Global Warming and Our Truck

We, that would be my brother and I,  have this Ford F150 and it is not new but we like it because it hauls wood real well and it can plow through the woods out of the reach of blood-lusting ticks while all the time in 4 wheel drive. We do not see it as a chick magnate due to it being not so pretty and then neither are we. It does function well and it can be repaired by an idiot and that would include me---but not my brother.

We park it in the woods right next to a sturdy oak tree, one that has been there for at least 100 years. The tree acts as a shield from the sun and hail plus it is a attractive setting for the iconic symbols of man and nature.

Not long ago while on an adventure to the forest to secure a years fuel supply, on approaching the handsome truck, it was impossible not to notice a very large branch had landed smack on the vehicle, right across the right mirror, fender and windshield. Under the branch, and that would be a branch from the aforementioned oak, was some visible damage including a mirror that had been liquidated, a dented fender and a broken windshield.

My first response was to approach my brother on whose properity the truck resides. Being sensitve and thoughtful, but still intent on resolution, I mentioned to him his tree had fallen on the truck and did extensive damage that certainly would devalue the beautiful machine. I was leaning toward compensation, maybe a warm appology, maybe an offer to have it brought back to it's once pristine condition---it was his tree.

He made the gesture that I was insinuating it was his fault, which of course I was doing. He then took the position that he was not home at the time and had no opportunity to prevent it, but had he been there he would have physically prevented the accident with feats of great strength. I noted that no limb had ever fallen from the tree before so it must have been his doing.  At that point there was great dissertation on his part about how the severing of the limb occurred during a large blow from the heavens therefore it was all of God's fault. Included in the diatribe was a notation on his good standing with the All Powerful and thus he was as pure as the driven snow and without and fault what so ever.

While I took umbrage with his claiming of naive innocence, and certainly the bit on purity, from a legal point of view, it seemed the case was weak. He in a rather arrogant tone suggested I take it up with the higher powers, meaning God himself or is it herself. It was if he knew the Great Father was going to tell me to buzz off right then and there.

That set me off in such a way as to get me thinking about filling a small lawsuit, not against my brother but to God. Initially, I figured the doucumnt could be forwarded to every major religion in the world and see if I could get a response but after talking to some friends well versed in various religions, that appeared to be a dead end. So I prayed, asking the Lord to help me out on this one becasue his tree had plopped on my truck thus I needed some compensation.

In a moment of inspiration I heard a voice, essentially a letter back, saying as follows (paraphrased), " I made a perfectly reasonable White oak tree, a very elegant tree, one that is used for flavoring in spirits, one that is profoundly strong and the limb is flat stuck on your truck. It is not that you are an idiot, but things happen (I think he said things) they are random and it hit your stinking truck. Get over it."

I thought, "Ya but, that tree has never lost a branch before, what's the deal?" There was a pause and I think I heard Him say, "On that evening, the south east wind I put together for some reason had an extra punch, just did. Worse that I expected for some reason". There was again a pause, He said, "You clowns need to listen up. I gave you a nice place with reasonable weather, then you dump a lot of crap in the atmosphere and the weather changes. That weather broke my particularly spectacular limb which got you smelly truck. I think you better reconsider who you are blaming".

Revolution Watch----Medical Care Changes

The local news paper showed up today with an all-to familiar headline---"Reduce Workforce". In reading thought the piece the usual suspects are mentioned, reduced patient usage, reduced insurance reimbursements and the sequester initiated by the federal government. In truth, the Ministry Medical organization is a big operation but still 250 full time jobs in a field that was supposed to be secure from layoffs due to increasing numbers of duffers, coots, blue hairs and codgers---my people, that is something of note.

So why are revenues and patient usage being reduced when the local population has not decreased? I found that to be a bit odd but thinking back a couple off weeks I recalled going to the local facility (and it is through Ministry), registered Ann for a comprehensive test. WE then then found out for the first time that they wanted the co-pay right then and there---no bill a month from now. I didn't think much of it because we have the money and it was not huge. What did get my attention is had this been a big deal, say for $10K or more they would have demanded the money in order to let you in. Bingo.

