Zika may hit United States.

What if a mosquito could spread stupidity? Well that is not the case, but there is a buffoon doing just that.  The buffoon came to Bismarck and did his magic. Zika shrinks the heads of babies.  The buffoon does the same thing to the brain, but only inside the skull.  7,000 people showed up in Bismarck to have their brains shrunk. It worked, the dingers walked out believing the most absurd statements that contradicted themselves right on the spot.

Donald Buffoon said he would put coal miners back to work.  The coal miners are out of work because there is too much natural gas. Donald said he would put oil and gas workers back to work. The Donald says he believes in supply and demand, but the supply of gas is high so the demand for coal is low.  Most elementary school children could figure out that you cannot have supply and demand work when you flood the market with both coal and gas, but the dingers walked out of the Donald's brain shrinking session believing he could suspend gravity if need be.  Only The Donald could make stupidity popular.  People openly declare they are stupid.  Other stupid people clap because a new person has come out of the closet and openly admits they are an idiot.  Anyone who would openly admit they support The Donald is an idiot.  A Trump bumper sticker is like a bumper sticker that says "My kid flunked and I am proud".

When the North Dakota Republicans became aware that stupidity was popular they got in line to prove they were stupid. Kevin Cramer is one of our congressional representatives.  Cramer immediately recognized the new market for ignorance.  Cramer jumped in line with The Donald, and The Donald made Cramer energy secretary. All Cramer had to do is deny global warming and agree to fail a test on physics.

In North Dakota there is a huge untapped market for ignorance. Republicans have jumped in with stupid ideas to fill the void.

Life among friends

The good ship sailed to Fossil Bay and last night we had a wonderful campfire holed up in Moose Bay again. Chuck said he would play background music on his accordion.  Only Chuck would make background music background music. Chuck walked about two hundred yards down the beach an played as he sang.  It was a nice tough.  The Commander reported this morning that the camp fire was one of the best in a long time. It was a perfect evening in every sense.  Liz and Bob joined us when they came into the bay on Windswept.  Wink is brewing the coffee, and the sun is shining.  After a morning cackle session, and a breakfast cookie or two the fleet will head back to port. Omar, if you are reading this perhaps we will stop by the good ship where Omar the sage resides.

The geese worked late last night and it was nice to see them come home from the office landing after dark. The Beaver also made a few rounds. The moose has left tracks but has refused to show his face.  The night was silent and even this morning things are so quiet and peaceful.  Sadly this was not the case early in the evening. A simple minded dinger was plowing the lake with his noise boat.  The dinger was one of those special idiots that are impressed by making a loud noise.  What kind of mind spends tens of thousands of dollars to buy a noisy boat and irritate people for miles? Apparently idiots have a mating call. Female idiots must respond to any loud device, be it a motorcycle, a car, a jacked up pick up truck or whatever. Well god is in heaven deciding what sports teams will win this week, and who will get cancer, so all is right with the world on a wonderful morning in Moose Bay.

Winky is mad

Winky, or as we usually call her The Commander is back at the helm.  She is yelling and cursing the stories she is reading on her phone for the morning update.  She is no happy about all the political silliness.  Wink and Kadizzle slept great on the boat last night.  We holed up in Moose Bay and Wink saw some moose tracks, but the moose never showed up. The new coffee maker worked great, and we spent the morning doing small cleanup jobs on the boat.  We are out on the lake as Kadizzle sits down below writing this.  Hopefully we can meet up with Chuck later today and he will bring his accordion.  Not a great wind, but we are making about four knots.  This is the first trip of the year on the Sovereign.  No destination has been chosen.  Perhaps Heaven Bay, perhaps Butcher Bay.  Fair Haven is out here somewhere, maybe we will run into them.  So that is it for today.

Loving Christians at the Nazi rally

The Donald came to Bismarck yesterday and the embarrassing stupidity of North Dakota reached the boiling point. KFYR radio which blair's Rush Limbaugh for hours everyday spewed it's usual nonsense.  All the hype in North Dakota is about family values, and our great Christian country.  Now, over to the love fest for The Donald.  The Donald spews hate, lies, and greed like fertilizer, and the loving people of North Dakota eat it up. The hypocrisy of this mess is incomprehensible. The Donald nights Kevin Cramer a dolt of unusual magnitude, Energy Secretary.  Moe picks Curly for vice president.  The Donald says he would like to punch someone in the audience who disagrees with him.  The loving Christians roar in approval. The Donald brags of his wealth and says he will cut taxes on everybody, and the dolts roar.  The whole thing is like the crowd at a lynching.  The Donald is firing out hate, calling women, ugly, and making up lies as fast as he can. The Christians love the idea of walling the Mexican rapist out of the country.  The whole thing is unbelievable. It is hard to imagine that we all walk among people who just cannot see the insanity of so called Christians drooling over a man that acts like Hitler.  No person has ever been more obsessed with himself than The Donald. The radio announcer bragged that he was going to take his little girl to see The Donald.  Imagine taking your little girl to see a man married three times, and who says he would date his daughter if he could. Wow, what a way to show your daughter what your standards are.  Even the most simple minded idiot knows The Donald made up terrible lies about Obama being born in Kenya, yet that reality just evaporated. In North Dakota we have reached a new low where reality has been suspended in favor of the Fox News fantasy. The main two things to remember in the Republican world, if you believe it, it is true, and the old favorite "Education just confuses people".

