Now it's been something seeing you again
Kadizzle enjoys being cheap, and frugal. One thing Kadizzle has always enjoyed is finding things people are throwing out and fixing them. Too many times the fix is so easy. A good way to start is just take the cover off the damn thing. Often you will find a screw has come loose or a little something is shorting out a circuit.
Kadizzle dreamed of a large hydrualic jack he could move boulders with. Yesterday at Dave the sign guy's messy picnic table Kadizzle saw a twelve ton jack. Kadizzle asked Dave what he would sell it for. Dave said it was broken and Kadizzle could have it. Hydraulic jacks are easy to fix. Almost always they just need some fluid. Sure enough after filling the jack, it worked fine. A new jack would be from $50 to $150 dollars.
Living in a neighborhood where new houses are being built makes us aware of the incredible waste. A lot of good lumber is wasted in the process of building a home, along with tile, roofing, and you name it.
We live in an incredibly wasteful society. On PBS last night there was a heartbreaking segment about the suffering people in Afghanistan. Kadizzle could hardly watch, and you could tell the host Judy Woodruff was about to cry. Young starving children, and babies dying. Meanwhile billionaires take rocket rides to space. That is the free market a good Republican will tell you.
Yesterday was the first day of trail work in awhile. Kadizzle spent a couple hours making the trail safer along a cliff edge. Care had to be taken that Kadizzle did not fall off the cliff while moving the trail away from the cliff.
With so much space at the new home and so little space in the Earth Module the two worlds are entirely different. Our friends Jeff and Barb are visiting and they invested in a camper called a Cricket. It is about a third the size of the Earth Module. The Cricket is designed to get into more rugged spots. However, they made a critical mistake. They are pulling it with a car, which cannot negotiate bad roads. The Cricket is a minimalist set up. The don't have a shower, and the toilet facilities are problematic. They spend a lot of the summer in a very cramped trimaran, so they are used to small spaces.
Two worlds are very different. Climate at the stationary house is about two or three thousand feet higher than the climate at the Earth Module. Climate makes a world of difference. Down here by the lake there are desert plants like saguaro cactus, all kind of thorny plants, and lots of sandy soil. Up on the mountain it is cedar, and no thorns. The nice thing is the ability to drive thirty miles and be on another planet.
Kadizzle needs to rant, so here goes. It is downright scary the number of Hoopleheads wandering around with Trump Nazi insignia. Living among Trump supporters in huge numbers makes one realize what it would be like to be a black person living in a white neighborhood. Irrational people are neck deep around here. Most disturbing are the pickup truck brain dead. These imbeciles drive a huge pickup around flying a large Trump flag and some other flag with another symbol of their stupidity. Seeing these people take so much pride in their evil and stupidity does not bode well. In Arizona the more ridiculous you are the better your chance of winning a Republican nomination.
Who are the Niggifiddles ? The Niggifiddles like order, it makes them feel more comfortable. Kadizzle is not a Niggifiddle. The reality of the Universe is there is no order. The Universe works on randomness. It would be nice if flowers just grew in a row, but they don't. It would be nice if the planets were arranged in size from smallest to largest, but it did not work out that way. Once you grasp that the amount of orderliness is limited in the universe you will be happier. You can spend your whole life lining up rocks or folding clothes, but in the end nature will prevail and things will go back to chaos. Now Kadizzle is not against orderliness, or cleanliness, but it can get out of control. When it does they call it OCD. Obsessive, compulsive, disorder. How much order do you need? Let's talk about facing. What in the hell is facing? At the grocery store you might notice someone has made sure everything on the shelf is in line with the front of the shelf. That means someone or several someones are going through the store lining up the soup cans, the cereal boxes and making sure the apples are stacked right. It must work, all the stores do it. Why? People must buy more and feel better when things are lined up. Does it really change anything? It does give the appearance of abundance. There seems to be plenty of everything, but that is not the reality. If there is nothing behind the front row, then it is an illusion that there are plenty of fiddily diddles. Order gives the feeling of comfort. If the fire engine is polished and bright is must be in good condition, but it could be out of gas. The challenge in life is deciding what is important, and what is not. If you want to be happy don't ever think you can impose order on the universe. The universe will obey the laws of gravity, and enforce the speed of light, but it will not line up the planets, or fold your clothes.
We needed internet service, and somebody had to provide. In Payson, Arizona the internet providers are confusing, and there is no cable internet where we live. The internet man came, and he is a hard working fellow who owns the company. He seems to be competent in electronics. Somehow as usual Kadizzle got into politics and other matters with him. No the scary part. Too many times you meet someone and thing they are on the same planet you are, then you find out wow, you were wrong. The number of strange crazies wandering around is astonishing. Back to internet man. Somehow at the end of the day after struggling to get our internet working internet man and Kadizzle struck up a conversation. Kadizzle gave him the IQ test. Did you vote for Trump? Yes was the answer. Kadizzle thought the guy was smarter than that. Next Kadizzle asked what he thought about climate change. This is were the fog set in. Internet man said climate change was because of another solar system that is going to collide with ours. Planet X revolves around two suns, most solar systems have two suns according to internet man. How many people are wandering around believing Trump lies, planet x nonsense, and so on. Well you got the Mormans a group of insane people believing a story a con man cooked up. Then of course you have the Trump Cult. They are thick here. It is downright scary to know you are living among people capable of believing the most insane things. The wallygonkles are all over the place.
Wall building has been a big deal for Republicans, but now Kadizzle has entered the fray. With the new home landscaping is one more money drain. Yesterday Kadizzle handed the stone wall builders a large handful of hundred dollar bills. Although most of their work was good Kadizzle was disappointed in some of it so he set out to do some stone stacking himself. Maybe Kadizzle was delusional, but he concluded his stonework was as good as the professionals, maybe even better. Placing stones to make a wall is very much like a jigsaw puzzle. Stones are scattered all over the place in this area. You look at a place where a certain shape stone is needed then you go out and try to find a stone of that shape. Like so many things once you get involved you begin to appreciate the talent of others. As Kadizzle worked he had more and more admiration for the native Americans that did excellent stone work building their dwellings.
Hard work is something foreign to most Americans. Kadizzle only had faint memories of working hard, but yesterday his mind was refreshed. A crew of three showed up to build a stone wall in the backyard. Moving large stones and gravel is real work. Kadizzle shoveled, and then shoveled, and then shoveled some more. Ryan the six foot six skinny string bean hauled with the wheelbarrow. Together we moved about 12 tons of gravel about forty feet to the new patio area taking shape at the mountain home. John is not a hefty guy, but he stacked the rocks for the wall. Kelly is big and claims he can lift 800 pounds. Never saw it happen, but he is good on the big rocks. We wandered into the forest next door and brought rocks back for the wall with the wheelbarrow, and the hand truck. If all goes well today they will show up with a skid steer and we can move the gravel with equipment.
As we busted our buns it hit Kadizzle that a lot of city kids never really work in their entire life. That means real work on the end of a shovel or carrying loads of hay, brick, or stone. For too many kids things just magically come to them. The cell phone and computer just show up one day. Most of the modern life of children is about playing sports not bailing hay. Kadizzle is fat and lazy now, but there was a time he hauled timbers 700 feet underground where you could not stand up. Kadizzle lifted and dragged a lot of hay bales in the heat of West Virginia. It has been a long time since Kadizzle shovel the spilled coal at the tailpiece in the coal mine, but Kadizzle remembers work. Work is something Kadizzle learned early to stay away from.
Kadizzle is cheap. He finds no shame in that, but it make the old miser scared to see the money shoot out the window. Nothing will shoot money out the window like building a new home. One brilliant thing the Kadizzles did when they left Hazen was sell everything. Of course we never thought about how we would have to buy it back. Almost all our furniture was sold or given away. That means we have to buy beds, something to sit on, and you name it. We saved a lot of little things that filled a twenty foot trailer. Where is the kafrumple, or the kiddlesnichel? That is the problem when you move. Some magic way things disappear when you move.
One thing we paid dearly for was the view. Kadizzle always wanted to live up in the air on a hill. Finally in the last quarter of life Kadizzle gets to sit on top of the mountain and look down on the world. Payson is a giant bowl in the mountains. The mountains to the North are called the rim, because they are part of the rim that surrounds Phoenix. At this very moment the sun is coming up over the mountains. It is always a great site.
