Exciting stuff!

 Today we received our mail-in ballots for the election!  Ok!  Here's hoping we can Dump Trump big time.

We have been doing our usual thing:  walking in the morning; going to one of the local restaurants for lunch; cooking dinner at home.  All very normal stuff except for extra hand washing; antiseptic in the car glove box; and wearing masks.  My wife made 5 or 6 masks way back when this stuff started but eventually I bowed to reality and bought extras for us.  Most people are pretty good about wearing their masks but there are a few who either can't manage it or wear them like over the mouth only.  Dumb shits!  

We do like to walk in the morning and sometimes we see something special.  A neighbor has a large cactus in their yard and once in a long while it flowers.  Late last month was it's time.

A few weeks ago we managed a road trip and stayed in a couple motels.  Part of the trip was just to see how our dog would manage travel; turned out he did great!  But there was this one motel that had added a little humor to their decor.  Found on the bathroom wall.

And a rather interesting shower curtain.

Yeah, some people have too much time on their hands!  Really it was interesting traveling during the pandemic.  Restaurants seemed to all have reduced menus and not a good number of employees.  (That isn't happening here in the Valley; you can order anything on the menu and it is as good as ever.)  We had no real trouble finding pet-friendly motels.  We ordinarily don't stop for lunch unless it is something like a sandwich so that was no problem.  (It was way too hot to leave the dog in the truck!)  

Anyway, that's it for me today.  I've gotta go cook dinner:  Choucroute Garni complete with some skinny little pork chops that I smoked for an hour or so the other day.  It should be good.  Take care and be careful out there!

Marathon

Anyone who knows me knows that I'm not much of a tv watcher.  I don't watch the news except for the weather.  I seldom read the newspaper.  I've even given up looking at most movies.  Instead I waste too much time on the internet.  But I've gotta tell you, I've been glued to the tv coverage of the Boston Marathon bomber chase.  What an amazing thing. 

Here is this young guy who seems to be an absolutely great kid who for some reason apparently participated is this horrible and pointless bombing.  What the hell?  I sure hope he can be captured alive so we can learn more about what goes on in his head. 

Personally it's been a quiet week - well since I'm glued to the tv obviously I'm not doing much!  This morning we had 40F (4C).  Darn.  That is just not right.  We ought to be at 80F (26C) during the day.  Well, maybe tomorrow.  I may notice it if I can pry myself off the tv. 

Yep, ice from the bird bath this morning.  Brrrr!

I did start watering the cactus last month & it is doing what it's supposed to do.  We have growth!  All that green stuff is new in the last month or so.

Well, I guess I'm off to glue myself back to the tv.  Have a good one!

Vegas Baby!

We've been home almost a week so it was clearly time for a trip to Las Vegas.  Today we especially wanted to visit the Erotic Heritage Museum.  My wife had found a deal on Groupon where we got in for half price:  $7.50.  I liked it a lot more at that price than at the $15 normal price.  The museum is right next door to the Deja Vu strip club; turns out the museum's patron is the guy who owns the clubs. 

It was actually pretty interesting.  They had a lot of art work celebrating sex though there was relatively little from other countries.  One exception was a series of German posters that Hitler tried to destroy.  There was some Asian representation as well but less than I would have expected.  There were also some pieces from primitive cultures but they weren't very well documented.  They also had quite a few televisions showing loops of various porn movies including ones from 1915, the 1920's and 30's.  They have a library that legitimate students can use but they also had a small display of pornographic literature.  Jeez, I hate it when I see things in a museum that I have at home.  It really makes me feel old! 

We had lunch in a brew pub called BJ's.  It's a fairly large chain that brews some of their own beers.  They have a few lunch specials at $5.95 which is fantastic for Vegas!  They were doing a pretty good business too.  I had a piece of fried chicken with potatoes & gravy.  It wasn't overwhelming but wasn't bad at all; especially for the price.  My wife had a trio of barbacoa tacos with black beans which she really liked but couldn't finish.  Again, it is a really good value.  I tried their porter and was happy with that as well but at $5.25 for a 12 oz. glass; well, I didn't think it was that special.