Making the Box

Kadizzle needed a small wooden box.  The box was to hold a control panel for the good ship.  When you need woodwork who do you call? As usual Ray came to the bugle call. Ray is the consummate woodworker. Kadizzle imagined a simple box, zip, zip, zip, bang, bang, and you have a box, but no this was Ray.  Careful measuring and detailed work ensued.  Slowly the box emerged with beveled edges, precisely made joints, glued, nailed, and made at museum quality.

Watching the master work embedded in Kadizzle the realization he has always known.  Kadizzle does not have the patience to tie his shoes correctly.  Kadizzle would throw a book across the room to kill a fly, Ray would shoot it's legs out from under it with a laser.  In his next life Kadizzle will be different.  He will be a craftsman, a musician, and a man that can accomplish something in an orderly organized fashion.  However, Kadizzle is still stuck in this life, so off to the boat to do some sloppy wiring, and other repairs that will indicate a monkey with a tool kit got on the boat.  Such is life.  Some were born to split atoms others have to stick to logs.

How not to be ignorant about the World.

Last evening the porch summit evolved into a living room conference.  Jeff went to bed, The Commander went to the television.  Cory and Kadizzle were left alone to solve the world's problems.  In the course of the great discussion Cory asked " How do you control population?".  We had concluded there were way too many people on the planet.

Jogging his memory Kadizzle came up with the solution.  Actually he remembered where the solution was.  The solution to population control is simple. Get people out of poverty.  So off we went to the Gapminder site.  As god would divine the perfect video was there. "How not to be ignorant about the world" is the video.  Now if you don't want to be ignorant about the world this video is an absolute, must watch.  The simple theme is we can cure the world of poverty in about fifteen years.

While most people were watching Game of Thrones, or some simple sports event, Cory and Kadizzle were watching one the most important videos of our times.  One thing the video points out is that in most cases monkeys guessing at random are smarter than humans about world knowledge.  The humans are college educated humans. The monkeys are in the zoo.

The bottom line is we are ignorant by choice. The average person is totally unwilling to think and learn.  Why think, research, and learn, when your Fox News can fill you totally full of what you think is knowledge? Most people love the simple solution of going to the bar or coffee shop and getting their mind filled with the local popular shit. If you live in North Dakota you get your brain filled with right wing shit. If you live in Seattle it is left wing shit.  However, yup, yes there are real facts out there.  You can find real facts, but you have to look for them and know what a real fact looks like.  Real facts do not come from Rush Limbaugh, KFYR the local lying rat radio show, or Fox News.  That is just a clue.  Have some fun, see what it is like to wake up your brain that is drugged by ignorance willfully inflicted on yourself.  Read something real, have a real conversation, read an article, go for it.

Everybody is getting shot up.

What would it be like to be an apple on a tree and see the other apples fall off the tree one by one? That is old age as it sneaks up on you.  When you were young you never thought about people falling apart, but as you trod toward seventy you see it all around you. Backs give out, knees need to be rebuilt, eyes get blurry and fail, cancer chews away at everybody, and on it goes.

Some old farts are riding bikes, and climbing mountains with ease, while others don't have the strength to push the remote control buttons.  Maladies are sprinkled on people like salt.  Who next will succumb to some new disaster?

Ok, that is the bad news, now for some advice.  Enjoy what you can, while you can.  It is hard to admit you are in the last quarter of the game, but you can still score.  Don't give up til it is over.  There was an old saying, " You are what you eat".  You could also say, " You are what you think".   Once you start thinking like an old goat, you will be one,  so try to avoid those thoughts.  Cars and bikes freeze up if you don't use them, unfortunately so do you.

Almost every day Kadizzle tells someone trying to squeeze that last penny out of the world to quit and enjoy life.  Kadizzle has seen too many people finally retire only to drop dead in a month or jump right into a cancer.  All the money in the world will not do you an ounce of good if  you are on oxygen.

One of the best things about being old is being able to say what you want.  You are old and you might be forgiven, or called crazy, but you no longer have to give a damn.  No one can fire you.  If you have been locked in your little business mind, unlock it and see the world in a new light.  Another blessing of retirement is meeting new people.  If you piss off old Willy and old Willy is not longer  your friend, find a new friend.

