Tuesday, August 31, 2010
NIGHT O' THE SKUNK ! ! ! ! !
NIGHT O’ THE SKUNK!!!
Or ‘morning of the skunk’
We in CaulEEEfonia have been enjoying a wonderful (for human beings) summer of unseasonably, and record, sways in temperature. We have gone from mid-90’s days in very early spring to high 50-degree temps in July and August. The nights have regularly been in the high 40’s and low 50’s. I have been enjoying this summer a great deal, what with being a post-menopausal female with continuing hot flashes and night sweats.
So, even with these low temperatures, I run my fans at night, choosing to cover up with a variety of different light quilts in order to get that ‘perfect sleep’. And, oh has it been wonderful. One night a few weeks ago, I slept with only a sheet, after a day of 107-degree heat and an 89-degree evening, all three fans blowing the hell out of my hair, sweeping it around and tickling my face. It was hard to sleep that night, but nothing like my last one.
It was a lovely night of 52 degrees. Quiet and still, without the occasional high-speed and so, loud, acceleration of some high school boy’s souped up car that takes place on the road next to my bedroom. Ahhhh…… Lovely.
And then…and then….!!!! About 3AM, I was awakened by the stench of high-velocity skunk stink. This was no ‘skunk passing by’ kind of stink, but the Real Thing. This was a result of, no doubt, a real skunk spray attack. Yuck. The little bastard must’ve done it right outside my bedroom window. But I was sleeping hard and drifted off, thinking that it would go away by itself and I could continue my nice, quilted sleep.
But NOOOOOOO!!!!!!! The little devil – was it hit by a car in the street, still oozing that powerful smell? I couldn’t see anything outside my window, but I got up to pee, just in case that might become an even more annoying situation later in the early morning. I crawled back in bed after closing the windows and dropped off.
Speed ahead 3 more hours. When my clock alarmed, I was awakened to the lingering smell of Skunk. I got up, quickly dressed and grabbed some air freshener. It smelled the worst in my bedroom (of course – why not?) and the rest of the house had a hint of skunk, which could be addressed more easily.
I still have not located said skunk, so I can only imagine that some unlucky feral cat or dog wandering the streets was gassed, but good….well that animal and ME.
I wonder what necessary function is provided by skunks.
Monday, August 9, 2010
BE SURE YOU THINK FOR YOURSELF!
Over the last few years, I have watched the series 'Mad Men' with a lot of interest. At first, I thought, okay, great, another prime time soap opera. I couldn't have been more wrong. It's much, much more than that.
Without even thinking of the entertainment value of the show, I could go on and on about the underlying implications relative to our culture. That, of course, is the basis of the show. It takes place during the early 1960's, which is each season, basically, another year. We just started 1965 this season. Woven throughout the show are small revelations about how our culture operated 'back in the day'. Not the least of these is the way that institutions, in this case an ad agency, manipulate the public. It is the most important recurring theme in the show, but these are revealed subtly, which makes the show even more watchable.
Then, last night, after watching the latest episode of Mad Men, I ran across an old BBC production, 'The Century of The Self'. It is in four episodes and I have only watched two so far, but it is clear to me how connected these disparate shows really are. The BBC documentary is a straight up bit of reportage and Mad Men is pure entertainment, yet they speak the same language: The typical consumer is a person to be manipulated and used for the betterment of The Elites who, says the documentary, have been doing this for many decades by using scientific data to support their beliefs that they are in fact, the best people to make decisions for the world.
The idea disgusts me and yet it has stimulated a lot of introspection. Perhaps they are right to a degree. If The Public is so manipulable we aren't even aware, nor do many of us care, so long as we have The Next Big Thing in our pockets. We are a lazy populace in The West; lazy, fat, and mesmerized by all the various entertainments that our technology supplies to us, with a big bowl of fattening fast food to go with it.
Yet we continue to tout The American Way of Life. I hear it all the time and think, egad! is that what they are talking about? more and more consumer junk that we can pile on top of the older versions of whatever They have sold us in the past. We never seem to think of that these days.
