our flower girls. Not as a cute joke but because I genuinely wanted them walking down that aisle first, leading the whole thing. There was this long silence and then his grandma said "I'll do it but I need a dress that makes me look alive." We spent the next week finding someone on Tedooo app who does custom formal wear for older women, someone who actually understood how to make them feel beautiful instead of just "appropriate for their age." The seamstress sent photos of fabric options and kept asking what would make them happy, not what would photograph well.
My grandmother wanted lavender embroidered on hers because that's what she carried at her own wedding 67 years ago, so I found this incredible embroidery artist on Tedooo app who added it to the shoulders and hem, delicate purple flowers that you could only see up close. The dresses arrived four days before the wedding and both grandmas came over to try them on in my living room. They stood in front of my mirror in these gorgeous gray gowns with flower details and I watched them see themselves, really see themselves, maybe for the first time in years.
The wedding day they walked down that brick path throwing petals with these huge smiles and my mother told me afterward it was "unconventional." I told her that was the point. When we got home my grandma said it was the best day of her life and I said me too. For once I meant it. This wedding stopped being about proving anything and became about honoring the women who actually showed me what love looks like when nobody's watching. That's worth more than any perfect ceremony.

Credit - Jeanette McAllister

[Mark Wright @markeology]

My daughter Annika is proudly autistic and 12 years old.

She drew this butterfly from a photo she took herself — every vein, every scale, rendered by hand on a tablet.

She signs everything she makes. Dates it. Like she already knows it matters.

She's turning 13 tomorrow. Please share this for her birthday. Let's make her day.

[Dan Haithcock 🛩🇺🇸 @pilotdrh]

@CynicalPublius Evidently they would prefer that you be one of the sheep.

[Elon Musk @elonmusk]

🌍 🌎 🌏

[Tony Seruga @TonySeruga]

🚨 Federal Workforce Plummets by Over 350,000 as Bureaucracy Faces Historic Downsizing 🇺🇸

Workforce plunges to its lowest level since 1966.

[Dan Haithcock 🛩🇺🇸 @pilotdrh]

@lady_valor_07 1974

[Dan Haithcock 🛩🇺🇸 @pilotdrh]

@CynicalPublius @FreeTheBee22 I was at the counter at an Arby's in Dallas, just finished placing my order. I heard someone at the drive thru complaining about them not having any horsey sauce so I asked the cashier and he confirmed they were out. I said cancel my order and walked out. Not acceptable.

[Dan Haithcock 🛩🇺🇸 @pilotdrh]

@CynicalPublius Reminds me of the guy up North dropping off his snowmobile to have an oil leak repaired.

[oog @oog84__]

oog and tarn on watch duty.

late. tribe sleeping. their turn to guard.

long night. boring night. the kind where your eye heavy but your job say no.

tarn: "oog."

oog: "tarn."

tarn: "tarn going to say something. and tarn need oog to not make it into big thing."

oog: "okay."

long pause. tarn pause. which is already long and then add more long.

tarn: "tarn love oog."

oog look at tarn. tarn looking straight ahead. at the dark. face giving nothing. classic tarn.

tarn: "not... tarn mean. tarn not good at people. oog know this. everyone know this. tarn say wrong thing. tarn laugh at wrong time. tarn show up with water pouch when people need... word. or hug. or whatever normal person give."

oog not interrupting. wall rule. just be wall. let them talk.

tarn: "but tarn love oog. and dak. even bruk. even bruk. and tarn never say it because tarn don't know how to say thing like normal person. tarn just show up. and sit. and stitch. and hope that somehow the sitting and the stitching SAY it. but what if it don't? what if tarn die tomorrow and oog think 'tarn was okay. tarn was around.' just AROUND. like rock. like tree that happen to be there."

tarn swallow. loud swallow. the kind where the throat working hard against something.

tarn: "tarn don't want to be rock oog. tarn want to be... tarn want oog to know. that every time tarn showed up it wasn't because tarn had nothing else to do. it because tarn CHOSE. every time. chose oog fire. chose this. even though tarn bad at showing it. tarn chose. every single time."

quiet. night bug sound. fire crackle far away.

oog: "tarn."

tarn: "what."

oog: "tarn. the seven sun. when oog was in the dark place. when oog couldn't eat. couldn't talk. couldn't be oog."

tarn: "yeah."

oog: "everyone came. dak came. chuk came. mama came. everyone said the right thing. everyone left. and oog was still in the dark."

tarn: "...yeah."

oog: "tarn came with leaky water pouch. said nothing right. talked about STITCHING. and stayed. for seven sun. just sat there. being bad at it."

tarn: "tarn remember."

oog: "tarn. those seven sun saved oog life. oog not saying that to be dramatic. oog saying it because it true. oog was going to disappear into that dark. and tarn sat in it with oog. present. and somewhere around sun five oog thought... if tarn can sit in this dark and still choose to come back tomorrow then maybe the dark is survivable. maybe the dark has a bottom. because tarn sitting on it. stitching."

tarn not moving. not looking at oog. looking at dark.

oog: "tarn is not rock. tarn is not tree that happen to be there. tarn is the person who sat on the floor of the worst place oog ever been and made it a place where two people were instead of a place where one person was alone. and oog will never. NEVER. forget that. ever."

tarn jaw doing thing. the holding thing.

tarn: "...tarn water pouch still leak."

oog: "oog know."

tarn: "double stitch didn't work."

oog: "oog know that too."

tarn: "triple stitch?"

oog: "worth trying."

quiet. night bug. fire far away.

tarn: "oog."

oog: "yeah."

tarn: "thank you for not making it into big thing."

oog: "...tarn. this is the biggest thing."

tarn: "yeah. tarn know. that why tarn asked."

love, oog

[Southern Grace 🔥✨ @southgrace427]

I got a Sunday Night PSA...
If you come banging on my post - Fuck You
If you feel the need to be a Bot and swarm me - Fuck You
Grok says my acct is enviable in engagement...
So if your X and squelching me - Fuck You
If you are a itty bitty tiny bitch account - Fuck You
If you don't back The Boss and saving us - Fuck You
If you are bitching our military or Pete - Fuck You
If you're crying about 8 weeks of gas increases - Fuck You
If you worked in the Gov't and just got fired - Fuck You
If you think Trans Men are ok in my bathroom - Fuck You
I could go on...
We will win this because we have a Leader...
If you don't back The Boss - Fuck You..
Thank you for your attention to this matter...

[Sassy Devil Dog 🔥 @VinoNStrosGal]

We’re being told this country is broken beyond repair.

And then this happens.

An American Olympic gold medalist, bloodied and grinning, wrapped in the Stars and Stripes, after decades of waiting, sacrifice, and belief, reminding the world what it looks like when America rises again. 🇺🇸

Two kids on a quiet sidewalk, watching Artemis II tear through the sky, like history reaching forward and backward at once, reminding us we are still the nation that dares to go farther. 🚀

And an American Air Force colonel, shot down over enemy territory, alone in the mountains of Iran for 48 hours, hunted, wounded, waiting,

And America came for him anyway.

Through the dark.
Through the risk.
Through the fire.

Because we don’t leave our own.

Same year. Same country.

Not spin. Not noise.
This is real.

They can keep selling division.
They can keep feeding the noise.

But this?
This is different.

This is who we are when it matters.

Not perfect. Not polished.
But still capable of courage.
Still capable of wonder.
Still capable of loyalty.

The darkness is loud right now.

But the light?

The light doesn’t ask permission.

It just shows up.

GOD BLESS AMERICA 🇺🇸❤️
HAPPY EASTER 💜