Getting old is a bad situation, but remember make the best of a bad situation.  Oh, what a cheerful subject to start the day, but such is life.  Remember no one ever escapes alive, now go out an have some fun before the final buzzer.

With the greatest of ease

Yesterday the cloth was hoisted, and the conglomeration of fiberglass, ropes, steel, and humanity began to move. The good ship Sovereign sailed for the first time in 2016.  What is magic about sailing?  A sailing craft moving through the water has no moving parts.  Everything on a sailboat can be perfectly still, yet the boat moves. It must be this magic that is so intriguing.  There is no noise from a sailboat except the water gurgling past the boat.  A sailboat moves like a spirit.  It needs no noise to make it go, it needs no power source.  A hand from the sky pushes the boat.  A sailboat cooperates with the universe and moves on it's own.  A sailboat saps the energy of the sun with no pollution. A sailboat only works if you cooperate with nature.  Nature will only allow a sailboat to move according to set rules that cannot be changed. You cannot change the wind, nor the direction of the wind, but you can make a sailboat go where you want to go if you cooperate.  A straight line is not always nature's way of getting you there.  A lesson exist here.  There is a reward for cooperating with nature.  The ride is far smoother than a power boat hammering against nature. The ride allows for talking and relaxing.  A sailboat is not a fast ride, but how many things that were slow did you savor in life. A good meal is better slowly eaten, a thought pondered is often better.  Slow is not always bad.  Slow is relaxing, slow is calming, so don't disrespect slow.  When your spirit is finally whisked away it will be the same wind that move the sailboat, it will not be a huge diesel.

How to poison a child's brain

Yesterday The Commander and Kadizzle encountered a couple of nice young boys.  It seemed strange they were not in school.  As God would have it they explained they were home schooled.  There is something special about home schooled kids. Right away you can tell they have been carefully protected from reality.  Kadizzle hates home schooling.  In some cases it may be necessary, but there are few.  Usually it is religious nuts protecting their children from the terrible world we live in.  Whenever we meet the poor kids subjected to this nonsense you can always tell they have been brainwashed with the special insanity of the fundamentalist.  What a tragedy.  These young people have been robbed of their brains, and the right to socialize with normal children.  The home school kids are usually very polite, and long for contact with normal adults, but you can tell they are simple minded.  They are taught a weird science that fits into the game of fundamentalism.  Normally kids gradually figure out there is no Santa Claus, and a lot of what adults do and say does not make a bit of sense, but the fundy kids grow up in a bubble.  It is just so sad to see children robbed of their right to think logically.

What I don't know

The electrons are flying through this computer.  Kadizzle is not sure how or why.  Gravity is pulling me down into this chair.  No one knows how or why.  Light is busting through the window at 186,000 miles per second. The sun comes up the moon encircles the Earth.  All these amazing things happen, and so much of it is a mystery.  As the song says, "Let the mystery be".   If you are ignorant that is fine.  If you don't know something admit it to yourself, admit it to the world.  Once you decide to make up an answer the game is on. Once you decide to invent Gods, elves, witches, and trolls, you are on your way to a world that surely does not exist.  The hardest thing for a human to admit is I don't know where I came from, and I don't know where I am going.

Of course you can make up some story about Jesus, Ala, Buddha, or whatever pleases you, but in the end, no matter how hard you try, you know, you don't know.  That is why you need a cigarette, a drink, or some buzz weed.  We are sitting on a tiny little speck in the universe. There are billions of us.  We are like dust in the cosmic scheme.  So be content as confused dust, don't make up stories and try to tell someone you have the answer you know damn well you don't.  Let the mystery be.

Life is Good

Kadizzle pried open his wallet and bought a third Sonos speaker. Now music, and whatever can be commanded to play anywhere in the house.  How far have we come from the ancient times when a big reel to reel tape recorder was the ultimate music device? From the phone Kadizzle can play Public Radio in the Bedroom while music flows from Spotify in the kitchen.  Life is good.  So many simple pleasures exist that leaving home is getting harder.  Soon it will be time to get cooked in the shower. Of course there will be music to accompany the hot water that will dissolve the night.

Most of us never appreciate how we live.  On a planetary basis we are probably in the top one tenth of one percent.  The rest of the planet can eat weeds, and use cow dung to cook, but we took it all and live the life of kings.  While some poor guy in Africa is trying to get one cow we are  collecting cars.  What kind of God set this mess up.  Of course it was a loving God that gives a guy in India two gallons of gas for a year and gives me two gallons of gas each week to cut my grass.  The guy in India feeds his grass to his cow, I throw mine in the creek.  Who cares, we are all good loving Christians, and we get to eat ninety percent of the pizza because god loves us.  God knows what is best.  It is best if those in other non Christian countries starve, that is only fair.  We do what we can to help the poor, but lord have mercy we have bills to pay to.  If those guys in India living on grain kernels think I can get my house cleaned for free they better keep thinking.  The guy just sprayed the yard, that cost money.  Does poor old Mr. Africa want me to get bitten by a bug and die?  Being rich has a lot of responsibility, because we have to decide what the poor get.  Sometimes we just get them a bomb, because they piss us off.  In our country anyone can be rich all you have to do is buy a lottery ticket.  If underdeveloped countries would just accept Jesus and put lottery ticket machines in the stores problem solved.  The biggest problem is these third world countries have failed at trickle down.  Just look at South America, they gave everything to the rich, and the trickle never came. They just did not do it right.  When we get The Donald in the White House we are going to have some serious trickling and you will have to work at being poor.

