Once upon a time 700ft under a hill in West Virginia

Once upon a time when Lord Kadizzle was trying to earn money to go to college he operated a shuttle car like the one pictured above.  Kadizzle was nearly killed by operating one of these machines. A shuttle car hauls coal from the face of the mine where it is cut from the seam by a continuous miner to an underground conveyor.

The shuttle car steers with all four wheels and is powered by an electrical cable. The cable is played out as the shuttle car goes toward the miner and is picked up on a reel as the shuttle car goes toward the conveyor.  Shuttle cars are equipped with two drivers seats which face each other.  When you need to go the opposite direction you simply switch seats.  Operating this vehicle in a tunnel 20 feet wide and four feet high is difficult and dangerous.

One  day Kadizzles foreman instructed him to pick up some supplies with the shuttle car. To do this Kadizzle had to make a turn contrary to the way the mine was laid out for shuttle cars.  As Kadizzle made the turn his head got caught between a block of wood on the roof of the mine and the seat back of the shuttle car.  Normally stopping the shuttle car would have been a simple matter of taking your foot off the throttle.  However, when Kadizzle took his foot of the throttle the wheels on the shuttle car continued to move the shuttle car forward.  Kadizzle quickly realized his head was going to be crushed.  By some miracle the shuttle car became stuck and lost traction.  With the wheels spinning Kadizzle was trapped. Another miner came to his rescue and hit the emergency shut off.  Kadizzle was almost killed.  Coal mining is a dangerous occupation.

Punched by the Spaghetti Eater

For some strange reason Kadizzle thought about the best punch anyone every landed on him.  Quickly it came to him that it was certainly the Spaghetti Eater that did the best job.

As a high school football player Kadizzle played football in the Ohio Valley.  Keep in mind the Ohio Valley was lined with steel mill towns and some rough football.  A football game in the Ohio Valley was a loosely controlled fight.

Triadelphia High School's team got on the school bus and made the trip to Weirton West Virginia.  Weirton was a steel mill town that often kept kids in high school an extra year if they were needed on the football team.

Kadizzle played offensive guard.  To Kadizzle's dismay the player opposite him was Mattao Magnone,  a huge Italian fat guy that was impossible to move.  In order to deal with Matty as he was called Kadizzle had to constantly fake a block and then swing his feet around an kick Mattao's legs out from under him.  Mattao mostly got by on his size, not his brains, so this tactic worked most of the game.

Like an idiot Kadizzle taunted Matao most of the game. Matao had a habit of grabbing Kadizzles shirt and holding him.  Kadizzle would say thing to Matao like " As big as you are you should be able to play fair you big Spaghetti eater".   As the game progressed Kadizzle hurled every insult he could think of at the big Italian.

Finally late in the last quarter the ball was snapped, and Matao planted a blow on the side of Kadizzles helmet with his forearm.  It was a perfect what we called in those days "forearm shiver".  The trick is to hit your opponent with the flat of your forearm planted with all your body weight against the side of the helmet.  The staggering blow of Matao's forearm worked its magic and rattled Kadizzles brain.  Kadizzle managed to stagger around in a daze until his senses finally came back to him.  After Kadizzle regained his senses he went back to the line and gave Matao a message.  Kadizzle said to Matty  " This shows how stupid you are,  if you had any sense you would have hit me like that in the first part of the game".

The is a side story to all this.  Sometime during the game we noticed the stands were emptying.  Looking back toward where our school bus was parked it appeared to be on fire, and the crowd was going to watch the fire.  Our team thought, "Oh my god they set our bus on fire".  Of course we felt they were taking football pretty serious.  As it turned out it was home coming for Weirton and someone had set one of the home coming floats on fire.  Anything could happen at a football game in the Ohio Valley.

Erin and Fran's new home in Stapleton

Erin and Fran are happily embedded in their new home with our grandaughter Ticklepinch.  Kadizzle and The Commander have excellent accommodations in the basement with our own bath and large screen TV.