The Kadizzles went from a small town to a larger small town. The Hooplehead infestation is more prominent here. The gun culture, the goofy truck culture, and the income disparity culture are all more obvious. Payson Arizona is a strange mix. When you drive around you discover just how many people are living on the edge. People say the meth problem is real here. Since a major north south route goes right through the middle of town no doubt the meth wagons stop here to fill the kids with joy.
Generally everyone seems friendly, but at every grocery store intersection, and Walmart there are the beggars. Hazen, North Dakota never had one beggar. They should hire a couple just to spice it up. Payson has a unique group of dolts that are at the major intersection. They pace around with signs that say " Honk for Jesus". Apparently Jesus loves a good car horn. Maybe Jesus likes those silly loud trucks to. There are a lot of Jesus nest around here, and strangely they are also Trump nest. God so loved the Earth that he gave us Trump.
An amazing thing about Payson, Arizona is there is nothing to support the economy but retired people who try to trickle on the poor people. People move to Payson to escape the heat of Phoenix. There is a housing boom here. The housing boom is making it hard for the beggars to pay the rent. One sign of the economy here is the number of thrift stores where the slummers pick through the stuff the rich throw away. All the thrift stores are well stocked with clothing. Everyone seems to be seeking a bargain. The prices for slum supplies seem high.
One thing that has always caught the eye of Kadizzle in the southwest is the desire for a fence. Everyone thinks they have something worth stealing. A yard full of junk is fenced off so you cannot steal my junk and make it your junk. Nothing says kingdom like a wall or a fence. That is why Trump people love a good wall. A wall means you have something worth stealing. One of the strangest things in America is the idea that you are rich. Everyone is rich. Even the poorest person with a car is rich and the government or Antifa is out to steal your money. The government is an evil entity that has no goal but to make you do things and steal what you worked so hard to steal from someone else.
Winky is down at Lake Roosevelt doing some volunteer work for the Forest Service. At our new home Kadizzle is alone cooking for himself, actually burning to death some hamburgers in our new toater oven. Kadizzle got caught up in a BS storm with the guys putting in the wi-fi. It was a political discussion. That gets to the point. Yesterday Kadizzle ran into four Hoopleheads. These Hoopleheads always make the same statement, in fact the guy putting in the wi-fi made the statement " Trump did some good things". When you ask these people what the good things are they are stunned. After you talk to a Hooplehead for a little bit you realize they are all getting their narrative from the same source. It must be right wing media. The one thing all of them end up saying in their narrative is " If Trump would just shut up he would be fine, his mouth gets him in trouble". Kadizzle has heard the exact phrase come from at least ten Hoopleheads in the last month. They all say exactly the same thing. Think about it. Could you imagine claiming someone is smart, but their speech makes them appear stupid?The Hoopleheads are in a cult. Kadizzle is frieghtened by this cult. Cults out of control kill people. Kill themselves and do a lot of damage. The Trump cult is strong in Arizona. In fact it is probably worse than North Dakota. Reality means nothing to these people, they don't hesitate to invent their own facts, science, or whatever it takes. 20% of the people we meet seem normal and capable of experiencing reality, 80% are lost in the wilderness. If you think Kevin Cramer, Kelly Armstrong, and John Hoeven are worthless lickspittles, you ain't seen notton like the Gosar. Senator Gosar was neck deep in supporting the January 6th insurrection. Gosar is openly mentally ill, and the Hoopleheads love it.
Kadizzle has taken on the task of building a rock wall in the back of our home. The process gives Kadizzle a lot of respect for every stone structure he sees. Moving large rocks by hand with ancient equipment is a daunting task. To build a wall one must first gather the rocks. Harvesting 2 and 3 hundred pound rocks is not like picking tomatoes. If the old man can get four rocks a day it is a victory. Kadizzle is using a hand truck and brute strength with a few levers, and picks thrown in. The landscape here is covered with stones. To make a wall the stones ideally have to be flat on both sides. All the flat rocks did not grow right by the house so many of them have to be moved fifty or a hundred yards. Moving rocks does provide some exercise. Now think on the scale of the pyramids. To the mix Kadizzle added another element. He went to the Home Despot and bought a chisel to shape some of the stone. Again this is not do da. The next time you go by a huge stone building from way back when think about the work that went into it.
As a side note every rock is not small. One extremely large rock took Kadizzle two days just to flip over and move about three feet. It was a puzzle and took a hydraulic jack and a lot of lumber. A rock that size you move inches at a time. One thing Kadizzle learned in the rock game is the power of a lever. Before cranes and modern equipment levers were the workers. It is amazing that you can take a seven foot strong piece of wood and move a large rock with ease.
This morning Kadizzle read an excellent article in the New York Times " Why Republicans keep falling for Trump's lies". The author did a great job of explaining how the mind of a Republican works.
Work is something most people don't do. However, living in the midst of construction Kadizzle sees people actually working. Who are these people. They all seem to be nice people that got stuck in the system that exploits them. Of course you can say they just did not pay attention in school and that is why they are in this mess. Wait, what about the teenager Kadizzle saw yesterday. He probably should have been in school, but it was obvious he was the son of an immigrant or and immigrant himself. Kadizzle was kind of dumbfounded to see the kid carrying two large cinder blocks. Our prosperity is based on exploitation. If someone wants to eat without stealing or selling drugs then there is a good chance they will have to work hard. The guy who put the stone on our house struggles to understand English. He works hard and skips lunch. On the other hand the Waltons wake up with Jeff Bezos and wonder how they will protect and spend billion they made selling stuffed animals to the workers building the country. We have not progressed an inch from building pyramids. Imagine the people struggling to get by piling up rocks. Is it really that different from people struggling to get by piling up cinder blocks.
The blindness of the rich to the poor is incredible. How dare that person serving me food ask for a decent wage? Slave encampments. Last night Kadizzle watched a video on the economics of ski resorts. The workers cannot afford to live in Aspen, and Vail. Let them get on a bus and go to the nearest trailer park miles away. Don't pay them, but put in the best bus system in Colorado to move the slaves around. Now suppose you need a CEO to manage ripping off the poor. No problem paying that guy $8,000 dollars per hour. That CEO is paid according to what he can squeeze from the immigrants, the high school dropouts, and those that failed to inherit a good start.
Well anyway the sun just came up and time to go out and try working in the yard. A lot of big stones need to be moved to build my pyramid. Where are those exploitables when we need them?
https://photos.google.com/photo/AF1QipN-4o4LG3wTTTy4KYF1NnGP4DIMRAYXvNp3uExg
If everything works you can click on the link above and see Winky riding the road. Yesterday the supreme commander and Kadizzle hopped on the ebikes to explore our new neighborhood. We discovered some very nice homes nearby tucked into the mountainside. Then we saw an indistinct dirt road. Yup, it was a Forest Service road leading into oblivion. Winky did not want to go for fear of mudd, but soon she followed Kadizzle into the wilderness. This road was why we moved here. Payson is surrounded by National Forest. That means endless trails and exploration. Back in Hazen on the prairie you could see everything a day before you got to it because of the flatness. Mountains have continuous surprises. Every twist, turn, up, down, and around has a new view. On the prairie it is just the same view, closer or farther away. Kadizzle has always been amazed at how forest scare prairie people. Kadizzle grew up in the hills of West Virginia, and adapted to the prairie. Both have their virtues. Being in tune with the land can take place in any part of the planet. So on we pedaled the ebikes, not knowing really where we were going. Consulting the map on the phone is seemed we would end up on a paved road that would take us home. The good news is there is a lot of exploring to do on foot, on the ebike, and on the motorcycle.
Somewhere the sun is struggling to come up, but as our eyes opened the huge window in the bedroom displayed nothing but stars. This portends a nice day. If the wind does not blow sitting in the sun will be the first pleasure. Last night the Winkle and Kadizzle watched a young mountain climber on his exploits. What he was capable of indeed was incredible. What was inevitable was his death. After conquering some of the most difficult mountains in the world with no equipment the odds finally cashed him in. As a professional safety guy Kadizzle used to tell his students " If you do something dangerous, long enough, the odds will get you". It rarely fails, Las Vegas gets your money.
The New York Times has a great editorial about the ongoing Trump insurrection. How can you tell so many people what is happening, yet the simple minded are destroying our democracy?