There have to be a lot of folks out there that could not come up with the money and if their credit cards are maxed out, they might well be shit-out-of-luck. Do the potential customers then stay home, thus not using the facility, thus not adding to the revenues and thus dying like our friend Big Al did because he lacked funds?

To top it off, many people are losing their insurance all together or having it cut back in coverage, all adding to this rather fast race to the bottom. Does this mean folks will not take care of themselves? Will this be like third world nations were the poor, or sorta poor just go without and become cripples or die?

In the mean time, jobs are lost, good paying jobs possibly, and then those people can not contribute to the economy either and maybe loose their coverage. So what it looks like, as we move into the continued austerity (sequester),  is a snow-balling affect. However, I am a tad struck by the need to decrease our standard of living and the basic needs of citizens. Odd that the rich are getting richer but the middle class is getting poorer. Stock market is going up like crazy---oh, that's right, only the rich have stocks. This damn revolution is getting ugly.

Primo Bird Watching

So, today I am sitting on my favorite leather sofa contemplating the world situation and  look out to the bird feeder to see if the stinking  Gray Squirrels are looting my sun flower seeds. But there sitting on the feeder's  edge is this very blue bird (not a bluebird because they do not do seeds) scarfing up a nice selection of black sunflower seeds.

I take a second look having never seen a bird of this color on this particular feeder becks being in town has its limitation and while we get Cardinals, a couple kinds of Nut Hatches, three different wood peckers, some finches note and a bunch of brown jobbies, but not any blue ones.  Initially, I'm thinking we have a Indigo Bunting but the bird is bigger and more impressive. Shortly after this visit, a Rose Breasted Grosbeak shows up, which is also a first here in town.

Point is I am stumped just a bit. Oddly, my brother calls and goes into a great rant about how at the moment he has 5 male Inigo Buntings on his feeder sucking up seeds. In academic necessity, I shoot a picture to Mary Jo and she seems to think it is a Bunting as she too is have Bunting sightings. They are on the move those Buntings. Interestingly, everybody is also seeing Grosbeaks but mostly the Rose-Breasted.

So I get to looking around and I find there is a Blue Grosbeak and it is bigger like the RB Grosbeak. About then I start getting puffed up like a toad because it is looking to me like, yes it is  a Blue. Oh ya, I am cool and the other Indigo Bunting afectionatoes can go climb a tree because I have the real thing.

Besides the Blue Grosbeak it was 80 degrees today and an excellent night for a couple of Door County gin and tonics to celebrate. Very pleasant, I must say.

Finding a Folsom Point

Our family has always had this interest in collecting so called, "arrowheads" by wandering through the farm fields of Central Wisconsin. For the most part, we just did it without totally grasping all we were seeing, after all we were just punk kids finding a little entertainment, and I suppose reliving the lives of the First Americans that traveled the same rivers we called out home.

On some occasions the fields on Buffalo Lake coughed up bones because the farmers plows eventually dug into the mounds and graves they lay scattered across the land. Never thought much of it but in looking at it now, it seems almost macabre. There were bodies out there and we had no respect, no real interest. It was like, "Hey, tough luck buddy". As time went along, we did learn about the peoples that were here not much before we arrived, really only a couple hundred years. For that matter even as a kid there were still a few passing through to fish. The graves were probably not all that old.

We did learn ultimately that the Natives had been in the area for some 10-12 thousand years at least, the so called paleolithic Indians. They were here living their mostly-sustainable lives hunting and gathering right out in front of the retreating glaciers. As time passed their "arrow points" went through many transitions with each age being identifiable by an educated individual. As a result, we would find small triangular points we called bird points that actually were arrowheads but very recent. We also found the bigger points we know now were used on hand thrust spears and for darts thrown with the use of an atlatal, or throwing stick.

Turns out the bow and arrow has not been around very long at all, so mostly what we see are dart points. These points are just too big to be useful with a piddly little bow.