Actually living at the Airport 365 days a year.

Kadizzle is sitting on the runway as this is written, not in a plane, but on the couch.  Strange as it may seem it is true.  Kadizzles daughter is living the life of ease in her new house.  The new house is built on the old Stapleton Airport site in Denver.   As a historical marker the old control tower was left standing just two blocks away.  How many neighborhoods have their own control tower?

The old airport must have have been a couple square miles large.  With so much land to work with the developers who turned it into housing and an urban area had a lot to work with.   The blank slate made it possible to plan large parks,  bike paths, and a host of amenities from the ground up.

The latest trends in urban housing can be seen on every block.  Many of the new concepts are great improvements.  Check back later in the day and Kadizzle will add a video and some pictures.

Lord Kadizzles first piece of heavy equipment.

In the third grade Lord Kadizzle was farmed out to some farmers in West Virginia for the summer.  As a third grader Kadizzle got to drive this strange tractor. It was used to cultivate vegetables.  The largest piece of equipment Kadizzle ever got to run was a 70 cubic yard dragline that weighed over 400 tons.  That experience was brief and well supervised.  The operator tempted Kadizzle when he was working as a foreman at a strip mine to give it a try.  The last foreman that tried it pulled the bucket into the boom and got fired.  I think that was the plan,  so I took my turn delicately and got out of the seat.

Kadizzle has briefly flown a small plane on several occasions.  The mine was a great chance to operate some very large equipment.  When bored Kadizzle used to let the D10 dozer operator sit in his pickup and Kadizzle would push some dirt for awhile.  It quickly got boring.  Underground Kadizzle was a real shuttle car operator.   A shuttle car is a difficult piece of equipment used to haul coal underground.   The shuttle car has no reverse, you simply change to the other seat facing the other way and drive that direction.  Operating a shuttle car in narrow underground tunnels take a lot of skill.  Along the way Kadizzle has driven 180 ton haul trucks,  large sugar beet trucks, and operated some smaller cranes.  It all started back there with that old Allis Charmers Model G.

The voices

Often I also hear voices in the refrigerator.  The ones in the refrigerator I often listen too. Many times they plead that they are cold and would prefer to be in my stomach.  Too many times I take pity on some old pork chop or left over meat loaf.

It is a good thing no one else can hear the voices.  Yesterday I was at the beach, and some of the things the voices said were not for public consumption.  Many times they tell me to have another drink, or somehow distract me before I pull my zipper up.  The worse thing is when the voices get me confused and then the voice of The Commander interrupts and brings me back to reality.  Right now the voices are saying it would not hurt to eat a little lunch.  It would not surprise me if they talk me into eating too much and tell me I can cut back at dinner. That is their usual tactic.

A many of many hats ends up with a bad one

Yesterday as the Kadizzlite crew moved back to base we stopped at a second hand store.  Ricky greeted us at the door in his bowler hat.  Ricky was sitting on his chair doing embroidery.  A very nice fellow, but he would not be listed under the manly category.  Ricky had a nice selection of hats, and Lord Kadizzle very much wanted the nice airline pilot hat to convert to a captains hat.

At $45 the hat was too expensive.  Kadizzle crafted a plan to trade Ricky pheasant feathers for the hat.  Perhaps the deal will eventually come to fruition, but in the meantime Ricky gave Lord Kadizzle the Love Boat hat for free.   Now the plan is to provide some pheasant feathers to Cheech. Cheech will return to the store to bargain with Ricky and perhaps Kadizzle will have less of a dolt hat.

Death by food in New York City

Days and days of eating wonderful food. Today we visited a park by the water that had everything needed to kill any fat man.  Hundreds of excellent food vendors with every conceivable type of food

Sailing backwards

Yesterday the Kadizzilites spent a good bit of time on the water around New York City.  Kadizzle has often wondered what it would be like sailing around the city of New York.  The current in the waters surrounding the city is very strong. The captain of the boat that took us on tour said the current was flowing at four knots.  That means that if you are sailing against the current your boat is pointing one direction but actually sailing towards the stern until you reach four knots.  So if you are making a good six knots it only turns out to be two.  The old sailing ships coming and going must have had a hell of a time.  Of course with the current you get a big bonus.