After a wonderful meal with the trail crew at our new home Kadizzle retired to bed on New Year's Eve. Fire belly struck with a vengeance. Five Tums would not put out the flames. Is that an indication of what 2022 will be? Kadizzle has a gut feeling some economic turmoil is coming. No one works anymore, and we will not let the immigrants come in to do the work. How does that work? The Payson paper says there is a shortage of slave shack in Payson. It cost to much to live close the rich you wait on, check groceries for, and take care of the yard. This was always the case at Vail, and Aspen. They had a separate town for the poor people. Sedona is like that, the poor come up from Cottonwood to clean the toilet. Just seems strange that people don't seem to want to work for substandard wages anymore. What is a CEO to do? Maybe the head of Walmart who makes $8,000 per hour could cut back a little, or Ellan Musk could pay a living wage. Getting by on 208 billion is just not that easy, so we must coddle these guys or they will not invent anything new for us. It used to be Thomas Edison would invent things at bargain rates, but now if you want an Amazon of a Facebook you have to pay at least a couple billion in incentive money. It just aint worth getting up for less than a billion. Kadizzle was going to invent a car that ran on air and water, but no one wanted to pay him two billion, so he just decided to watch TV. Times have changed.
My grandfather Russell Goodwin is in the Wheeling Hall of Fame. His house was very nice. At one time it was actually two nice apartment houses. My Grandfather took out the dividing walls and ended up with a nice home. Since it was two separate apartments the house ended up with two of everything. Two kitchens, two nice staircases, two nice bathrooms, and a hall on the second floor that was two halls wide now that the center dividing wall was removed. The bedrooms were large, but the most amazing part was a very large attic with a full sized bedroom, a bathroom, and a large room for a pool table. Neighborhood kids spent hours playing pool in my Grandfathers attic. He was tolerant of the noise created by a bunch of kids over his bedroom. In addition to the house there was a two story garage with several large rooms. One of the rooms above the garage was a dark room. Both my grandfather, and one of my uncles were very enthusiastic photographers. One large kitchen wall was covered with family photos. My Grandfather bought each of his five children a nice home in the area where he lived. My cousins lived within blocks and it was great to grow up with the extended family nearby.
Why do some people succeed and others fail? Of course there are many factors. Maybe daddy left you a piece of land with oil under it. You did not succeed, you just had the right daddy. Trump is splendid example of that. Maybe you got some good DNA and were smart enough to see through the trickery of those who prey on the less fortunate. Maybe you understood economics and saved. Maybe you listened to someone with knowledge.
Society very much depends on the haves, and how much they soak from the have nots . Shooting a cow is not a difficult endeavor, but a mountain lion is another category. Why shoot either one? Well you can sell a stupid person a Mr Pillow pillow and it is not hard. Kadizzle was at the Walmart hall where people go to buy items made of Chinesiem. You can get a decent pillow there for twenty bucks or less, but Mr. Pillow will sell you one for a hundred. Really, what can you do to a pillow? Well you can use pillows to bilk the Trump cult. Republicans have turned mental deficiency into a gold mine.
Long ago Kadizzle was a college student in Huntington, West Virginia. The truth is Kadizzle was not the best student. Attention deficit disorder was a plague then and now. When Kadizzle went to the library to do research he would walk between the stacks of books. Before he ever got to the book he was looking for another book caught his attention. Before he knew it his time at the library was wasted.
The modern version of this is Youtube. Kadizzle starts to look at one thing, and then something else catches the eye. The net result is now Kadizzle can captain a plane, a helicopter, and just about anything that moves. You can learn it all on Youtube. Once you start exploring the journey is endless.
Morning has come to the mountains. A small skiffle of snow in spotty places. Tomorrow the trail crew will arrive for a turkey dinner. Winky is in the kitchen cooking up a storm. Ah stuffing, the fat mans nirvana. Kadizzle started syphoning the water out of our retention pond yesterday. Winky exclaimed " You will never get anywhere with that". Yes my child, but this morning the pond is dry.
Our new headquarters sit on top of a hill up in the mountains. No one would have thought water would be a problem, but puddles have been forming in the basement. The blasted builder still has not put gutters on our home. Hopefully that will solve the problem. However, Winky wants to play drain the crawl space tomorrow. The mud here is something special. It is like walking through glue and sand. One step into the mud and your boot will pick up three pounds of mud. It is easy to see how the Indians could make pottery out of this stuff. Almost like natural cement.
The plan was to be without a home for a couple years, travel about, let the sun power the Earth Module, maybe some foreign travel. Nope, didn't happen. The Captain of the Universe Commander Winky wanted a home drilled into the ground. Here we sit at five thousand feet. After a long, very long wait, we are in our new home. Endless hassles, that is what home building is about. The house is not at the exact angle to the universe it should be. Picking out colors was like picking out lottery numbers, and of course the garage doors came the wrong color. The granite had to find a hiding place because of the building delays. The Earth Module will be a squeeze in it's home beside the home. On and on it goes. Since the builder has been too slow installing the gutters water is accumulating in the crawl space. Kadizzle has storage containers on the deck collecting water to keep it away from the foundation.
All things considered we are actually in the lap of luxury, if you can be in that lap with no furniture. Just about everything got sold in North Dakota. We kept the kitchen table, some chairs, and a futon. The new beds are great. Setting up utilities, and getting mail service are problems of a large magnitude. Mail service has driven us insane. The post office and the builder cannot manage the installation of the mailboxes. Over the summer we have had three addresses. Until you change your address you have no idea how your address is tied to everything. Not hard to see how the homeless cannot survive without an address. Credit cards, banking, the car, you name it. Without an address you do not exist. Then of course we have not entirely faced the mess of changing drivers license, medical care, and on and on.
Prior to his insane debacle we were debt free. Now, maybe we can leave the children some juicy debt.
Well, better go to the good side. We are in the mountains with endless trails. The weather is spectacular compared to a winter in North Dakota. Drive down the road and the temperature goes up ten degrees. Drive up the road and the temperature will drop five degrees. Life is too short to spend all in one place. Too many of the hillbillies Kadizzle grew up with never busted out of the hills. That is the report for this morning. Hope everyone had good holidays.
At our refuge from winter we awakened to a dusting of snow. That can happen at five thousand feet. Kadizzle is trying to get the engine room in order. The engine room is world headquarters for The National Association for the Advancement of Humanity. The engine room has computers, music, a desk, and all the comforts of a place where you can be alone with your thoughts. Once Kadizzle manages to come alive in the morning he wanders to the kitchen and puts ten little measure of the coffee in the coffee pot. When he pushes the button the world begins to come to life. As the blood and caffeine bring Kadizzle back to life he checks of the evil Republicans and plots his means to secure a good life for the oppressed. At some point little Joey awakens and wants breakfast. With luck Winky might make some French Toast or an omelet. The main research organ is the New York Times. The NYT is one of the last bastions of democracy. Evil Republican agents are buying up newspapers like the Bismarck Tribune and turning them into right wing rags. The entire country is doomed as we turn into Fox News Nation.
Back to the National Association for the Advancement of Humanity. Everyone gets those calls where the caller does not identify themselves. When Kadizzle answers the phone if he does not recognize the call he will answer " National Association for the Advancement of Humanity". If you will not tell me who you are, then I will return the favor. So if Kadizzle answers that way don't be put off, just identify yourself.
Once upon a time Kadizzle told himself his next house would be a small one. Here we are in our new home, it is not that small. The old house had a basement that basically doubled the size of the house. It was way more room than two old people need. Now, in our new home we just have one floor. That is what you do when you are old, no steps. The new house still has enormity. The living room is the main and perhaps the only public room, but it is huge. Filling it with furniture will break the bank. Kadizzle likes roomy rooms, but he may have gone overboard on the bedroom. Even with a king sized bed space is plentiful. The garage is also a vast warehouse.
How many people in the world live in tiny apartments, huts, and cramped quarters. Maybe we take too much. Why? Because we can. Even when we attempt to take less we still fail. Our cars are too big, and pickup trucks roam like wild beast on our streets. Are the Kadizzle's guilty? Hell yes, but we are different, we deserve all this. Of course no one else does. We worked hard for what we have. That is a lie. We were born into families that had an extra edge. We had good educations, homes with books, and two parent stable families.
Conservatives love the old saw " I worked for what I got, why can't you?". Well, take a black family for example. Did they get help buying a house from mom and dad? Nope. Did they inherit a little money to help along the way? Nope. Did they sort of have a job fall in their lap? Nope. If you help poor people it makes them lazy and dependent. Of course that does not happen with upper middle class Americans. They always flourish with help and support. The wonderful double standard. The rules that apply to me are not suited for you.