Kadizzled considering a penis transplant.

Who would have thunk it?  Last night on the national news the report came across the airwaves about the first successful penis transplant.  The next one may be when Trump enters the White House.  At any rate old Kadizzle put on his organ donor card that his penis is not available to anyone else when he dies. That is for their own protection. Yup, Kadizzle's long time friend has gone into retirement.  The poor fellow took the prostate surgery pretty hard.  The doctor did not make a big deal out of it, but in order to reconnect the magic pee tube he had to shorten Willy.  The consequences of having Willy shortened become apparent when you pee all over the place because now your fire hose does not work the way it used too.  Let me elaborate.  Gravity used to make sure Willy was correctly aimed under some circumstances.  Men will perhaps figure out what Kadizzle means.  Women, don't even try.

As if all this was not bad enough, Kadizzle has become acutely aware that Willy is addicted to testosterone.  Without the magic testosterone all Willy wants to do is pee, no more of the fun stuff.  Where did the testosterone go? Well, guess who else likes testosterone?  Those nasty little cancer cells that cause prostate cancer like testosterone.  So some genius doctor figured you could starve the cancer by cutting off the testosterone. Great plan, but Willy sure as hell wanted no part of it.  So now Willy who was once a proud citizen standing tall is a hopeless volunteer that just barely gets his job done of peeing successfully.

What do we do now?  Perhaps a penis transplant will solve the problem.  Now for a little good news.  Kadizzle is nearing the end of the testosterone famine.  Kadizzle has had his last shot of Lupron.  What in the hell is Lupron?  Lupron is a magic drug that suppressed the production of testosterone.  You know the boys who live right below Willy and make the testosterone?  Their little factory has been shut down. So they must be somewhere in the South of France.  Gradually if the doctors are telling the truth the factory will start up this fall, and Kadizzle will become a he man again.  Problem solved.  Well yes and no.  Maybe the boys will come back, and Willy will get "Randy" as the British say, but there is still the shorting problem.  This is where the transplant comes in.

Now how do you go about this.  When you sign up for the list do you get to choose size and color.  This could all lead to some interesting conversations.  Once the transplant is over Kadizzle can just imagine telling The Commander " Meet our new friend".   With Willy no longer in the picture the new guy will have to acquire a name.  To be politically correct Kadizzle will not mention some of the names one might choose if the new guy is from a different ethnic group, but use your imagination, and you are bound to laugh.

Kadizzle will sure hate to see Willy go, because we had so many adventures together.  It wasn't Willy's fault the cancer came.  Willy could get carried away, but he never got us any disease or for that matter any children Kadizzle did not plan for.  Of course Willy was not perfect, but who is?  Willy had his faults, he would distract Kadizzle too many times.  Willy was a schemer, but his intentions were good.  Thankya Jesus he cannot read, or he would be pissed off right now.  All of this is making Kadizzle sentimental, and having second thoughts about giving Willy another chance.  OK, Willy we have gone through a lot together, we're going to stick it out to the end.

Sink, swim, or fix it.

Yesterday was the big day. Kadizzle launched The Sovereign, not without a few problems.  As the ship chugged away from the trailer something seemed amiss.  Looking below water was filling the ship. Not that much really, but it seemed Kadizzle had forgotten to reconnect the intake hose to the engine water.  Quickly Kadizzle shoved the hose into position and the problem was solved.  Now, off to launch a few more ships for friends.

As Kadizzle was parking the last of the trailers, The Commander called on the phone in full panic mode, again the ship was taking on water.  According to The Commander it was a dire situation.  Water was almost up to the floorboards.  A good rinse early in the season always gets the dust out, and move the dirt from the hard to reach places.  Well this time it was essentially a different version of the same problem.  The line to the wash down pump was not connected.  This managed to put about fifty gallons in the hold.  No big problem, but The Commanders reaction made it seem like the Titanic was going down.  This time it was just a matter of shutting the sea cock and making some minor repairs.  There was one good outcome from all the simple mindedness.  The manual sump pump got a good work out.  It turns out the manual sump pump needs some attention. Of course this is not to mention the electric sump pump did not work.  The moral of the story is to do your sinking close to the dock.  Today we will return to the boat.  If it is still above water it will be a victory.  If there is just a mast sticking out of the water at the slip, we must have missed something else.