Among the knowledgeable, certain points are known to be associated with the earliest Natives, so that when one is now found it can be said to be 10 thousand years or better old. One of these is the Folsom Point. They are now found over the entire USA, thus confirming the paleolithic man wondered the entire nation at a very early age--and it would appear there were lots of them, more than originally thought.

All in all,  it is exciting stuff, that is to hold a ten thousand year old point in your hand, knowing the last person to touch it was from that time. Also interesting is that each point tells a story of sorts, not that it still has DNA on it but it can show the piece had been sharpened repeatedly, that the top had been ground to prevent cutting of the hafting. Here is a Folsom Point (upper one) found just south of here. A rare find indeed, a magical find if you will. I'm still a bit puffed up thinking I was the second person to handle the tool since Bill-Travels-With-the-Wind tossed it over ten thousand years past. Maybe it got him a nice caribou so he and the family could spend a nice couple of weeks hitting the hot spots on the Fox River. Then again----


It also tells me, we late arrivals, we have been here only a short time and while the First Nations peoples are still around, we may not be doing real well at being even slightly sustainable. They may have tripped through these parts for up to 20 thousand years. What do you suppose we will look like in that amount of time? A person recently noted that prior to the oil boom in N. Dakota the only thing increasing in numbers up there was buffaloes and Natives. That oil will go away real soon.

Music in These Here Hills---Small Hills

It comes to pass that music is part of our lives, and it is not just the Sound of Music---(We do play Some Where over the Rainbow), but the actual attempt to play music. Admittedly, most of it has a Celtic slant but the Good, Bad and the Ugly is not Celtic and it does not describe the likes of us---I don't think. Well?

It also involves the enjoyment of a nice refreshment and the exchange of various anecdotes, some of which involve political observations and humors adventures, some of which can not be included here, hey. Because most of us have now live to be over 60 (if I recall) the inglorious past has extended out there for a yard and a half, if youses knows what I mean. So we can draw on some historical adventure dating to the Eisenhower administration. OK, Truman administration and as a result many chortles and belly-busters are the call of the day.

Still, it is the music that has kept us at it, and it sure looks like we will carry on as long as the beer is good and the fellowship is understandable, not to mention the camaraderie of lost souls.

The Sturgeon----The Yearly Trip repeated for Thousands of Years

First off, the Sturgeon is a very interesting animal, a fish yes, that has by all appearances been around for many thousands of years. Oh really, probably hundreds of thousands, if not millions. Not being a ichthyological paleontologist, I am in no position to say except the fish is really a primitive thing---at least in looks.

I swear I have seen fossils of them or one of their close ancestors. They do look like swimming dinosaurs with their spiked backs and bottom-feeding type mouths. Almost monsters, like Nessie of the Loch, they drift through our lakes sucking on the bottom cleaning up anything digestible and probably some not so digestible---much like fund managers on Wall Street. In a sense they seem shark-like (think Wall Street), as if they should be in the ocean. Maybe they once were and are just left overs from a time when seas covered over this area.

One of the more striking aspects of the monsters is their size. Recently, they arrived in the Wolf River for their yearly spawning run and there right in front of the crowds were fish in excess of 100 pounds, fat and ready to lay eggs. They got a late go of it this year because the 53 degree temperatures needed to run, came late and once hit, they all came in great profusion, tons of them, all stacked up like wiggling cord wood. It was a sight be seen. And many human sorts came to see them, hundreds of Sturgeon marveling affectionatoes stood, camera in hand, watching the fish get it on, do their deed, and engage in the carnal frolic. No, I didn't get off on it.

On the information displays, it pointed out that the sturgeon species in lake Winnebago and Poygan have been doing this since the last ice age, that is coming to the exact same spots on the Wolf. I also noted that it was pointed out they had human Sturgeon guards, folks posted 24/7 to protect the fish, for in the past there were poachers. Wow, that is interesting. Dudes actually spearing the fish for food.