Babylon Berlin is an expensive Netflix production Winky and Kadizzle have been watching for days. A very strange production that takes place in Berlin around 1918 to 1929. The chaos and politics of the time was as strange as it is now. The theme reminds one so much of the Trump plotting to overthrow our government. History is always the same, some group sells a new society to the gullible. Like always the poor are the pawns. Like always the uneducated are the fodder.
Seems people never change. You can always play on the same weaknesses, delusion, religion, greed, and the hope your side will win. It never happens and almost always ends in a mess. In the old days a mess was just a couple million people killed in a silly war. Maybe the next mess will include nuclear weapons. Chemical weapons made world war one a lot of fun, and phosgene plays a big role in this mystery thriller.
History is always about those on top wanting more and manipulating those on the bottom to get more. Selling the foolish false hope has always been a big theme in history. The idea that our side is right, and those other guys are up to something has always been a big seller. The lesson of history is the common guy usually loses.
OK, a little change of the tune. Yesterday Kadizzle took a test on his favorite database. Do you want to see a different world? Yup, the world is not what you think. Go to a site called "Gapminder". There you will find a quiz that ask you questions about the condition of mankind. The quiz will show you based on facts, that you are wrong. You are wrong about how many people can read, how many people have clean water to drink, and you are wrong about so many important things in the world. We have made progress, but we have a long way to go. Sadly those on top now want things to stay the same because they are on top and they like it that way. So the Republicans are suppressing voting, and doing every evil deed they can to stay in control.
Well the new year is coming, and no one can stop the clock. We are all marching toward the end. No matter how old, how tired, or how depressed we still have to fight so our children can have a decent future. Doing nothing is not acceptable. The grandchildren, Quinn, Sylvie, and Evie deserve the chance to live in a better world so it is game on. Talk to the dolts, ask people to vote no matter how hard it is. When that person on the phone says " Can I do anything else to help you?", here is the answer. " Yes, you can vote against every Republican that breaths". You can talk to the clerk at the grocery store and explain that those who make more than 138,000 pay no social security. Watch their expression. You have the right to wake people up. If you let them sleep we all will slowly parish in the swamp of Republican lies.
Children are precious, in more ways than one. First they cost a fortune, but then perhaps they are worth it. Now our children have had children, which we may even enjoy more. You can turn them in when you get tired of playing with them. You don't have to feed them, and eventually you get some peace and quiet with grandchildren. However, you have to share the family with inlaws. In the old days in Hazen we had both extended families at Christmas. Now that we have moved to Payson we will be alone for Christmas. Sister Patty could not come up from Cottonwood because of the weather. Our new neighbors Larry and Grant brought us some cookies yesterday. Christmas will be celebrated with just Winky and the neighbors.
Rain fell all day yesterday and the sediment pond in the back yard filled up. The pond was a strange aspect of the property Kadizzle is not to happy with. It is not actually a pond, but a cinder block enclosure. It should have been a pond. Kadizzle may turn it into a more attractive part of the yard, but that will take time. Rushing into this house purchase has had a few glitches, but Winky wanted a home in Payson. Our main reason for living here is the surrounding area. There are endless trails, mountains, and wild area. We have such a large new area to explore on foot, on ebikes, and on the motorcycle. Then there is the Earth Module which can take us out for longer trips. Waking up with mountain scenery is very different from the old prairie in North Dakota. We have not escaped the Trump flags and the redneck pickup trucks. Add to that the pretend motorcycle guys who would like to think they are part of some gang.
Now Winky just came in the engine room and said Kadizzle must help her pack up the bar stools she ordered. Winky does not hesitate to order things and send them back. Not sure what color she wanted she ordered every color. Now out of four chairs three will have to go back, what a fun way to start the day packing chairs. Of course next the chairs will have to be hauled somewhere like UPS and that also will be fun. Money flies out the window with a new home. We are doing our part to support the economy and inflation. The trick will be for us to give out before the money does.
You have a good friend or neighbor and they reveal they have a problem. What do you do? Your neighbor could not be kinder or more friendly then one day they say " I could never vote for a black man". Almost falling out of your chair you realize an aspect of a person you never thought was there. Then one day you look at out the window and see a Trump flag flying next door. Again you are shocked. The person seemed rational, and intelligent, but no. One thing both these people have in common is a deep religious belief. What went wrong?
The real dilemma is do you say anything? The older generation thought you could mix religion and hate with no problem. You could despise other humans for no reason and that was just fine with God. Kadizzle wants nothing to do with that God. Part of the problem with these people is their minister knew better, but the man that stood in front of them in church needed a paycheck, and a job. That man up there in front of the church knew what those people wanted to hear. The preacher knew how to polish Jesus so he would shine brightest on white people, Republicans, and those who spiced their life with a little evil.
Kadizzle has known two preachers that are good people, but they did not express their true religion until after they quit preaching. What a strange world. Good man who cannot speak out until it is too late. How many people will die wishing they had said more about the infestation of evil caused by silence.
The truck rumbled up to Peter Bigfoot's refuge deep in the desert canyon. The road was in the best shape ever. Floods had ravaged the road, but a lot of work put it back in order. Our mission was to re establish the trial for Campaign Creek. Peter is a lucky man. He has a friend with a D9 Dozer who is helping rebuild his ranch that was devastated by the monsoon floods. The amount of water that came down Campaign Creek is incomprehensible. A stream that normally you could hardly drink out of ran deep enough to surpass the top of the pickup truck. The evidence in the trees told the story. The Stream had been up to eight feet or more deep in place. The water moved boulders the size of cars, and tore up everything in it's path.
Rain in the desert is an entirely different animal. The desert has no holding capacity for water and a big watershed will flood instantly. As Kadizzle writes it is starting to sprinkle. The prediction is for up to two inches. If it comes quickly look out. More sand will inundate the highways and the boulders will move.
Long ago and far away when Kadizzle was a surface coal miner Dave took care of putting things back together after the miners tore the land apart. Dave was dedicated and won several awards for his work. Like I told him most people would be hard pressed to figure out what land was mined and what land was not. In West Virginia, my home state, the land will never recover, but Kadizzle can be proud of the reclamation done in North Dakota. Dave played a key role.
Sad that although we restored some land in North Dakota we are now endanger of losing the whole planet to Republican greed, and denial of climate change. Kadizzle and Winky are in the southwest which is burning up from fires, and ravaged by drought. With six thousand planes in the air at all times burning 3,000 gallons each, do the math about how much crap we are putting in the air alone with aircraft. Of course this does not include the cargo ships burning oil sludge. Who cares we will all be dead soon, but the grandchildren may suffocate.
There was a song " I am going to sit right down and write myself a letter". Kadizzle writes himself a letter almost every morning. Does this nonsense go out into the digital universe and then on into space? One thing Kadizzle has been to lazy to do it set up the comments section on this system. If you want to make a comment and you really want Kadizzle to get the comment you can use the email, dakotaquinn@gmail.com Maybe you did want to communicate something and forgive this old man if he never got your communication, but now you have a means.
We are back at the Earth Module and are going to go up the mountain today. My heart isn't in it. My hand is eaten up with arthritis and the hand needs a rest. Have not actually climbed up the mountain trail in many weeks. It will be interesting to see how much the rain, fire, and growth has damaged the trail.
This new life style of having a lake home and a mountain home is a bit strange. Calling the Earth Module a lake home gives it an uppity tone.
Our new yard is actually a rock garden. Rocks of every size dominate the landscape. Some weight a pound others six tons. Winky and Kadizzle moved rocks yesterday. Two old people in their seventies vs a two or three hundred pound rock. The old goats finally won, but Kadizzle is sore today. A handful of arthritis like never before. With rudimentary tools, a pick and a hand truck we took on the rocks. So far maybe three tons have been moved. Just prying one out of the ground is a job. Kadizzle lifts by prying with the pick and Winky puts some small rocks under it. The final victory is celebrated by hooking two old people to the hand cart and pulling the prize to its new home.
Morning has come once more and it is feeling more like home in our new home. If you are in North Dakota freezing your backside off come on down. No real furniture yet, but we do have a very comfortable extra bed. It looks like the new neighborhood will be mostly old folks, but a real mix. Kadizzle met two gun loving ex marines down below. The man and woman were both marines. She brought some damn good cookies up to welcome us the other day. Fred comes by pretty regular walking his dog. Fred and Deb have spent their time on the rock pile at their home. There may be some kids nearby. Kadizzle likes young people and cannot understand why old goats would want to live without them. They are the hope. Only the young can save us from the Republicans.