Life in tenmant housing

Today Kadizzle, The Commander, and daughter Cheech (aka Megan) crossed the Williamsburg Bridge into the lower east side for a tour of a tenement building.  Apparently an owner had boarded up the place back in the early 1900's, so it was just like it would have been when the original Irish family and 7,ooo other people lived there. 

Coming from a family of 9, Kadizzle could imagine what it would have been like for a family of six or eight to live in a space the size of our garage.  Five out houses served well over 100 people in the six story complex.  All water had to be carried up four flights of stairs.  By any standard it was a miserable life style.

For a mire $221 Kadizzle will get to sleep in his New York City bunk bed.  The Commander is going to force Kadizzle to climb the ladder.  On the boat we have the V Berth fairy.  I wonder if there is some special fairy that climbs that ladder at night if you have been good.  Kadizzle has not been a good boy so  most likely there is no danger of attack.

Today the Kadizzlites traveled from Denver to New York.  It is like landing in a different world.  The prices are definitely not from the planet of North Dakota.  Just seeing the variety of people is refreshing. Pretty girls of every make and model.  Kadizzle was just chided by the The Commander.  Often Kadizzle greets women with W.C. Fields old greeting " Hello, my little apple blossom of the orient.".  We just had an appetizer at a nice Chinese place.  The girl seating us was so pretty Kadizzle could not refrain.  It was such a pleasure to see a real oriental beauty and be able to say.  " My little apple blossom of the Orient".

So the New York adventure begins.  Amazing to see stores that actually are unique.  The choices of eating places withing walking distance is in the hundreds and each place has something different.  Kadizzle has no clue exactly what we just had, but it was very good.  Our Hotel is an old warehouse converted to a very nice  lodging place.  You can tell by the old beams in the hall the place is way over a hundred years old.  The Commander just called and is demanding my presence on the roof. She says the view is excellent, and there is a bar up there.  So far dinner has not even been though of and we have blown well over a hundred dollars on snacks and some wine and beer.  Such is life.

Rock Walrus returns Iphone to dock

When Kadizzle prepared to go to the lake yesterday he mentally told himself many times to be sure not to put his Iphone in his shirt pocket.  According to plan that is how the trip to the lake to work on the boat started.  The Commander always gets her dander up when she gets blamed for everything, but sure enough the ensuring disaster was her fault.  At some point The Commander called. In an absent minded state Kadizzle put the phone in his T Shirt pocket.  It was not too long after that he reached over the side of the boat to put some tools on the dock.  As planned by the gods of gravity the phone slipped out of the pocket and into the water at the deepest end of the dock.

With a $200 dollar bill sinking to the bottom of the lake Kadizzle stripped his clothes off as quickly as possible.  Hopefully none of the cabin owners in the area were gazing out the window.  One could hear a some old goat saying " Look Mildred there is a rock Walrus on Quinn's dock, boy they really do have a short tusk".   On the first dive the phone could not be found.  It was essential that Loyd Bridges did not stir up the bottom or the whole mission would be hopeless.  However, by the grace of the lake gods something that resemble an Iphone was in sight on the second dive.  With great joy Lord Kadizzle came to the surface and put the phone on the dock.

Now there would be the obvious question will a phone submerged in twelve feet of water still work.  To the credit of Steve Jobs the phone slowly came back to life.  Thank god the recovery went so well. Plan B would have been super embarrassing.  Believe it or not Kadizzle lost the hand held VHF radio in almost the exact same spot.  Recovering the radio was more difficult, but a major help in the process was the fact that the radio was turned on and Kadizzle could see the light from the radio.