Some of my favorite manufacturers use these techniques and I struggle to avoid the trap they set. Apple Computers is first on that list. Am I the only person who has wondered why they need to wait to install every last function in this, the latest version of the iPod, iPad, MacBook Pro, etc.? Apple certainly has the ability to put that camera in the iPad now, don't they? They have already announced that they have plans to install this function in the next version of the device. iPad 1.1 or would that be 2.0? This is beyond planned obsolescence, no? This is like bringing you to the edge of orgasm and holding off for 6 months. Manipulative?! No! It's more like a subtle kind of torture. Yet buyers line up overnight at every new Apple product release. I'm not sure they even care, so long as they can sport the latest thing. "Be the first on your block" I can remember from my childhood. I was born into this kind of thinking and it has only gotten more pervasive over the years.
If anyone reads this and wants to get the real lowdown on the subject, you can watch the four episodes here:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article12642.htm
We could all use a little education, eh?
Without even thinking of the entertainment value of the show, I could go on and on about the underlying implications relative to our culture. That, of course, is the basis of the show. It takes place during the early 1960's, which is each season, basically, another year. We just started 1965 this season. Woven throughout the show are small revelations about how our culture operated 'back in the day'. Not the least of these is the way that institutions, in this case an ad agency, manipulate the public. It is the most important recurring theme in the show, but these are revealed subtly, which makes the show even more watchable.
Then, last night, after watching the latest episode of Mad Men, I ran across an old BBC production, 'The Century of The Self'. It is in four episodes and I have only watched two so far, but it is clear to me how connected these disparate shows really are. The BBC documentary is a straight up bit of reportage and Mad Men is pure entertainment, yet they speak the same language: The typical consumer is a person to be manipulated and used for the betterment of The Elites who, says the documentary, have been doing this for many decades by using scientific data to support their beliefs that they are in fact, the best people to make decisions for the world.
The idea disgusts me and yet it has stimulated a lot of introspection. Perhaps they are right to a degree. If The Public is so manipulable we aren't even aware, nor do many of us care, so long as we have The Next Big Thing in our pockets. We are a lazy populace in The West; lazy, fat, and mesmerized by all the various entertainments that our technology supplies to us, with a big bowl of fattening fast food to go with it.
Yet we continue to tout The American Way of Life. I hear it all the time and think, egad! is that what they are talking about? more and more consumer junk that we can pile on top of the older versions of whatever They have sold us in the past. We never seem to think of that these days.
Some of my favorite manufacturers use these techniques and I struggle to avoid the trap they set. Apple Computers is first on that list. Am I the only person who has wondered why they need to wait to install every last function in this, the latest version of the iPod, iPad, MacBook Pro, etc.? Apple certainly has the ability to put that camera in the iPad now, don't they? They have already announced that they have plans to install this function in the next version of the device. iPad 1.1 or would that be 2.0? This is beyond planned obsolescence, no? This is like bringing you to the edge of orgasm and holding off for 6 months. Manipulative?! No! It's more like a subtle kind of torture. Yet buyers line up overnight at every new Apple product release. I'm not sure they even care, so long as they can sport the latest thing. "Be the first on your block" I can remember from my childhood. I was born into this kind of thinking and it has only gotten more pervasive over the years.
If anyone reads this and wants to get the real lowdown on the subject, you can watch the four episodes here:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article12642.htm
We could all use a little education, eh?
Monday, August 2, 2010
The Real Reason for the Wars
I have just seen the results of a CNN poll which asked if Democrats or Republicans could best protect us from ‘terrorism’ (my emphasis). The Dems got 33%, the Reps, 47%.
As many of you know already, framing a question or idea can lead to specific and planned-for results. In this case, the continuing use of the word “terrorism” is something I’d like to discuss. Or opine upon, since there is only one of me.
Terrorism is a highly charged word that is the last refuge of fighting people who have no military. The specific tools used in acts of terrorism can run from throwing rocks to IEDs, Improvised Explosive Devices, in other words, home-made bombs (oh my, the American culture does love its acronyms), something along the lines of a Molatov cocktail with flak on a timer or remote detonator; something to explode the thing, which holds heavy metal bits that can maim and kill. These things are certainly terrible, but to focus our attention on terrorism as an enemy of our country and now faced in the Middle East as well as at home, is confusing to most people. Terrorism sounds really, well, terrible. To produce terror? Well, these things certainly do that, but we should not be focusing our thinking (which is a powerful thing and something that can turn the tide and part the sea in the way a war is prosecuted) on the technique of the unfunded fighting people around the world. We should be focusing on the real reason for the war.