People's choices about how they live have become less restrained, and that is a good thing. In recent times we have become friends with more gay people. Our new friends are intelligent, and interesting. They add spice to our lives. Living in a tolerant society seems to be a good thing. Since we are in the heart of redneck Trump land seeing gay people navigate the landscape is interesting. The rednecks seem to have adapted. Gay people have money, and they spend it, just like black people do. No matter how right wing and redneck you are as a businessman you will not do well if you offend minorities. In the old days we had unions to protect people, but strangely our economy protects minorities even though Republicans don't want them to vote or have a decent life. Every business caters to Spanish speaking people by giving them the choice to deal with the company in Spanish. Minorities are encouraged to boycott discriminating businesses.
The most important thing for minorities to realize is who their worst enemy is. The answer is pretty simple, it is the Republicans, and coming in second is probably religion. What religion? Thing about it. Religion robs the poor with the TV preachers, and look what the Catholic Church has done to women, native Americans, and the poor in general. Then look at how the fundamentalist have supported Trump.
Winky is driving Kadizzle nuts. Winky gets frustrated dealing with computers on the phone. The new voice technology has been adopted by just about every company. Computers that analyze your voice do it by analyzing the electronic signature for the words you say with an algorithm. When you yell and say something quickly it is self defeating. Getting angry with a computer is insane, and sitting next to Winky in the morning while she yells at computers drives Kadizzle nuts. Realizing if she would just say " Yes" slowly the computer would understand yes, but if she says it at the speed of light it creates a problem. Old people and technology is a recipe for mental illness.
Cloudy and overcast in the mountains. Here we are in Payson, Arizona. Endless task await getting into the new abode. Spent yesterday assembling a desk. Instruction said one hour. Into the third hour the desk is still not put together.
Kadizzle awakened in the middle of the night to a noise, and could not figure out what it was. There is a small airport within hearing distance. It sounded like someone was reving up the ending of a turboprop ready to take off. The sound persisted and the brain expected the plane to go into the air. Nope, just the sound. Suspicious that it might be coming from the house Kadizzle went into the living room. When he opened the bedroom door the noise stopped. It turned out the noise was from the furnace sucking air through the crack of the bedroom door.
Kadizzle is cheap, no question about it. He saves a nickle where he can. Today you will get a lecture on banks and credit card companies. Refuse to pay their fees. Kadizzle just avoided $70 in surcharges. Credit card companies pay a lot of money to get a new sucker. Over the years Kadizzle has save hundreds of dollars by calling the credit card companies and telling them to remove late fees. If they have any sense they will remove the charge. With our moving our finances are a mess and things are all mixed up. The bank wanted to charge $39 for an overdraft fee. A mix up caused about a two day delay in the money transfer. The bank removed the fee by simply asking. Now think about it how many billions banks and credit card companies make charging these insane fees. These companies have no compunction about abusing the costumer so why shouldn't the customer fight back? Another case if Verizon. Often because we travel we get terrible internet service. At the end of the call with Verizon they always ask "Is there anything else I can do for you?". Kadizzle says yes, you can take $25 off my bill for lousy service. Usually they do. Once Kadizzle asked for $25 and they took off $70. You may want to purchase the new book put out by Lord Kadizzle enterprises. The title of the book is " It don't hurt to ask".
Last night Winky and Kadizzle watched the movie The Year Of The Dog. It was strange western with a theme about a young homosexual, and another older gay cowboy. Kadizzle would recommend it. The movie was set in Beech Montana. Perhaps the movie makers did not know Beach is in North Dakota. The movie was set in 1925 which meant there were cars in the movie.
Today the plan is to go up to Payson and the new home. Living in two places has complications with what goes where.
Waking up in the morning and perusing the news is depressing. The real virus is stupidity and it's spread has brought the planet to it's knees. The years spent with both Trump and Covid have just worn people down. The Supreme Court is scary. It is now a political arm of the Hoopleheads. Think about the implications.
We live on a planet that has always been the same size, but our cities have not, our use of the atmosphere has not, and so the planet is being overwhelmed by human termites. Capitalism is premised on the idea of infinite growth. That doesn't work in the giant terrarium we live in. Go into just about any public space and it will be posted on the wall how many people can occupy the space. Perhaps we need a sign on the planet that says how many people it can hold comfortably. Sadly we have long past the comfortable level.
Here we are at Debbie and Al's in their home they don't live in. Debbie and Al prefer their fifth wheel out back in the little RV park they are building for friends, so Kadizzle and Winky have this huge home to ourselves when we visit. Al made a wonderful homemade pizza last night. The view from here is fantastic, so are the bike trails, and hiking.
Al is a craftsman and has gone insane buying nice equipment for his shops. The garage is a metal working shop, and the living room is a woodworking shop. Al bought a professional grade lathe and it will be interesting to see what he makes. Al has surrounded the home with an artistic steel fence. Each of the three gates will be works of art.
Republicans have successfully fought CRT, critical race theory. Now, Kadizzle ask you to help fight the teaching of Arabic numerals in the schools. You can see where this is going. The Republicans will take up the fight clueless of what Arabic numerals are. The Hoopleheads will go to school boards and blast the members. Like Jewish space lasers any cause is worthy. Kadizzle has had a long running Jihad against Rob Port, but today he wrote an excellent article pointing out the grifters in the Republican Party. Covid did something to Port's brain that resulted in a massive improvement. It seems he is gradually becoming a liberal.
Today we head to Tuson to visit friends and do some bike riding.
Day two of fighting brush on the Deer Creek trail is over. Six worn down old people stopped for ice cream on the way back from the trial. Carrying the motorized weed whackers in three miles to start work was chore, but many hikers will be happy to walk the trail unaccustomed by thorns.
Rain may fall this evening, and the desert can use a dose. Tomorrow we head to Tuson and perhaps some ebike riding. A hot shower will feel good, and then wonderful rest.
It is not even five in the morning, Winky and Kadizzle are up buzzing about in our new home. We are at a new level of luxury. A huge kitchen, instant warmth, and a king sized bed. On it goes every convenience we could dream of. So like fools we will go to the Deer Creek Trail and work for free in about two hours. Blasted brush and desert cat's claw that tears your arms apart. Kadizzle has been assigned to run the weed whacker. It is sort of fun to curse the blasted brush and then give it a dose of spinning blade. The victory is short term when rain hits the weeds they come back twice as strong.
If you are a reader in good standing of this nonsense you are certainly invited to stop in Payson and spend the night. We like company, and have already made many new friends here. Some nice lady brought cookies for us yesterday as a house warming gift. Good cookies. Just what Kadizzle needs as he approaches the weight of a black hole.
Kadizzle has seen a lot of homes built, but never like what they do in Payson, Arizona. Most houses have plywood or strandboard placed over the studs, not here. Many of the houses here have the exterior siding, some weather paper, and then insulation. Apparently the building code allows these paper houses. We insisted on a real house. Just looking at a home you cannot know if the walls are substantial or paper. Kadizzle thinks if you put a light fixture on an exterior wall and there is no sheathing behind he exterior siding you may be in for some sagging fixtures. Builders will make a nickle where they can.
Kadizzle grew up in a home built in 1914. That home had one hardwood floor on top of another for a total thickness of about two inches. That does not happen any more. Hardwood was used everywhere in older homes. Today softwoods are pasted and glued to come up with a home. Maybe one is not better than the other, but the old homes had copper pipes. No more of that. The wires even seem smaller. Well the insulation is better. Craftsmen built the old homes, the new ones are build so quickly and the old fashioned woodwork is just not there. In Europe they build homes to last centuries. Here they might last until the paint dries. Once upon a time Kadizzle had a job supervising the demolition of homes where an interstate was going to go. The big endloader would put it's bucket under the corner of one of those well built homes and the entire house would come up as a unit. Now if you did that to a modern home you would just tear a hole in the corner.
Last night we slept in our new home in Payson, Arizona. We met the neighbors this morning. Two figure skating instructors. Seems like they will make good neighbors. Already we have made many friends in Payson. Payson is a cowboy town. No shortage of rednecks and Trump cultist. However, the people are friendly, and helpful. The worst thing is the traffic. How such a small town can have so much traffic? Payson is at the intersection where people go North, East and West. Most of the streets are quiet, but the main street through town is always busy.