Dashed Hopes

Our trip to Bismarck to see Bernie was refreshing. Knowing there are still live embers in the fire that can keep democracy alive brings hope.  Knowing there are young people that care brings reassurance.  Sadly we have to look at the other side.  People live in fear. So many people are afraid to come out and do something or anything different. We live in a society where people conform.  People learn at an early age it is best just to be like everyone else.   Don't draw attention to yourself.  Try to figure out what everyone around you thinks is right and follow their lead.

This is exactly what got Germany and Japan bombed into ashes.  No one wanted to speak up, no one wanted to be different.  Yesterday it was Hitler bolstering lies and false hope, today it is Rush Limbaugh, Fox News, and Donald Trump.  Do we ever learn anything?

The best trick is diversion, for Hitler it was the Jews.  Today the Republican mindset has everyone believing it is the poor, the welfare cheats, and the worthless people on the bottom that are driving the country into the ground.  This is a master diversion.  How is that old guy at McDonalds destroying our country by serving you a hamburger? How is that single mother on foodstamps pushing a baby cutting into your gold supply?

If you are looking for who stole your pizza, look for a fat guy.  That is a simple rule of reality.  Where did the money end up.  Today Kadizzle ran across an interesting piece of data.  The bonuses paid to the people on Wall Street amounted to 29 billion dollars. All the wages paid to low income people were only 14 billion.  Now, who is taking your cheese? How many thieves do you think are on Wall Street?  How many people do you think are working for minimum wage or less?  When you pay attention you see how the circus really works.

Kadizzle needs a Colonoscopy. This is an inspiration

I called my friend Andy Sable, a gastroenterologist, to make an appointment for a colonoscopy.

  

A few days later, in his office, Andy showed me a color diagram of the colon, a lengthy organ that appears to go all over the place, at one point passing briefly through Minneapolis.

  

Then Andy explained the colonoscopy procedure to me in a thorough, reassuring and patient manner.

  

I nodded thoughtfully, but I didn't really hear anything he said, because my brain was shrieking, 'HE'S GOING TO STICK A TUBE 17,000 FEET UP YOUR BEHIND!'

  

I left Andy's office with some written instructions, and a prescription for a product called 'MoviPrep,' which comes in a box large enough to hold a microwave oven. I will discuss MoviPrep in detail later; for now suffice it to say that we must never allow it to fall into the hands of America 's enemies.

  

I spent the next several days productively sitting around being nervous.

  

Then, on the day before my colonoscopy, I began my preparation. In accordance with my instructions, I didn't eat any solid food that day; all I had was chicken broth, which is basically water, only with less flavor.

  

Then, in the evening, I took the MoviPrep. You mix two packets of powder together in a one-litre plastic jug, then you fill it with lukewarm water. (For those unfamiliar with the metric system, a litre is about 32 gallons). Then you have to drink the whole jug. This takes about an hour, because MoviPrep tastes - and here I am being kind - like a mixture of goat spit and urinal cleanser, with just a hint of lemon.

  

The instructions for MoviPrep, clearly written by somebody with a great sense of humor, state that after you drink it, 'a loose, watery bowel movement may result.'

  

This is kind of like saying that after you jump off your roof, you may experience contact with the ground.

  

MoviPrep is a nuclear laxative. I don't want to be too graphic, here, but, have you ever seen a space-shuttle launch? This is pretty much the MoviPrep experience, with you as the shuttle. There are times when you wish the commode had a seat belt. You spend several hours pretty much confined to the bathroom, spurting violently.  You eliminate everything. And then, when you figure you must be totally empty, you have to drink another litre of MoviPrep, at which point, as far as I can tell, your bowels travel into the future and start eliminating food that you have not even eaten yet.

  

After an action-packed evening, I finally got to sleep.

  

The next morning my wife drove me to the clinic. I was very nervous. Not only was I worried about the procedure, but I had been experiencing occasional return bouts of MoviPrep spurtage. I was thinking, 'What if I spurt on Andy?’ How do you apologize to a friend for something like that? Flowers would not be enough.

  

At the clinic I had to sign many forms acknowledging that I understood and totally agreed with whatever the heck the forms said. Then they led me to a room full of other colonoscopy people, where I went inside a little curtained space and took off my clothes and put on one of those hospital garments designed by sadist perverts, the kind that, when you put it on, makes you feel even more naked than when you are actually naked.

  

Then a nurse named Eddie put a little needle in a vein in my left hand. Ordinarily I would have fainted, but Eddie was very good, and I was already lying down. Eddie also told me that some people put vodka in their MoviPrep.

  

  

At first I was ticked off that I hadn't thought of this, but then I pondered what would happen if you got yourself too tipsy to make it to the bathroom, so you were staggering around in full Fire Hose Mode. You would have no choice but to burn your house.