Plan B would have been for The Commander to call the phone so it would light up and ring under water. Who knows if this is possible?  The bad news would have been trying to get hold of the commander. Could you imagine calling on the VHF radio and asking someone, " Would you call my wife and ask her to keep calling my phone?".    Surely they would ask why and  Kadizzle would have to admit that it was under water an he needed to find it. 

Now the VHF radio is equipped with a lanyard that has flotation.  Somehow wrapping the phone in foam just does not seem like a solution.  The moral of the story is keep you phone in you pocket.

Go Fly a Kite with Biscuit and Gravy

Sitting at the kitchen table the noise of the door bell disturbed Kadizzles internet fog.  There was Gravy at the front door.  Gravy explained he needed help.  The kite they have been trying to launch into space had crashed on top of the neighbors camper.  Somehow it was Kadizzle's job to recover the kite.  Biscuit and Gravy have a knack for turning just about anything into a disaster.  When they first came into the neighborhood they roared down the street with Gravy pulling Biscuit in a wagon hooked to Gravy's bike.  The cable strung from the bike to the wagon got caught in the bike wheel and made a spectacular wreck.  Naturally Kadizzle was called on to untangle the cable.

So today's mission is to boost Biscuit onto the roof of the camper to retrieve the kite.  Once we had Biscuit back on the ground with the kite Kadizzle decided to give the two knuckleheads a kite flying lesson.  Things seemed to be going all right until Gravy somehow managed to ram the kite into the ground and break it. Biscuit and Gravy could break a ball bearing. 

Once Biscuit and Gravy were in a physiological test that involved ball bearings.  First the tester gave three ball bearing to an engineer. The engineer lined them up in a row, made a triangle, and tried to do engineering things. Next they gave the ball bearings to an artist. The artist tried to stack them and figure out a way to make an artistic statement with them.  Now, it was Biscuit and Gravy's turn.  They managed to steal one, break one, and lose the other one.

The Remeadigus

What in the hell is the Remeadigus?  In ancient Roman times the mayor of every little town was required to make a trip through town each day to see how things were going.  The mayor was supposed to remedy any problems he found.  That is where the word remedy came from.

Everyday when Lord Kadizzle is in the ancient town of Hazen he tries to do a Remeadigus.  The best way to perform this function is by bicycle.  The first stop on the trip usually involves checking the potato heads.  There are four potato heads.  Up the street the neighbors made a nice little boy, and a nice littler girl.  As they got bigger the couple must have decided they liked their children so well they made two more identical.  So now the two older potato heads are in school, but the younger reproductions are fenced in the back yard with the dogs.  So as Kadizzle rides up the street the little potato heads start yelling "hey Mr. Potato Head".  Apparently they have figured out how to return the nick name.

Across the street is where the Biscuit and Gravy live.  Haven't seen much of them lately, but yesterday they were out on the street trying to fly a kite.  They have a unique knack for messing up any project. Kadizzle warned them about getting the kite string caught in the power line.  Gravy said he realized that could give him a sting.  Calling an electrocution a sting seemed like a novel idea. On the way back from the down town Remedigus Biscuit and Gravy were repairing the kite they managed to get stuck on the roof.

On a good day a lot of kids are involved in the Remeadigus. The next stop is usually to see the Doodlebugs.  Karen takes care of the Doodlebugs and does an excellent job.  As Kidizzle approaches the wild Doodlebugs in Karen's yard they begin yelling " It's the Doodlebug Man".   At this stop a few kids have to be thrown into the air and Kadizzle tries to remember all the names of the kids at the day care.  It is amazing how Karen trains kids.  They always do what they are told, stay out of the street, and take care of each other.

Shiney's  little art store is the next stop.  As you enter the dog alarm goes off.  This is a must stop if you want a couple pieces of candy.  Shiney is usually up on the happenings in town and has a couple stories about the Hoopleheads to relate.  Since Shiney is right behind the pocket park she can give a good report on what goes on there.

It might be necessary to stop at the Hazen Star office and check with the editor.  This is required to make sure the paper is not letting the local conservatives get out of hand.  Now we have a new editor that has to be broken in to the ways of keeping Hazen on as good a course as can be expected deep in the land of Rush Limbaugh and Fox News.