We are near a nice little park with three small lakes. People are always fishing there. How they can fish as much as they do and not run out of fish? The home sits high above town and gives us a good view of the lights at night. Working all the bugs out of the ceiling fans, the garage door openers, the fireplace, and so on is a daunting task. The kitchen is very large and Winky should be very happy. As usual we have more storage than junk to fill it.
Tonight is night number two. The area is quiet and the National Forest is just on the other side of the Street. We took our first walk in the local forest and elk tracks were everywhere. It will be fun to see the first elk wandering around.
Kadizzle was a bit shocked to see a vicious attack on his good friend Dina Butcher by Rob Port in the Fargo Forum. Dina had a measure passed that irritated the Republicans. Dina's group called the Badass Grandmas has promoted transparency in North Dakota government. Of course this makes it hard for the Republicans to harvest bribes. Port is a pathological liar much like Scott Hennen. Kadizzle personally has experienced Port's lies. Port once asked Kadizzle to appologize for stuffing money down Kevin Cramers shirt. Kadizzle was to call in to the radio show and an agreement was made about what would be discussed. Port totally broke the agreement and used the opportunity to promote Cramer. Before this radio interview Port called Kadizzle to arrange a time. Kadizzle was riding his bike north of Hazen when he got the call. Kadizzle told Port he was on his bike and he would call Port back. For absolutely no reason Port said Kadizzle was not on his bike and lying about it. Kadizzle reached the city landfill north of town and called Port back. Kadizzle offered to have the landfill people verify he was on his bike. Port did not want the proof. This is the way he operates, and so does his buddy Scott Hennen. Lying is a way of life for these guys. To top it off Kadizzle did a little research and it turns out Port is funded by right wing groups. Port accuses Dina Butcher of taking out of state money, yet he takes dark money himself.
" Evil prevails when good men fail to act". Evil in the form of Republicans is prevailing. Good men are failing to act. Reading the news and seeing how openly the Republicans cheat, lie, and steal is discomforting. Thugs have learned from the Republicans with the new mass stealing at stores how to just overwhelm normal people. Stupid people act in mass to destroy our democracy. The assault on the Capital was no different from a smash and grab operation. The Hoopleheads cheer the bullies. Republican congressmen are cheered when they promote the virus. Again normal people idly stand by and think it will all come out OK. Normal people are nice, polite, and thoughtful. It does not work anymore, but normal people continue to be nice to the Hoopleheads. Normal people do not realize there are far more Hoopleheads than they ever thought.
It appears our loan will be wrapped up on Monday. Kadizzle spent the morning dealing with the title company and the loan company for our new home. When it was over it felt like financial rape. It is like buying a car. You are dumb enough to focus on the cost of the car, but whoa, what about the tax, the license, and about ten things the dealer dreamed up like air in the tires. The title company plays the same game and so does the lender. There is a fee for spelling your name correctly, and another fee to have someone else check the spelling. All of this nonsense has been invented to provide vacation money for bankers and title company owners. What do these people actually do? Most of it they learned from the Wizard of Oz. Like the funeral industry which made it so expensive to die people go on living, these rats manipulate state law to make sure they can be paid well for doing little or nothing. Now, everyone gets cremated. Of course it cost way more than it should. You are already half burnt up when you find out what a traditional burial would cost. Parasites live on fees, and by the way there is a cleaning fee, a service fee, and a fee for me smiling while I cheated you.
Our builder said we can move in. The world will change. We will have a home without wheels. Friday the junk will flow into the new home. We have already met some new neighbors. Kadizzle has always wanted to live on a hilltop, or maybe a mountain top. Sitting on the massive deck Kadizzle can sip some wine and drench in the sun and shade. Landscaping will be equivalent to building a pyramid. There will not be a blade of grass. The home is in what might be called high desert. Cedar trees dominate the landscape.
The news is playing in the background on NPR. The school shooting. As in many things a simple solution is there, but Republicans love to get some gun votes. Kadizzle has advocated making it mandatory to put a chip in guns. The chip would give off a radio signal. Stores use these chips to keep people from stealing liquor, clothing or expensive items. The chips are cheap. Imagine molding a chip into a gun. When the chip is exposed to microwave energy it gives off a radio frequency with a message. If anyone goes into a school, a church, a bank with a gun the gun itself triggers an alarm. However, the gun nuts would go nuts. The military already uses this system, and so do many police departments. Gutless coward Republicans will do any spineless thing to placate the Trump cult.
Kadizzle spent six hours yesterday going over the defensive driver course. This is a requirement to drive a government vehicle. Of course there were all kind of statistics to scare you about driving. So many of the offenders could be caught with modern technology. Aggresive drivers are the ones Kadizzle has the biggest problem with. These nut cases weave in and out of traffic like it is a game. Computers could catch them. Computers can detect many traffic violations, but oh, oh no, catching people with computers is a violation of their privacy. Like the right to carry a gun and kill anyone you want, you also have the right to drive a car and kill anyone you want. In Arizona traffic cameras reduced accidents by 20%, but the delicate people objected so we went back to killing people.
Hope everyone had a great turkey day, Kadizzle certainly did . Kadizzle comes from a family of nine and a big chunk of the offspring were here. Some Kadizzle has not seen in twenty or thirty years. As for children we had six of the bumkins on hand. This gang has cooks of the highest caliber so the belly swells with food. Plenty of lubricant was also available of the finest quality. All of this took place in a rented deluxe home with a pool. To summarize it was a great holiday. Indeed we can be thankful. Considering the number of relatives in the clan the number of flumpers is small. What is a flumper? A flumper is a fish on land that just flumps around and accomplishes nothing. If you look most families produce a few flumpers somewhere along the line. Every pie does not turn out perfect. No one ever becomes a complete flumper. Everyone has a virtue or two. Then again, who gets to decide? The worst flumper ever was Donald Trump, yet his cult loves him.
Well the plan today is to pack the tribe into a car and drive to Payson to see the new home. At last it is officially done. When we move in Winky and Kadizzle will welcome guest. Sitting around in the mountains with old friends will be great. If you are reading this you are an old friend. If you get the desire to escape the cold come on down.
Payson is about five thousand feet or more, but it is not that far from the Mexican border. That means you get a lot of sunshine, snow once in a while, but generally good weather. As to the outdoors, if hiking and mountains are your thing we got em.
The two little monkeys are up early as usual playing with Megan the mom. Coloring is keeping them occupied. Quinn has become very good at the word grandpa. Evie has already become skilled for her age with coloring. Too much turkey was a disaster for digestion last night and the battle against fire belly took five Tums to put the fire out. With leftovers sitting around this old fat guy is in big trouble.
Staying in this luxury compound Kadizzle thinks of trail crew member Ken. Ken is color blind. This airbnb is very nicely done, but every item is either black or white with no exceptions. Well there might be some tones of grey, but there is not an once of color. In a strange way it is sort of pleasing. Even the pictures on the wall have no color.
Gathered for Thanksgiving the family has had endless political discussions. However, everyone is on the liberal spectrum. Consequently the discussions are calm and peaceful. So much is written about political fights breaking out at the dinner table. The massive feast will take place later today.
Yesterday son in law Sam and Kadizzle went to the grocery store. As we approached the automated checkout area Kadizzle sensed something was amiss. A couple was about to check out with two grocery carts, one was loaded to the brim. Another questionable character was checking out and having trouble with his credit card. It happened that Kadizzle purchased a bottle of gin with one of those locked tops that stores use to keep liquor from being stolen. The attendant at the checkout had to take the gin bottle somewhere to unlock it. After we left the store Sam asked Kadizzle if he noticed the strange couple stealing stuff. Kadizzle did not see it, but suspected they were up to something. While the attendant was away they stuffed things they had not scanned into their bags that had been scanned. Thinking about the incident Kadizzle realized the man with the credit card was in cahoots with the other couple. He had a credit card that was in bad shape, and it looked like it would not work. With the bad credit card he had been distracting the checkout woman earlier while the other couple was stealing. No doubt the store cameras recorded what happened, but they will never catch the people. Nothing taste better than stolen food apparently.