  

When everything was ready, Eddie wheeled me into the procedure room, where Andy was waiting with a nurse and an anesthesiologist. I did not see the 17,000-foot tube, but I knew Andy had it hidden around there somewhere. I was seriously nervous at this point.

  

Andy had me roll over on my left side, and the anesthesiologist began hooking something up to the needle in my hand.

  

There was music playing in the room, and I realized that the song was 'Dancing Queen' by ABBA. I remarked to Andy that, of all the songs that could be playing during this particular procedure, 'Dancing Queen' had to be the least appropriate.

  

'You want me to turn it up?' said Andy, from somewhere behind me...

  

'Ha ha,' I said. And then it was time, the moment I had been dreading for more than a decade. If you are squeamish, prepare yourself, because I am going to tell you, in explicit detail, exactly what it was like.

  

I have no idea. Really. I slept through it. One moment, ABBA was yelling 'Dancing Queen, feel the beat of the tambourine,' and the next moment, I was back in the other room, waking up in a very mellow mood.

  

Andy was looking down at me and asking me how I felt. I felt excellent. I felt even more excellent when Andy told me that It was all over, and that my colon had passed with flying colors. I have never been prouder of an internal organ.

  

  

On the subject of Colonoscopies...

  

Colonoscopies are no joke, but these comments during the exam were quite humorous. A physician claimed that the following are actual comments made by his patients (predominately male) while he was performing their colonoscopies:

  

1. Take it easy Doc. You’re boldly going where no man has gone before.

&nb sp; 

2. 'Find Amelia Earhart yet?'

  

3. 'Can you hear me NOW?'

  

4. 'Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we there yet?'

  

5 'You know, in Arkansas, we're now legally married.'

  

6. 'Any sign of the trapped miners, Chief?'

  

7. 'You put your left hand in, you take your left hand out...'

  

8. 'Hey! Now I know how a Muppet feels!'

  

9. 'If your hand doesn't fit, you must quit!'

  

10. 'Hey Doc, let me know if you find my dignity.'

  

11. 'You used to be an executive at Enron, didn't you?'

  

12. 'God, now I know why I am not gay'

  

And the best

Once Upon a Time

Once upon a time in a galaxy far away, in fact on a different planet in Southern West Virginia, Kadizzle had a conversation with a hillbilly. The hillbilly said to Kadizzle " You are a free thinker".  Kadizzle responded, " What is that?".   The mountain man said " Well, you just think whatever you want".   At that magic moment the clouds lifted and Kadizzle realized there are people who do not think "Whatever they want".   Why would anyone restrain their thoughts?  Of course one must not let every thought turn into an action, otherwise the streets would be full of dead people.

But just imagine real people who restrain themselves from thinking.  Yup, they are all around us.  The Earth is populated with people who deliberately idle their brains.  People put wall inside their heads, and live in those walls.  One favorite saying Kadizzle has always loved is " There are none so blind as those who will not see".  Minds in prison create Fox News, Hitler, and the Republican Party.  So get your mind out of jail and trying thinking about something different.   Think about how you have been fooled. Think about how you have been mislead.  Think about how good most people are.  Think about your right to enjoy life.  Think something you do not normally think. It will be fun.

The Hisorty of Ignorance

For God knows how long we have been entitled to free programs from Amazon. Last night Old Kaddizzle decided to give it a try.  The first program he watched was The Wolf of Wall Street.  It turned out to be very amusing. Would recommend it.  However, there is plenty of everything good Christians should not see or hear.

Since we are on Christianity, let's get to it.  The Wolf of Wall Street is about how a young guy goes nuts bilking stupid people and makes a fortune in the process. The oldest and most original way to bilk people was religion.  To get people to just simply give you something all you have to do is play on their greed, their fear, or scare them.  Now the door is open. Promise them heaven, and of course there is a ten percent carrying fee.  Tell them to buy a special stock, and of course there is a fee. Of course you can scare them and sell them guns and ammunition. Now, if you are a politician, you can do all the above.  Tell them you love Jesus, just like they do, scare them that the Mexicans are coming to rape them, and be sure to tell them they get to keep their guns.  It works every time.  Donald Trump has made stupidity and ignorance popular and acceptable.  When everyone goes to church to get robbed, why shouldn't you?  When everyone has a gun, why not me?

You cannot get rich working, unless your work is taking money from the gullible. No one has a better racket than the stump preachers.  The product you sell cost nothing.  You sell hope to the simple minded. You charge dearly.  Of course you can sell some vitamins with sawdust mixed in, or maybe a heater that will heat your house for next to nothing.  Take the heater apart and it is just an infrared light bulb.  Now, walk around and see how many people freely admit they are idiots waiting to harvested.  In their yard you will find a Trump sign, on their truck will be the NRA sticker,  and now you know who you can scare and sell a basket of hope. 