Back in the day (as they say), countries in the Middle East were pretty much off-limits to American capitalist enterprise. Those Muslim countries, which had some very strict laws, did not encourage the eat-everything-in-one-sitting ideas promoted by American and other Western businesses. But the real Elites (as The Right likes to call people whom they dislike and fear) in The West had other plans. Not only did the Middle East hold most of the remaining sources of oil, but there were a shit-load of consumers over there, if we could only get those women out from under Burqas and educate the men about tits and ass!! What an enormous pool of ignorant consumers that would prove to be! Why these folks barely have houses, what might they do if exposed to a big-screen TV, for instance? Or cosmetics? And fashion?!!!! Woweee-------What a gold mine that area could be for the thinking man’s capitalist.
Slowly, but surely, our country began to insert itself into the Middle East commercially (you know, those American Interests you keep hearing about in the media?) The Bush Administration, in particular, was pushing for this, offering American companies tax breaks for taking their operations to the Middle East and other countries with large pools of potential consumers.
The business machine in The West has effectively created a nice, fat bunch of users, eaters and consumers over here. Although I have had friends of mine disagree, advertisements are very effective in manipulating our minds. Why else would a product pay millions for placement in films and on TV? It’s a powerful message to an open, viewing public hungry for The Next Big Thing. No sooner has your iPod’s battery run down for the first time, than the next Device-of-the-Moment is offered to the hungry Western public. They just HAVE to have one in every color!
So getting American culture inserted in the Middle East was paramount in the plans to tap that potential consumer. Look what American companies have been able to do in India! We turned those people into wonderful consumers of the products of our American-owned companies. Now they all carry these multi-colored tech devices and literally eat up our fast food.
The day I learned in a hidden story in the media several years ago that Hooters had opened a restaurant in Amman, Jordon was the day I felt like giving up. But I’m not going to. Marsha has a mouth and she intends to keep using this one strong remaining ability I have as an aging human being. I have a mouth AND a mind. Stay tuned.
As many of you know already, framing a question or idea can lead to specific and planned-for results. In this case, the continuing use of the word “terrorism” is something I’d like to discuss. Or opine upon, since there is only one of me.
Terrorism is a highly charged word that is the last refuge of fighting people who have no military. The specific tools used in acts of terrorism can run from throwing rocks to IEDs, Improvised Explosive Devices, in other words, home-made bombs (oh my, the American culture does love its acronyms), something along the lines of a Molatov cocktail with flak on a timer or remote detonator; something to explode the thing, which holds heavy metal bits that can maim and kill. These things are certainly terrible, but to focus our attention on terrorism as an enemy of our country and now faced in the Middle East as well as at home, is confusing to most people. Terrorism sounds really, well, terrible. To produce terror? Well, these things certainly do that, but we should not be focusing our thinking (which is a powerful thing and something that can turn the tide and part the sea in the way a war is prosecuted) on the technique of the unfunded fighting people around the world. We should be focusing on the real reason for the war.
Back in the day (as they say), countries in the Middle East were pretty much off-limits to American capitalist enterprise. Those Muslim countries, which had some very strict laws, did not encourage the eat-everything-in-one-sitting ideas promoted by American and other Western businesses. But the real Elites (as The Right likes to call people whom they dislike and fear) in The West had other plans. Not only did the Middle East hold most of the remaining sources of oil, but there were a shit-load of consumers over there, if we could only get those women out from under Burqas and educate the men about tits and ass!! What an enormous pool of ignorant consumers that would prove to be! Why these folks barely have houses, what might they do if exposed to a big-screen TV, for instance? Or cosmetics? And fashion?!!!! Woweee-------What a gold mine that area could be for the thinking man’s capitalist.