Next comes city hall.  Behind his desk the economic development director will be waiting for Kadizzle to buy him his daily diet coke.  This is not a testimonial to Diet Coke.  Duke may be the largest man in circumference in town.  Duke will fill Kadizzle in on all the goings on in the business world in Hazen. This could take up to a minute.  After discussing how to rearrange the world and complaining about the "Sunsabitches" it is time to go to the library.  The pleasant ladies at the library are always in a good mood, and it may be necessary one more time to spread the Democratic gospel of prosperity. Perhaps there are some kids there for story hour that can be encouraged to read.

Finally the Remeadigus can start the journey home.  This could involve a stop at the thrift store for a bargain on some junk, and to check the rag bin for good wiping towels.  The stop may also involve trying to make the preachers wife who runs the store see that Republican thinking and Christianity don't mix.  Recently she told Kadizzle God was against health care for everyone.  She knew this because Jesus only selected a few people to be healed.

The Remeadigus is just about over unless a stop at the creamery is in order to keep Daryl's blood circulating.  There could be an ice cream treat in store there if Daryl is in a generous mood.  Maybe a stop at the hardware store, maybe not.  Now back by the Doodlebugs where story reading on the swing is just beginning, and back home to take orders from The Commander.

Tomorrow it starts all over.

What happened here?

Lake Sakakawea has hundreds of bays.  At some point the good ship Sovereign, or the previous ship Xanadu has anchored in a lot of them.  When the ship sails in to the bay old memories sail into the mind.  The Commander and Lord Kadizzle sailed into Cherry Bay a couple days ago.  The bay was named because when ever it was referred to someone ended up saying.  " You know that is the bay we sailed into and ate cherries with the Donovan's".

Heaven Bay got its name from a day Pat and Kadizzle sailed in many years ago.  Neither of us had ever been in the bay.  The water level at the time made it the ideal place to pull to shore for the night and build a camp fire.  It was such an idealistic place it instantly was named Heaven Bay.  It was the Bay Erin and I stumble on an entire clump of rattlesnakes hiking up a steep hill.  The Snakes were in a small cave.  Heaven is where Kadizzle laughed so hard his chair fell over backwards and he almost rolled into the lake.

Berthold Bay holds hundreds of stories, but the oldest memory always seems to be Bob Johnson doing the dishes in a bucket and throwing the dishes in the lake that were in the bottom of the bucket.  Berthold bay has a bottom of solid dishes and things lost from peoples boats including one of our earliest grills.  Berthold Bay was where the life buoy on Sovereign got it's only use.  A tourist in the charter days claimed he was drowning.  It seemed like he made a lot of effort to do it, but the buoy went right in his hands and saved him from what seemed his imaginary doom.  The tales of Berthold Bay are endless.

Shit Happens Bay,  the name says it all.  It was the Bay where Joe Windbaur wanted to run up into the woods in what seemed like a tornado.  Did not seem like a good idea to get ground to bits by flying trees.  Dave Stephens and Bill Butcher snagged a tree with the anchor for about two hours.  The Quinns had the mother of all in the dark, anchor dragging, dinner with Bill and Dina.  That meeting started with ominous signs.  Just to find each other for the famous meatloaf dinner we had to fire flares.

Twin Buttes had its spectacular storm with boats thrashing about and ground tackle coming loose.

Nancy Bay was an anchoring adventure in a storm waking up on an unknown shore.

Lewis and Clark Marina was where the park attendant threw the dock line in the prop as the wind drove Xanadu into the jetty. 

Everyone remembers where every rattlesnake was seen in each bay.   At the bay on the south side of Mallard Island  Kurt and Kadizzle tried to make a slide for life by stringing the anchor rope from the hill top to the mast.  The famous prairie fire started by the yacht club took place over by Wolf Creek.

On and on it goes, every bay has a story, and many memories.