This is the time of year for it to be warm here and we are warm.  Right now it's 111F (almost 44C) and this is almost 18:00 hours.  If we are lucky it cools down in the very early hours so we can open the house for a couple of hours and get some fresh air.  Otherwise, it's just stay inside and thank your lucky stars for air conditioning.  For some odd reason we haven't felt like filling the hot tub.  Other than that we have everything squared away from our trip.  Even the seemingly endless of loads of laundry are done, the trailer is cleaned and put away.

I'm always on about the politicians around here.  I'm happy to say I've found somewhere that is even worse.  Here is a story about a Jordanian politician who pulled a gun on a critic on live tv!  Not bad by any standard.  The moderator had guts though, he got between the two and kept them apart.  I don't know that I would have been there between those two.

Gotta go.  Have a good one!

Still cold and windy

It's cool and windy here but we are very aware that in places like Mississippi hundreds have died in tornadoes.  We feel for those poor people who's lives have been turned upside down by the storms.  Now I need to make a second donation to the Red Cross; first for Japan, now for our own South.

Our house has a small semi-secluded patio off the master bedroom.  It is shielded from the wind and makes a lovely place to sit on days like this.  It is on the south side of the house so you get sun.  It epitomizes the tranquil nature of our lives here.  We have our little container garden, the bbq, a small table and chair set for two.  A few feet away is the bird feeder and bird bath.  If you are quite still the birds eventually get used to you and eat and drink normally.  It's a nice place to sit with a cup of coffee or a glass of wine and enjoy the world.

The trappings of life are so changed from the way things were when I was young.  People thought it was normal to make chicken soup from the bones and maybe the back of a chicken.  Now we go to the store and buy broth in cans.  It is good to sit and watch the birds and know that life itself is much the same.  There is a site I like to visit called Everyday Carry;  people send in photos showing what they carry on their person on a daily basis.  It's pretty funny to an old guy like me.  Apparently there are young men who carry $200 pocket knives, $150 flashlights and other expensive toys in their pockets every day.  I carried the same $12 Swiss Army knife for 35 years.  Maybe that's why I was able to retire early.  Don't know; I do think it's weird.

Have a good one!

Walking

We took a walk yesterday - first one in a long time unfortunately.  We only went about a mile and a half (2.4km) but it was good to get out.  Took the dog, of course.  She heels while we are on the road but is given 'Free Dog' when we are out in the desert.  Here's a happy dog off sniffing everything.

As we walked along I noticed something that is thankfully unusual.

It's a live 9mm round.  Heaven knows how it would end up out there; it looks like it's been bashed around a bit as well.   I suppose it just fell out of someone's pocket.  Cars drive up and down that trail quite often. You wouldn't think it would be dangerous to run over but I wouldn't want to put that theory to the test.  Amazing what you can find if you are looking.

Have a good one.

Confused

Ok, I had to stop along the road and pull this sign up.  It was posted on a piece of empty land between here and the main part of town.  It was placed there a day or two before the elections.

Whoever placed the sign is clearly angry but I guess I'm having trouble figuring out if they really know what they are angry about or not.  President Obama; lots of people are tired of him.  Sheriff DeMeo; he won re-election but by a much smaller margin than I had expected.  Senator Reid and his son Rory Reid; the Senator won and the son lost his bid for Governor.  People are angry at all career politicians and Harry and Rory are certainly that.  Finally, mosques.  What the devil does that have to do with any of the above?  This person seems to be striking out at any authority figure.

Can there be anyone reasonably thoughtful who really thinks the President isn't Christian?  The Reid's are Mormon; not mainline Christians but there are lots of Mormon's around here and even more just a couple hundred miles north of us in Utah.  The Sheriff's religion is unknown to me but I can't imagine it is Islam.  I don't think there is even a mosque in the county; Las Vegas probably, but not here.  So what is going on with this sign?  Look how carefully it is made! 