Slowly, but surely, our country began to insert itself into the Middle East commercially (you know, those American Interests you keep hearing about in the media?) The Bush Administration, in particular, was pushing for this, offering American companies tax breaks for taking their operations to the Middle East and other countries with large pools of potential consumers.
The business machine in The West has effectively created a nice, fat bunch of users, eaters and consumers over here. Although I have had friends of mine disagree, advertisements are very effective in manipulating our minds. Why else would a product pay millions for placement in films and on TV? It’s a powerful message to an open, viewing public hungry for The Next Big Thing. No sooner has your iPod’s battery run down for the first time, than the next Device-of-the-Moment is offered to the hungry Western public. They just HAVE to have one in every color!
So getting American culture inserted in the Middle East was paramount in the plans to tap that potential consumer. Look what American companies have been able to do in India! We turned those people into wonderful consumers of the products of our American-owned companies. Now they all carry these multi-colored tech devices and literally eat up our fast food.
The day I learned in a hidden story in the media several years ago that Hooters had opened a restaurant in Amman, Jordon was the day I felt like giving up. But I’m not going to. Marsha has a mouth and she intends to keep using this one strong remaining ability I have as an aging human being. I have a mouth AND a mind. Stay tuned.
Saturday, July 31, 2010
The Tree, The Tree
The story of The Tree is a relatively long one, but I'll try to edit it down.
It started when Marc and I bought the house. We had a potted live "Christmas Tree" that we had had for a few years. There was a nice spot where an old, diseased willow tree had been cut down some years before, so I planted The Tree right in the middle of the stump. My plan was to let it grow up to a height where I could still manage cutting it down when it got too big, but what with a few setbacks, I was unable to cut it down at the time I had planned.
A large part of the reason was my new neighbor, Debbie, a 40-ish, skinny, thin-haired Brit who sport every cliche you can imagine to describe a Brit. Dour, mean-spirited, with absolutely no social graces. This woman would have been charred had she lived in The South.
Oddly enough, she is an emergency room nurse, so perhaps her behavior towards me is a result of pent up anxiety from a stressful job. Maybe she thinks it is acceptable to "kick the dog" (me) when she gets a little to much backlogged anger. Well, I had enough of that growing up, so she is looking toward the wrong person to interact on that level.
Things were bad enough after she moved in with her complaining about every little thing she didn't like about my yard. She actually suggested that my landscaping (I'm a master gardener and sculptor) was unacceptable to her and that I should adopt her style, you know, the typical English Garden where the owner battles nature at every turn. I'd sooner die than have a garden like hers. Now, my neighbor on the side feels pretty much the same way about the way I garden, but they don't understand what they have here. Other neighbors LOVE me because of my garden, knowing that the way I have added plants and changed things actually increased the value of their property. The other two, well.... not so much.
Come forward a couple of years. My husband, Marc, and I had split up, with a resulting financial crunch for me that made it impossible for me to do a lot of the strenuous work on the garden alone, which was how I had gardened in the past. I couldn't afford even a couple of laborers to help for quite awhile. I had already painted the exterior of my entire house over the first year after Marc moved out. Some of the big-time gardening, like cutting down The Tree, simply had to wait.
At that time, about 2 years ago, there was an argument between two of my other neighbors, they live adjacent to Debbie and me. Audie, a 60-something Genius Gardener and landscaper had begged and begged the other neighbors, the Two Dees to remove some materials that they had stored outside their fence that were truly an eyesore. Now Audie couldn't see this stuff from inside her fence, but when you start talking about car parts leaning against the fence, red yet, it's time for a little pow-wow amongst neighbors with everyone on their best behavior, with a mind focused on compromise and negotiation.
The Two Dees claimed that their property line reached all the way over the creek (more of a large drainage ditch really) to Audie's fence. The Man Dee told me about all this, so I took it upon myself to go down to the City to determine the truth for myself. Man Dee was wrong. In a strange turn of events beyond our control, it seemed that the property line was the other way around. Audie's (and therefore, Debbie's) property lines ran across the creek and ended just outside The Two Dee's and my fencelines. This is very odd. Normally, property lines will follow a landmark, like a creek, with the owner on each side of the creek owning into the middle of the creekbed. But I checked it and Man Dee was wrong, wrong, wrong.