The verdict just came in for the three white men that shot the black jogger. Amazing, they were found guilty. The rules for shooting people need to be refined. It is not clear who you can shoot now. It was a white guy shooting white guys and the jury said that was OK. Police have seemed to be able to shoot black people indiscriminately. Women have a pretty good chance of getting off for shooting husbands. Since we are now a gun toting society we need to get some rules. In the old days duels were very formal. There was a strict protocol for killing someone you had a misunderstanding with. It was all very polite and a referee was present. Can't we go back to the good old days? Sir, you have offended me and I would like to kill you. Can I drive by your house about ten an shoot my AR-15 multiple times into your living room? Well, maybe we could meet at the park, and I could bring a friend and he could count to three and we could each shoot at each other. Not a bad idea. OK, see you at the park tomorrow. That is how the shootings should work. We have lost all decorum.
The NYT had an article today suggesting a city give everyone an ebike. Think about the insanity of cars. In a car you are using a six thousand pound car to move a two hundred pound person. It simply makes no sense. Kadizzle was very disappointed he could not bring the ebikes for Thanksgiving. It would be fun to buzz around her on an ebike. In a car is is painful. If cities were designed for ebikes, and tiny electric vehicles think of the savings, narrow streets, cheaper streets, safer streets, less pollution, people would get exercise. The obsession with cars is insane. Kadizzle has put over four thousand miles on his ebike. To go that distance in a car would take 200 gallons of gasoline. At three dollars a gallon that would be 600 dollars, just for gas, but what about tires, oil, and all the other crap? This gets us to Denver where Erin lives. Kadizzle takes the ebike and puts it on the train two blocks away. Once downtown Kadizzle unloads the ebike from the special spot on the train and off he goes, no parking fees, no hassle. Look at the Europeans who ride bikes way more than the lump ass Americans. The Europeans are in much better health.
It is that time of year with the family when we settle into the lap of luxury. For Thanksgiving we are all gathering in Phoenix. With a heated pool and all the amenities it will be great to be with the children and grandchildren. Laying in groceries was one be task. After purchasing $450 of food yesterday the shoppers will go back for more.
Kadizzle hates large metropolitan areas. Visiting is fine, but who in the hell would want to live here. The crowded insane traffic, and shopping mall pollution is so depressing. Give me the middle of nowhere any day. In the country you can always go for a walk or a hike. Here you really have noting to do. If you are into music or art, sure you can see some stuff, but everyday? Cities are just plain depressing. To see how run down and poverty stricken the cities have become is sad. Most American cities have no character. Every city is polluted with the same malls, signs, and general mess created by mass consumption.
The tribe is coming for Thanksgiving. Erin and her family will be here later today. Megan and the magic snoochels will be here on Tuesday. Once a year we live like the one percent with out children. Sunday we move to a luxury house with a heated pool. After living in the Earth Module for a year this will be a big move up. Our new home in Payson is done and just a few bureaucratic hurdles to jump. We will meet Erin and her gang in Payson today to view the new residence.
Astounding that now shooting protesters is a new Republican sport. The country is paying the price for endorsing the NRA mentality. Recently for about three weeks Kadizzle owned a handgun. Bill was moving out and threw a loaded small handgun in the garbage. Kadizzle fished it out. Kadizzle did not want to have a handgun in his home, so he sold it to the Mexicans working on the sewage dump. The fellow was going to give it to some young girl for self defense. No doubt Kadizzle will be involved in a murder trail. Had the gun stayed in the dumpster who knows what might have happened. It might have fallen into the hands of children. Two things are rising in the world, sea level, and stupidity.
A sad thing in North Dakota. The people in the legislature that seem to have the ability to think are leaving. North Dakota will end up with a solid mass of idiots running that state.
This morning Kadizzle contacted one of the complete idiots that is in the North Dakota legislature. The idiocy of the man who is a plumber by trade is absolutely astounding, and should strike fear into any normal person. The plumber said he could have been a scientist, or a general,but chose plumber. So far Kadizzle has talked on the phone to two of these complete dingers. Both of them went to the My Pillow convention in South Dakota.
Now to the main event. Venting to Dina about this insanity, Dina said she discovered that her pillow was a " My Pillow". She said she found a microchip in the pillow. You help is needed. Kadizzle wants to play on Dina's idea and spread the rumor that the " My Pillow's " have microchips in them. There is Russian writing on them. When you get the chance, and you know you are talking to a dolt, this is what you say " Did you hear about the woman who found a microchip in her my pillow? Apparently it had Russian writing on it". Of course if they ask for details use the Republican technique. Say you were told this by a neighbor of the woman. Add anything you want like the CIA is examining the microchip. The woman was having strange dreams about election fraud. The goal is to see how long it takes to spread a silly story among the Republicans. If anyone can call into Scott Hennen at KFYR and ask " Did you hear about the woman who found a microchip in her My Pillow?" that would be worth 100 Kadizzle bonus points.
Kadizzle is up early. Winky is in Sedona on a bike ride expedition. The world is still as crazy when Kadizzle went to sleep. People still believe the most insane things the Republicans can dream up. The people with functioning brains are leaving the North Dakota legislature. What is left is a bin of loonies. The new Republican modus operandi is twist a story, or make one up, use the fabrication to scare the Hoopleheads. Scared Hoopleheads will vote for anything the Republicans propose. It works every time. Trump showed the Republicans how to make the Hoopleheads dance. Hoopleheads love crazy talk. Say anything that makes no sense and it will attract the simple minded.
All the gang sat around the campfire ring including the new neighbors Colleen and Dale. The new neighbors had not met everyone on the trail crew so introductions were in order. Everyone gave a synopsis of their life. What did they do for a living, where did they live, children, education, and so on. Somehow Rita gets these things going. More than once Kadizzle has seen Rita do the FBI interview. She is pretty bold about asking people the details of their life. A lot of times this can be a little messy with deaths, divorces, and maybe even criminal records. It is kind of nice to get it out in the open. You never really know who you are dealing with. Kadizzle remembers once meeting a couple in a van here. It seemed they were down out and maybe broke. It turned out wrong. The guy was a nuclear physicist, and they had a strange way of traveling. For three months they would travel a foreign country, and then they would live in their van for three months.
So it is up on the mountain today. It will be the first real hike for the trail crew. The game plan is to go to the Four Peaks trail and try to clear the logs from the trail. This will mean a rope puller, block and tackle, and carrying some heavy stuff into the wild. Kadizzle is not to enthusiastic about hauling the tools.
Six old people from age 68 to 75 up in the morning and setting off to fight the brush in the Tonto National Forest. The trails all over the forest don't clean themselves. Nasty thorny bushes grow at amazing speed. Hikers will be cut to shreds if someone does not fight the cat's claw into submission. Volunteers and prisoners are on the front line in the battle. So much of this work has to be done by hand. Throwing the brush off the trail is like handling razor wire.
Meanwhile the country falls apart while the Republicans make sure the rich are never taxed. There are some groups of young people that work on the trails. The young people are paid a mere pittance, but it does get some city kids out in the wilderness experiencing a different phase of life. For what it cost to give one billionaire a space ride thousands of people could be put to work making the country better for everyone. Who cares? The head of Walmart makes 8,000 dollars an hour. Meanwhile the poor old granny at the door gets 8 dollars an hour. No problem this is capitalism in action. Are we really that stupid?
Reading the New York Times this morning it is obvious the country is on the wrong track. Republicans will take us toward a Nazi type country very quickly. Manipulating stupid people is a technique the Republicans have perfected. It is all about protecting the rich from taxes. The rich buy all the politicians they want. With the politicians on strings they make them dance. Recently the head of Sanford Health was ousted with a 49 million dollar bonus. Nobody noticed the robbery. This is America, as long as you have gas for the boat and cable tv on the flatscreen who cares? Suffering is the only thing that works. Long ago we had a depression. People got cold, hungry, and were suffering. Those people were on the verge of communism and socialism. Then the smart rich decided it was time to throw some crumbs. So here we go once more toward a peasant revolt. We just don't learn. The world is melting, people are starving, but the tv works, and the fish are biting.
Last night Kadizzle watched a video explaining why a pendulum would not work in a plane to help you determine up down and sideways. If you had a pendulum in a plain don't believe it is pointing down. Now on the other hand if you see something on Fox News it might also be a good idea not to believe it. The pendulum in the plane is influenced by things you may not be aware of. You also may not be aware of what is influencing the news. What do you believe? Don't believe that skinny guys are the cause of the food shortage. Don't believe poor people are the cause of poverty. Don't believe you can pick up the change falling out of rich peoples pockets and survive. Don't believe anything the Republican Party supports.