The only think I can come up with is that the person is so angry that he or she just isn't thinking straight.  There are so many things going wrong for this person that they needed to strike out; to just say 'NO'.  I really don't know what to make of this but I hope it made the person feel better.  Now, if everyone in our country could just let go of a little of this anger and start trying to work together to fix things....... 

Have a good one!

An amazing place

A week ago or so I finished reading Bill Bryson's book 'In a Sunburned Country' about his love for and travels in Australia.  Bill is a cross between a travel writer and a humorist and if you haven't tried his books I can recommend them.   Here's his Random House site.  He spent a lot of time and money visiting down under and seems to have really enjoyed his stay.  Only in one city did he find people he didn't like!  (Refreshing  because the only person I know who's been there thought the people were awful but then again I think the guy who told me that is an idiot.)  Bryson is an interesting guy:  born in the US, spent most of his adult life in England.  I found him originally when he wrote a sort of travel-log of the US from his peculiarly US-English background.  The thing that he keeps repeating about Australia is what I keep noticing about Nevada - there's a lot of not much out here.  Only in Australia, there is more of less - if you know what I mean. 

People are getting ready for Christmas, Kwanzaa, Chanukah, and probably other holidays all over the world.  Leaves me a bit cold as an atheist but I do like a party.  We send Christmas cards to the older relatives and we have a special dinner and even a tree.  The tree, of course, predates Christianity and we skip all the angels but it certainly does have Christian connotations these days.  We exchange gifts; after one's childhood I expect most of us prefer to give than to receive.  Certainly I do.  Every year I give either money or food to the food bank; this year I think I'll have to find a few toys as well.  There are plenty of poor people in our valley.  So following on the Thanksgiving holiday, let's all be as generous as we can for this special time of year.

Come, yea thankful people, come
Raise the song of Harvest-home;
All is safely gathered in,
Ere the winter storms begin.  

Henry Alford

WTF!!

Well, excuse my language but I came across this little gem in my travels: in some Texas counties there are outstanding arrest warrants for more than 10% of the population! Here's a link to a state senator's comments.

What is the deal? I just DO NOT understand. Of course the fact that governments are expecting the police department to be a revenue source is the root of the problem. The cops have a really tough job in the first place but to make them "earn their keep" this way has to be counterproductive. Imagine what would happen if they actually executed the warrants on say, another 5% of the population. Dallas County has something like 2.5 million people. So you arrest 125,000 people? How? You'd need to call out the Army. There is something really wrong with this picture.

The same thing is happening even here in Pahrump if we can believe this guy complaining to the newspaper. He claims 50 tickets were written in the same general area over several days. Well, this is the same guy who claims to have driven 170,000 miles(275000 km) a year as a delivery driver. Hmmm, there are about 2000 working hours in a year so he was doing 85mph (135km) every hour he worked? I doubt it, even in California! LOL I suspect inflation in his story; verbal inflation that is.

So what's my advice? Well, I don't have any but the obvious: don't get ticketed. Duh. But if you do, you've gotta work with the system to pay your tickets. Because otherwise, you are on a downhill slide that won't be pleasant. Meanwhile, we need to change the system. Having $300 tickets for going a few miles over the limit is over the limit itself. Having 10% of the population with outstanding warrants is some kind of awful indictment of our society. Don'tcha think?

Have a good one, it's dangerous out there!

Went to the big city!

Went to Las Vegas today. My wife got the gift of a massage for Mother's Day from our daughter and today was the big day. They both went off to be pampered and left me free to wander around. Had a great time!