Society has been divided into the have's and the have not's.  The have's robbed the have nots. Not too much to it.  It all started when one guy said "I can talk to God, but you cannot".  So if you want me to put a word in to god for you give me ten bucks.  The game was on.  Now the dingers wander over to the gas station and plunk down ten bucks to buy this weeks lottery ticket.  Give me ten dollars worth of hope.  I know it will work.

Kadizzle experimenting with a sex change.

Prostate cancer has many interesting aspects.  First, it does not like men.  That is pretty sexist in and of itself. What cancer likes the most is testosterone.  Keeping prostate cancer in check means depriving it of that magic substance that builds muscle, and drives men to do stupid things.  Once you inject Lupron into Kadizzle it stops the production of testosterone.  That means Kadizzle gets to have hot flashes.  Normally we think of women having hot flashes and don't give a damn, but it all changes when your own body periodically catches fire.  Yup, you throw off the sheets, and keep changing from warm cloths to cool. The first taste of menopause makes you think of MEN o pause.  Menopause for men has been created to give Kadizzle respect for women.  Besides the hot flashes you get some bonus fatigue, and a little weight gain.  So now the maybe good news.  Kadizzle has had his last shot of Lupron which should wear off by September.  Gradually Kadizzle could become a he man again.  There is a catch, called getting old.  Once you burn up two years with no testosterone you get back in the saddle to see old age has also taken it's toll.  No matter how you slice it getting old is a bitch.  Incidentally, the Lupron can make you into a bit of a bitch.  There is some extra grumpy that comes with the shots.  As you get old try to fall apart gracefully.

Launch Fever

After yesterday the cushions are on the ship, the paint is on the hull, and only the sails need to be installed. Perhaps too many summers have been tied up sailing, but we are about to launch on another. The sun needs to melt some snow in Montana and push the lake up in North Dakota a little.  People are beginning to show up at the boat yard, cleaning, and polishing, all signs of spring.

Cory our resident millwright helped polish yesterday and is looking forward to a trip on the good ship. Fair winds and warm weather cannot be that far away.  Spring has sprung in the North and the trees are popping. The Commander has most of her garden in and the promise of fresh vegetables is there.  For mother's day The Commander got a new self propelled mower. She will love it.

Kadizzle thinks of the guy north of town who farms when he thinks of The Commander and the way we work here.  The farmer has a reputations. The locals say " He will never take on a job, his wife can't handle".  That is the way we handle the yard work here.  The Commander has disqualified Kadizzle from running the push mower.  Kadizzle just does not have the expertise.  There  is some question if Kadizzle is qualified on the riding mower.  This could ultimately mean Kadizzle is not qualified to cut the grass at all. The only thing for sure is Kadizzle is qualified to empty the grass clippings, and haul the crap to the dump.

A monkey for a pet

There was a time in Kadizzle's life when he thought a monkey might be a wonderful pet.  However, Kadizzle got older and realized no one would want a monkey in their house.  Now, we have a man, Donald Trump who will be a monkey if he gets in the White House.  The people who put him there have never fully thought about what a monkey can do, and what it will do in your house.  A monkey is clever, and fun to watch, but if you think you can control a monkey, think some more.  The cute monkey with the funny hair makes a great TV show, but when the monkey can launch missiles everything changes.

What is it you do?

The sun is just about up. Kadizzle got up early, 5:30.  In our basement two men reside.  They are millwrights. Millwrights repair the turbines that make your electricity.  They got up at six and headed out to the power plant where Kadizzle used to work.   They will not be home until six.  Someone has to do the work. Who knows what they get paid, but Kadizzle knows the CEO gets 350 times more.  Now Kadizzle knows what millwrights do he used to work at the power plant, but what in the hell does a CEO do that makes him worth 350 times more?  Does the CEO wear dirty clothes?  Does he shit in a porta john?  Does he pack his lunch? Does he drive from New York to North Dakota to sleep in my basement and leave his family?

We live in sad society where we disrespect working people.  Working people are what builds the highways, the skyscrapers, and the cars, yet they are treated like disposable slaves.  The rich fight giving them health care.  The rich fight a minimum wage.  Imagine that a CEO making 350 times what a millwright gets and refusing to pay someone a decent minimum wage.  A CEO gets fired he walks away with 20 million.  A millwright gets fired he walks away with his lunch bucket.  We worship scoundrels.  The guy who runs Coke makes millions,  the rats who run Blue Cross get millions, but the guy who really does the work can retire broke, who cares.  Are the CEO's really such brilliant people?  The data does not show it.  So many of their companies produce no better return than if you put your money in a sock.  In almost every state the highest paid government person is the football coach at the University.   What if the game is canceled how will that affect your life?   Now try getting up and starting your day with no electricity.  That electricity is there because a whole lot of working people got up and made it happen.  They dug the ditches, mined the coal, and turned the bolts.  The CEO does not work night shift, does not get dirty, and has no respect for the people who really work.  His job is to pay them the least he can, and deprive them of every possible benefit before he ships their job to China.