What can you believe? Gravity is pretty reliable. Exploiting ignorant people is pretty easy. Psychopaths are good at running for office. If you buy enough lottery tickets you will win the lottery. Who knows what to believe?
North Dakota has a couple of right wing newspaper writers. Scott Hennen is the worst, and the Fargo Forum sponsors a couple of other despicable characters. Now and interesting phenomenon, Rob Port used to be caught up in the right wing fantasy, however a strange thing happened, Port got Covid. Kadizzle had a Jihad going with Port for a long time, but after Covid, Port seemed to become more rational and moved away from his right wing positions. To the amazement of Kadizzle a bad case of Covid seems to have cured Port of a bad case of Fox News mania. Today Port wrote a very good article about the simple mindedness of the Republican Party as it destroys itself with the Trump gang. Kadizzle actually wrote Port and congratulated him on a good job. Never did Kadizzle think such a day would come, but if more Republicans would seek to save their party from the insanity that has infected it, it could be a good thing, and perhaps there could be some good come out of Covid if it is attacking the Republcian brain cells that infested Trump.
Kadizzle used to be Quin the Eskimo living in North Dakota, but since assuming life in Arizona we are dedicated snowbirds. Losing track of the seasons happens when you live in perpetual summer. Friends back in North Dakota are experiencing the usual cold winds, wind chill, and ice with snow. Life in the Earth Module has been full of perfect days. It seems too lucky. Some sort of winter is bound to come. The temperatures are easing down and soon we may need some heat puffs in the morning.
The trail crew has managed to clear some of the local trails and the ebikes have been humming along. Now we have several sets of ebike buddies in the campground. Kadizzle took a couple of uncoordinated ebike newbees on the trail. Their incompetence was dangerous, and they had some low end bikes that made it worse. If you buy an ebike to go on trails get a good one. Make sure you get tubeless tires. Another important thing is full suspension. It makes a big difference. If on the other hand you want to be a sidewalk putter, a less expensive bike will do. There are two types of motors. One type is called a hub motor, and the other is a mid drive. Kadizzle suggest the mid drive for serious bikers. The hub drive does have some advantages. Some bike have throttles, and others you must peddle to make the bike move. If you have any questions feel free to call.
Kadizzle was so disgusted with the story about Jason Heitkamp parking a truck at the legislature that had "Fuck Biden" on the tailgate that Kadizzle called Jason Heitkamp. The man is an incredible liar and does it very poorly. First he said it was not his truck, then he said a friend gave him a ride in the truck. He tried various ways to deny he had anything to do with it. The lettering on the back of the truck was very large and it would be hard not to notice, but Heitkamp said he did not know the sign was there. Another fault of the lie was the truck was in his parking space. Unless his friend comes to spend all day at the legislature why was the truck there all day?
Oh Lord, don't let that cold wind blow 'til I'm too old to die young
Sleeping seems like a job. Kadizzle wakes up exhausted. It seems to be the dreaming. All night long the head buzzes inventing insane plays. Kadizzle wakes up around three and wonders how does this work. The best explanation Kadizzle has been able to find is neurons fire at random. Each neuron seems to be a packet of information. The mind is very good at quickly patching things together. Think about it this way. You take a cup full of little squares, each square has a word on it, you shake it up and throw the words on the table. The job of the mind is to quickly make a story out of the words. Maybe that is what dreaming is. However, the mind is a super computer and can put together an entire play instantly. How does this work? Every night Kadizzle awakens and tries to figure out how this happens. Sometimes the things that influence the dream can be figured out. One thing about the dreams are they get time so out of synchronization. In the dream Kadizzle is 70 in a play where he should be 20. His mind might be his current mind, but his body is twenty. Is there such thing as a dreaming disorder? One dream a night would be fine, but this goes on all night long.
About three in the afternoon happy hour takes place at the Earth Module. Yesterday sounded like a book club meeting. The intellectuals were recommending books to each other. The topics at the meeting are far ranging, whatever you read, Forest Service gossip, politics, and of course story telling. The group has a wide range of backgrounds. One has a PHD, another masters degree, and Winky and Kadizzle are each 3/4 masters degree. Naturally we are all experts on just about everything. All the attendees are liberals, Republicans are strongly discouraged. Should one show up they are welcome, but will be attacked viciously on their views. The group has people from diverse backgrounds, university teachers, coal miner, banker, forester, warehouse worker, nurse, and investigator.
A long time ago Kadizzle worked with a wise, but little educated man. Duane had a saying Kadizzle liked. Duane would say " He lives in a small world". Too many people live in a small world.
Jackie is now part of our trail crew. Yesterday we officially went to work. Jackie discovered that in Old hours about four hours is eight hours. All the trail crew is over 71 years old with the oldest 75. Jackie is the only one under 70. After a hard days work we knocked off about 2:30. Jackie asked if this was a typical day. Yup, an eight hour day after you are 70 is closer to four. The trail work is not easy. We are brushing trails near camp. The worst part are the thorns. When your done it looks like your arm was in a shredder.
Was interesting seeing the reporting on the "big" rally at the capitol in Bismarck. Realistically the crowd of 3,000 was missing a zero. It was more like 300. When North Dakota holds an idiot's convention that is considered a good turnout. Kadizzle could sense the right wing nature of the North Dakota newspapers when they tried to puff up the numbers.
You can ask the computer when you will die. The first time Kadizzle did this the computer said he would die at 1:00 P.M. on October 1st of this year. The day came and Winky was disappointed. She had marked on the calendar the date hoping for some relief. Since Kadizzle is still alive he decided to ask the computer again about his time of death. The news was devastating. Kadizzle should already be dead. The program asks about your weight, your drinking habits, your exercise and if you are right or left handed. Not sure what that has to do with living, but maybe left handed people die sooner. Before the program calculated death right to the hour. Now it says there is 0 time left. Kadizzle is literally living on borrowed time according to the computer calculation. Not sure if Kadizzle feels lucky or scared. Well it does offer some opportunities. If someone says they are going to kill Kadizzle he can reply " That is ok I was supposed to be dead a few weeks ago." If anyone says " I wish you were dead", Kadizzle can say, well technically according to the computer I am." Maybe I am dead and just don't know it. At any rate it removes a big burden knowing you are already dead. They should have a special rate for dead people, just like they do for senior citizens. When they ask how old you are, you can say " I am dead". How do you prove your dead. Well you will need the internet. Kadizzle may go back to the computer program and adjust a few things to see if he can eek out another year of life. A little more exercise and less drinking could bring him back to life.
Well, Kadizzle adjusted his life. He moved to the country, gave himself an average body, changed his outlook from realistic to optimistic, and upped the exercise a little. Good news he is alive again and will die in 2023. To be exact he will live for one year, 45 weeks, six days, five hours, 26 minuters, and it was 14 seconds, but now Kadizzle has used up several minutes. Oh, it is so good to be alive again. Now to figure out when in 2023 Kadizzle will be dead again. Of course there is the nuisance of having to exercise more. Not sure how Winky will take the news. She was kind of looking forward to less of a mess around here.
What a surprise today on the NPR website. An article featured Nimblewill. We met him years ago when he hiked through Hazen. He stayed with our friend Myra Axtman. Not so long after we met him in Hazen we were driving down the Columbia Gorge in Washington, there was Nimblewill walking down the road. The man has hiked tens of thousands of miles. When you turn off Fox News, put you gun down, and get off your ass you meet a lot of interesting people.
Howling coyotes kept us up all night. It was continuous. Kadizzle got up at 5:30 and chased them away. On the bike with the spotlight Kadizzle peddled in the dark. Down towards the lake he saw one big guy cross the road. Then he saw a pair of green eyes looking back in the brush. The coyote party will not be tolerated tonight. Usually they howl for a little while then stop. These coyotes have become very used to humans. Once when we were near Death Valley Winky set out some meat to thaw on the steps of the camper. Withing minutes a coyote was there to steal the meat. Kadizzle saw his reflection and chased him away just in time.
A couple years ago the coyotes could be seen walking by with a domestic dog following. The coyotes tolerated the dog, but made him walk about ten yards behind the pack. It is interesting how animals have become used to humans. A huge Elk walked through the yard of our new home in Payson. Elk wander the city. Somehow animals seem to know when hunting season is. All the fires have forced many of the animals to move closer to humans.