Stopped at one of the casinos that isn't on the strip for lunch. I think I've said I'm not much of a gambler so haven't been in the casinos in a very long time. It was quite impressive. The casino's here in Pahrump are quite small; human sized. This place was huge with tons of mirrors and, of course, scads of gaming machines. We hear a lot locally about how lousy business is for the casinos but this place seemed to be doing pretty well. There were lines everywhere - a line for the buffet; a line to join the player's club; a line to get into the poker room. Now granted, they only had four of the six poker tables occupied but still, it wasn't bad for a Wednesday lunch crowd!

I drove down The Strip which was probably a silly thing to do. Traffic was awful and made only worse with some construction. Again though, there were a lot of people walking around. Maybe they weren't spending money but there were a lot of people out there. I know this isn't news but the strip IS amazing. These companies have spent tons of money creating these places to try and draw your interest. For me it was just too much but that's why I'm not "The Donald" (as in Trump).

I'd forgotten that one of the early draws for Nevada was the easy marriage - easy divorce laws. There were several little marriage chapels near downtown. Kind of funny actually, would you believe "Wee Kirk O' the Heather Wedding Chapel"? Whatever floats your boat I guess.

Have a good one but be careful, it's dangerous out there!

It's different here!

I keep saying how different it is here from any place I've ever lived. It has a real smalltown feel but there are really supposed to be 25-30,000 people living in the valley. Actually, it isn't officially a town at all. There are, however, two newspapers serving the area. They are kind of gossipy and the police news is important. This is one of the articles that ran the other day.


Suspect claims he's God, or FBI agent

Russell Troy Winterton, claiming alternately to be God and an FBI agent, was arrested Tuesday, charged with attempted robbery, impersonation of an officer and resisting arrest.

Nye County Sheriff's deputies were dispatched to the Horizon Market located at the intersection of Blagg and Simkins Roads for a robbery in progress at about 8:00 p.m.

Dep. Paul Harvey saw the suspect exit the store through the front doors of the store and ordered the man to lie on the ground. Winterton refused, telling the deputy he was a cop, and later claiming to be an FBI agent.

Finally, Winterton said, "I am God and God can do anything."

Winterton was placed under arrest and transported to the Nye County Detention Center without further incident. He is being held on bail of $12,623.


Now how many communities can claim to be the residence of God? And I love the bail, how the devil do you come up with such an amount? What happened to $15,000 or $10,000? And the paper ran the guy's mug shot and a photo of his fake police badge. We are just lucky here!

Have a good one & TRY to be safe.

OJ Simpson

The news is full of the fact that OJ Simpson, one of the finest football (American) players ever has been convicted of trying to steal some of his own memorabilia. Simpson is over sixty so he is of my generation. When I was younger I watched some football (not a lot, never a real fan) and really enjoyed watching his performance. Now he has been convicted of trying to steal this stuff. Here is a quote from the Yahoo! news article:

The case was set in motion by Thomas Riccio, a collectibles broker who tried to bring in the FBI when he heard that two memorabilia dealers were planning to sell a trove of Simpson artifacts. Failing to get their attention, he helped set up a "sting" by promoting an anonymous buyer who turned out to be Simpson.

Riccio, who has peddled goods including video of Anna Nicole Smith's breast implant surgery, saw a chance to profit by recording the confrontation between Simpson and collectibles dealers Alfred Beardsley and Bruce Fromong.

He rented a cramped hotel room away from the Las Vegas Strip for the meeting and planted a digital recorder atop an armoire. Riccio then sold the recordings of the six-minute confrontation for $210,000 before turning them over to police eight days later. Although they couldn't be authenticated, the recordings became the heart of the prosecution's case, along with audio recorded by gunman Michael McClinton at two wedding parties.

What gets me is that this sleaze bag who sold video of a surgery (!) got over $200K for a video of what was basically an argument. What a wonderful world this is. What wonderful people there are taking video's of others for their own profit. What crap. And who the hell would buy photos of some bimbo's operation; even if it was breast implant surgery. Oh jeez, there I go again.

Have a good one!