Scott R. : The Quillayute Cowboy: 2017

Oh yeah…, another trip around the sun…, and damn, that was a quick one. But they all are these days. This trip won’t officially end for me for a few more days yet…, but it is close enough to reflect back on it a bit…, I guess. I did manage to slow down long enough to slip a secret weapon into my wallet before I turn 65…, though I do hope to hell that I don’t get any more use out of that Medicare Card than I got out of the secret weapon that wore out a couple of wallets back in the junior and high school days…, when it seemed like the years would never end…, and it seemed that I would never get a chance to get that secret weapon out and use it.

Hear 'em singing happy birthday

Better think about the wish I make

This year gone by

Ain't been a piece a cake.

Everyday’s a revolution

Pull it together and it comes undone

Just one more candle

And a trip around the sun.

Well…, I don’t know what I could wish for.., that I haven’t already got…, and I just don’t have room for much more of any material things anyway. OK…, I’ll just wish for one more ice cold beer…, and that’s never far out of reach here in The Saddle Bar(n). You can keep the cake…, but I will warn you that processed white sugar is not good for you..., there is ample evidence that white sugar robs the body of B vitamins, disrupts calcium metabolism and has a deleterious effect on the nervous system.

I guess I could wish for world peace…, but that isn’t conducive to economic growth. And the military industrial complex…, or as I refer to it…, the Bomb and Bullet Builders, are about the only economic engine still firing these days. I have always contended that the Wee Bush drug us into the Iraq War with lies about weapons of mass destruction and mushroom clouds on the horizon in order to “get the economy going.” That worked just well enough to get him re-elected…, and if the economy would have held on just a little longer and it hadn’t all blown up in his face…, he could have smirked off to paint his toe nails in his bathtub…, swearing that it was all Obama’s fault. Obama knew the score as well…, but played the game a little better. Not nearly as many empty American boots on parade during his watch…, but maybe I should add “Drones” to my Bomb and Bullet Builders tag…, and note that he left a lot of bootless foreign bodies behind in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, Somalia, Yemen, Pakistan…, and who knows where all else. Now…, the current degenerate killer occupying the White House seems to be catching on quick and forgetting what he campaigned on. Yeah…, 59 Tomahawk missiles, at about 1.59 million dollars apiece to Raytheon, unleashed for reasons at least as dubious as the reasons for the Wee Bush’s 15 year war on Iraq. More troops are being sent into battle in more hot spots and more US strikes have been carried out in Yemen during a recent five day period than were launched during any other full year on record. As I write this…, there is a US Navy task force steaming full speed ahead to North Korean waters and Trump has unleashed a MOAB…, Mother Of All Bombs on Afghanistan . Why waste a wish…, who knows how many more I will get? I’m not taking any chances with that damn processed white sugar though…, so maybe I will fare thee well for a few more trips around the sun yet.

I'm just hangin’ on while this old world keeps spinnin’

And it's good to know it's out of my control.

If there's one thing that I've learned from all this livin’

Is that it wouldn't change a thing if I let go.

Well…, don’t worry. I’m not about to let go. I wouldn’t miss this upcoming circus for all the tea in China. Speaking of China…, they seem to be building some suspicious looking island just off their coast and over 10,000 miles off our US coast…, and we are squealing like stuck pigs that it is a military provocation directed at our Homeland. Practically an act of war…, I am sure John McCain would say. While at the same time…, we are shocked! And I do meant SHOCKED !…, that the damn Russians have the nerve to say, “What the fuck?” when we instigate a coup in Ukraine, accuse them of "invading" Crimea, and deploy missiles and the biggest troop and tank contingent since WW II in Poland…, about 10 miles from the Russian border . Is it any wonder that they want to find out what is going on in our muddled minds? There is no doubt that during the campaign, there was a massive electronic “phishing” expedition by the Russians. I made fun of it on my blog…, noting that I got some 800 hits in a month. It didn’t seem to scare me as much as it did the surveillance sleuths in our deep state “intelligence” agencies…, and if the Russians really meant any harm…, there is no evidence of it. And if they did help to defeat the blond toadstool who was hell bent on seeing just how far she could push them…, many thanks men…, many, many thanks. Or so I thought…, until the Trumpster showed his true toadstool colors. I would still much rather shake my head and wonder what goofy, oddball, doomed for failure plan the Trumpster will come up with next…, than sit here wondering just when the cackling hen would panic over another “phishing expedition” and pounce on the big red button…, or heaven forbid…, get loose with a bayonet in hand. I am pretty sure that she imbibed in excess processed white sugar in the past…, and the visual evidence confirms that she still does.