A Good Meeting at the Crazy Club

The day started with the sun shining and Kadizzle hopped on his steed and headed for the Crazy Club.. Low, and behold Chuck was already there having coffee, and Shiny was up and wide awake.  It did not take long before the crazies were sitting on the veranda shooting insane ideas into the sky.  Technically Chuck should not be allowed because of his hard core Republican blood, but he did qualify because his bolts are as loose as needed to be in the Crazy Club.  So there we sat firing words back and forth about the victory of Trump.  What will Chuck do?  The poor Republicans have been put in the position of supporting a person for president who could be in our Crazy Club.  Of course Kadizzle was shooting up Chuck and his weaving on politics to accommodate Trump.  Shiny was just sitting back enjoying the fireworks.

Somehow the conversation turned to doers of good deeds, and Colonel Klink came to mind.  Klink is a member of the club.  He probably does not know it.  Any man in Hazen with his own shrine to an elephant and his own tree house with running water is automatically a member.  This gets old Kadizzle around to Bill.  Bill is not a member. Bill is dangerous. Bill is certainly crazy enough.  Bill has threatened to cut Kadizzle's head off and use it for a urinal.  Now this is fine, but Bill might actually do it.  The Crazy club has a strict non-violence rule.

As the weather gets warmer the Alley Cats should be starting to roam.  The Alley Cats are a separate organization that roams up and down the Alley on their way to the post office or somewhere else.

Now there is some competition for the Crazy Club.  Rita runs her sewing shop, and she has some prize crazies.  Dave is as nutty as one might want to be and he is a safe and good crazy, but Rita has been cursed with Bill as a member of her collection of mental institution escapees.

Back to Klink, Klink is a saint among the crazy.  Klink has taken in the destitute crazies and given them places on his vast land holdings to live and do their work.  A few crazies drop in the art shop on the sly.  These are the secret artistic crazies.  They don't participate in the regular meetings, but the do create good art.  The art if they are lucky gets sold at the Crazy Club.  The Crazy Club meets almost every day at the Brooks house in Hazen.   Usually it is around coffee time.

If you think you are not quite right you might be eligible.  To join you have to be mentally flexible.  You have to accept people as interesting independent beings who have the right to be different.  You have to be nice most of the time and truly like all the other crazies.  If you do not like every crazy in the club you may be asked to join a more hateful crazy club like the NRA.

Who is robbing you?

Who is robbing you? Seems pretty basic, and pretty simple, but Americans just cannot comprehend.  If someone took your wallet, they would have your wallet.  Well, our good friends the Republicans have convinced everyone the poor are robbing us, but there is one major problem, the poor are poor. If they robbed us they should be doing well, right?  Republicans would have you believe that the country is busted because the poor are getting free cheese, and cell phones.  If you look closely you will see that 400 families have as much as everyone else combined.  So do you still think it is the guys with the cheese, and the supposed free cell phones that took everything?  It defies common sense, but it works for those seeking tax cuts for the rich. Once trickle down kicks in we will all be rich.  So lets concentrate on the welfare cheats, and forget about the tax cheats.  Who took the cake? Is it the guy with the icing on his lips? Hell no, according to the Republicans, it is the guy with the crumbs.

Promise of a Better day by Tony Fortado

Waking up is not always easy.  Sometimes you wake up like you just finished a marathon.  The sleep wears you out.  Too lazy to get out of bed you can reach for the computer and get up to date right there with the pillow under your head.  When the gravity finally lifts so you can rise you stagger to the kitchen and pray the coffee will restore life to your body.  Winky a.k. a.  The Commander is up full of vinegar and she wants the garbage out.  Shouting commands The Commander cannot get Kadizzle motivated to go into the shocking environment of the outside world. Winky takes the garbage out.  There is big excitement the new rain barrell is up and running.  Sadly the lord will not provide enough rain to fill it.

Now the inspiration to go on. The magic new Sonos speakers are playing and a song comes on the Folk channel by Tony Fortado. The song title is Promise for a better day.  The song is a masterpiece, and here we go we are going to try to have that better day.  So here we sit gettin up to date.  The Commander is blasting money out of our wallet into Amazon's  kingdom.  Stuff will appear on our doorstep, and life will go on. Wink says the UPS man must think we are nuts, but we are Americans, and Americans push buttons and the rest of the world sends us trainloads of junk to haul to the dump.  Children sniff glue in India and sleep by the railroad tracks, and most of the world lives on two dollars a day, but we just click, click, click and oil for our bike chain comes to the door.  Jesus loves us and if those heathens would just accept Jesus the UPS man would bring them stuff too.