That got me thinking a bit and realized this was an event that no doubt got the attention of Native Americans as well. 100 pound fish, now that is some food. One can only imagine the rush that went on 2 thousand years ago to secure the years supply of easy-to-catch yummy Sturgeon. It had to be part of their yearly life cycle. Me, I simply would be happy to swim up stream with my wife, metaphorically speaking of course. For this afternoon, I had to be content just to watch one hell of incredible ritual of nature and imagine the role it once played in First Americans yearly cycles. 

Revolution Watch ------Egypt and the Facts

I am a fan of statistics in that many times they tell a story that is not seen in public discourse. I collect them from the CIA Factbook, Worldwatch, The UN, Pew, and multitude of other sources. Sometimes information is just laid out there and it is impossible not to be stunned. Yesterday, I read that we just crossed the 400 parts per million of CO2 in the atmosphere. We have been told repeatedly that if we can not hold the count to 350 we will not be able to keep the temperature increase below a 2 degree C gain--this is a point at which life as we know it can not be maintained---so it is said. Oops.

Then I stumbled on this from Chris Martensen an economist with a penchant for looking at conditions outside of economics. This is the situation in Egypt as seen in statistics.

The relentless math:
Population 1960: 27.8 million
Population 2008: 81.7 million
Current population growth rate: 2% per annum (a 35-year doubling rate)
Population in 2046 after another doubling: 164 million
Rainfall average over whole country: ~ 2 inches per year
Highest rainfall region: Alexandria, 7.9 inches per year
Arable land (almost entirely in the Nile Valley): 3%
Arable land per capita: 0.04 Ha (400 m2)
Arable land per capita in 2043: 0.02 Ha
Food imports: 40% of requirements
Grain imports: 60% of requirements
Net oil exports: Began falling in 1997, went negative in 2007
Oil production peaked in 1996
Cost of oil rising steeply
Cost of oil and food tightly linked
-Chris Martenson

Strange thing about these statistics is that Egypt is not alone. Many of the countries in the region are no better off. Yes, some are still exporting oil which can be used to purchase things like food---and many like to buy guns. Almost all of them have declining oil production.

I have also noticed that the USA and a few other big powers are willing to jump into the fray of these unstable countries if they are still exporting oil---Libya for example, but if they are not we just let them kill each other---Syria. So what might be in store for Egypt, a country thought to be very unstable? Not pretty.

The really sad part of it is the Egyptians themselves are clueless as to what the problems are and armed with the internet and its broadcasting of the ways of the wealthy, like us, they want it all. Hardly blame them. But really, there appears no way to get from there to here. Egypt is not alone.  Double population in 35 years, right!

Spring Startup of International M--A Good Day for Gasoline

It was warm today and after some invigorating garden work, and, oh yes, a frosty Ranger beer, it seemed appropriate to put some gasoline to good use. It is not that I used the petrol to work, or get work done but purely for entertainment. Now, I know some will say this is just wasting fuel in a time of scarcity but after watching a couple monster pickups go by, all of them empty, and hearing the neighbor rev up his rather hot race type car, it seemed reasonable to get the 1928 International M going.

I gave it a shot of either (another petroleum product) down the throat and primed the fuel pump and after only one rotation it fired up like it had never been turned off. There it ran just pushing rods hither and yon, smoking nicely, rotating cams, spinning those big fly wheels and dripping some oil.

Now there is a piece of machinery, all 600 pounds of cast iron pushing out that monstrous 3 HP. What a hunk of history. Interestingly, I have heard farmers say they got one of these in 1928 and used it every day until 1955. Might have changed bearings that took all of an hour, but once started it would run for days.

Truly, a marvel for folks who had to do much work by hand until these things showed up around 1900. It is absolutely amazing how many of them are still around, and still able to be brought to life. Saw hundreds of them this last weekend in Baraboo, including this marine engine once used to power a launch. Thing of beauty.

So today I burned some fossil fuel for about 45 minutes so the Chinese couldn't get it, and to add to the greenhouse gasses, and I didn't do anything except marvel and watch it spin. The beer added to the thrill but I am easily pleased.