It's been a while

I was going to try and post more often, but you can see how that worked out. Seems like every time I think I might blog, something comes up; when I don't have anything to do, my mind goes blank or I don't feel up to it. It's amazing that some of my friends and readers still come here, considering how irregular my posting seems to be. For all of those who come here, thank you.

It's a little warmer than usual around here lately; we have been getting a wee bit of snow in the mountains, but no enough to do any good. Precipitation here in the valley has been almost nonexistent. It is getting too dry around here. Even with low temperatures, the lack of moisture could have deleterious effects on dormant vegetation. Hopefully we will get some rain soon, though I am not looking forward to snow. The air pressure has been acting like a yo-yo, so my joints have been very unhappy; some days I have to struggle to tie my shoes and walk to the mailbox, other days it just hurts without limiting me too much. Growing old really sucks.

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I can't say I'm impressed with the federal government and their handling of the financial crisis. They all vote to bail out a bunch of incompetents, and then start asking for more money. From what I can see, all they are doing is trying to see who will kiss their asses for some money, and how much they pucker up will determine how much they get. The auto manufacturers are the ones that really annoy me; they do a piss-poor job of designing and making cars, and then want the taxpayers to save their butts, without giving any reason to doubt they will go belly-up again. It seems to me if they are going to get some loot from the deal, they should have to do some major restructuring. And the auto workers are going to have to come down off the clouds and join the rest of the working class in this country. They are not without blame in this.

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I don't really understand India; they have a poorly trained police force (due to lack of funds, they say), but why is it they have enough money to have a nuclear weapons program? Seems to me if you want to protect your citizens, you start on the ground level. Of course, letting the people people protect themselves wouldn't hurt. Terrorists (who are cowards at heart, and don't try to convince me otherwise) look at places like Dombai the same way the crazies in this country look at schools and malls: as low-risk, target-rich environments.

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I see where the firearms industry is doing well for right now; a lot of people feel that there is going to be an offensive against their 2nd Amendment rights under the new administration; I think they're right. Expect the federal government to chip away at the 2nd Amendment, the same way they have been chipping away at the rest of the Bill of Rights. If you don't think the Bill of Rights is being eroded, you haven't been paying attention. Of course, the mainstream media paints a different picture; they manage to distort facts, hide stuff, and tell plain-vanilla lies.

"If you don't read the newspaper you are uninformed, if you do read the newspaper, you are misinformed."
-Mark Twain

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Mainly a lot of old stuff, from several different genres. There has to be at least one or two favorites in this bunch.

"Werewolves of London" by Warren Zevon
"Strange Days" by The Doors
"The Shadow of Your Smile" by Tony Bennett
"Homeward Bound" by Simon & Garfunkel
"Amarillo by Morning" by Terry Stafford
"Summertime" by Reneé Olstead
"In the Misty Moonlight" by Dean Martin
"Yesterday" by Marianne Faithfull
"Five Feet High and Rising" by Johnny Cash
"In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" by Iron Butterfly (long version)

This version of a classic blues/jazz song being sung by Reneé Olstead is one of the newer ones. She is a singer-actress who has been around for a few years. At the time of the video below she was 17, but has been singing this type of music since her early teens. You may have seen her in movies and on TV in the past couple of years.