No you never see it comin’

Always wind up wondering where it went

Only time will tell

If it was time well spent.

It’s another revelation

Celebrating what I should have done

With these souvenirs

Of my trip around the sun.

A couple trips around the sun ago…, I penned a piece about the old home stomping grounds in north central Idaho and climate change. Since that time the area has experienced the worst forest fire season in history during the summer of 2015. While I was on the phone with my brother Larry…, he said, “Hold on…, the cops are here!” Hold on hell…, I made a run for it. Old Hippie habits die hard. It was OK though…, I grabbed a couple more beers out of The Saddle Bar(n) while I was out there. When I got back to the phone he said they were there issuing warnings…, not a mandatory evacuation at that time…, but to be ready for one if things got worse. Luckily they didn’t. This winter of 2016 – 17…, they got what still hasn’t been called…, but could be record snowfall…, with an abrupt warming and rain to follow close on. Flooding, slides and washouts…, the County issued a disaster declaration to free up funds so repair work could begin immediately, without a bid process. He works on a road crew for Clearwater County and I was expecting that he would probably be out working when I called. He returned my call about a week later and said that he had indeed been busy and that he had never seen anything like the weather they were experiencing. Yeah…, the Arctic has experienced 30 degree above normal temperatures, records are being broken monthly for temperatures and ice loss. An iceberg the size of Delaware is ready to calve off the ice shelf in the Antarctic and the glaciers there are melting at alarming rates, Greenland is pouring fresh water from its melting glaciers into the ocean and sea levels are rising the world over Practically the entire world got together and adopted the Paris Climate agreement during this last trip around the sun, determining that we had to do something about climate change immediately. But we needn’t worry…, it’s all a hoax…, so says our new President. I think someone has been slipping him the processed white sugar…, in bigly yuge doses.

I'm just hanging on while this old world keeps spinnin’

And it's good to know it's out of my control.

If there's one thing that I've learned from all this livin’

Is that it wouldn't change a thing if I let go.

Yeah…, I plan to hang around and watch the show…, maybe even participate in it now and then…, when the need arises. The CO2 levels that are widely believed to be a significant factor in warming up our little spaceship earth…, seems to have been kind to the potato garden and the pastures last year and the Spruce trees were producing cones like I have never seen. There were record worldwide grain crops last year and there is no place to store all the excess grain that the farmers don't want to sell at the low prices offered Yeah…, excess food and low prices…, world hunger solved…, right? Yeah…, make a wish. Anyway…, the dogs, horses, cats, chickens and ducks don’t seem too alarmed about the climate…, so I am not ready to panic either. The people of the world seem to almost yearn for some sort of catastrophic, world ending apocalypse…, whether it is Nostradamus predictions, the Mayan Calendar, the Hale Bopp Comet…, or Nibiru. I am more of a "Long Emergency" and "Catabolic Collapse" believer myself. The climate doomers feel that massive methane releases in the Arctic will dramatically accelerate the warming trend. I think old mother earth is trying to cool and de-acidify our dying oceans to hold off that methane release by feeding all that ice cold glacier melt into them. So…, I guess I really don’t know for sure what is going to happen…, but I do know one thing for sure…, I don’t want any processed white sugar…, but I will have another ice cold beer…, thank you…, and maybe a shot of 1800 reposado gold tequila.