The Two Dees and I have had an ongoing disagreement about handling an enormous sycamore tree in their yard that extends far over my property (and Audie's), cutting off a lot of the available sun and constantly dropped leaves and branchs all over the area. Man Dee and I are very allergic to the sycamore. Sycamores are very pretty trees that are known for the debris they generate. They are really considered "junk trees", sort of like privets (several of which The Two Dees also have on their property, which annually sprinkle privets babies around the entire neighborhood. Toss in the car parts and now Audie, who I know from personal experience had been very tolerant about the sun and debris issues, finally gave them an ultimatium about the car parts. She would've been happy with just that. Take away the car parts and there you have it. But NOOoooooo.....!!!!! The Two Dees drew a line in the sand, or in this case, dirt, and refused to removed these ugly materials.
I told them, point blank, that they were wrong about the property lines, but Man Dee stood me down and the next thing I knew, Audie was having a surveyor plot the property line. BINGO. Audie and I proved to be right about the fence line and the issue became bigger. Now Debbie realized that the area which she had thought was mine, was actually hers. Fine by me, I thought. It was just more backbreaking work for me to keep up the creeside, which has the usual problems with invasive plants of various kinds.
There were several, very nasty confrontations with Debbie. She was furious that, when I realized where the property line actually was, I didn't inform her. I asked her when I would've done that, since she and I have not had one pleasant or even civil conversation since the first month she moved in. She had claimed to be "a gardener", but proved to be the owner of a garden, not a gardener. She bemoaned the loss of her previous garden which the new owner had allowed to descend into disrepair, according to Debbie. When I told her that I was planning to cut down The Tree because it was leaning too far over, having been planted in The Worst place possible to provide the needed stability. Oh NOOOOO, she moaned. She loved that tree and didn't want me to cut it down. So I wasn't in any hurry to cut it. She claimed at that time that she loved the tree and the shade and privacy it provided her. After I had so many nasty confrontations about my own garden with her, I began to wonder if her old garden had simply been altered in a fashion of which she disapproved. She apparently didn't realize that The Tree was going to grow. Up and out.
She ranted, she raved! WHY had I not told her about the property line, after all, SHE "has (d) a life", implying that I didn't, so I had an extra responsibility to watch out after her life for her.
I asked her exactly when, since we never spoke to each other, I would have been expected to have told her. I suggested that we never talked and I didn't see that I had any responsibility to tell her anything. Everything I had ever said to her was promptly cut down severely, as though I knew nothing about landscape design or gardening. BAH. She even suggested that she was "paying taxes on that land", not realizing that tax rates here in California are based, not on the size of the plot of land, but on the sales price. But she wouldn't listen to me. She just ranted and raved.
The next thing you know, she was complaining about The Tree now. Parroting what I knew to be the attitude of Audie about the big sycamore tree and the blocking of the sun on her carefully tended property, she claimed that the tree was cutting out her sun. There was nothing back there at the time, so I knew, one again, this was no gardener.
So I, being in the financial straits I was in, left the tree there. She immediately wanted to work on the creeksides, installing several shrubs that she obviously chose to give her the best screen between her property and mine. I asked her to wait to install these plants until after I had cut down the tree, which she now complained about every time we found ourselves facing each other in our backyards.
Fast forward till now. I had saved up enough money to get my friend and pruning genius to help me cut it down. Even Marc donated some money and time on the project. It couldn't have gone any better. Every time I winced, thinking that my friend, Kirk, said pruning genius, had cut a limb and possibly damaged her plants, I quickly realized that the loose and small branches and pine needles were doing very little damage to the shrubs, only breaking a few (maybe 10) small branches on the shrubs, which were honestly none the worse for the wear.
Marc left to meet his friend for dinner and some music while Kirk and I talked. I gave him a haircut. He had worked so hard on the pruning and tree removal, I wanted to do something to take care of him, the way he had taken care of me in removing the tree. I was so excited. I have been wanting to cut down The Tree for about 6 or 7 years. It was done. And done beautifully. The limbs and branches were down in the bottom of the creek, nicely cut up into manageably-sized pieces, with no damage at all to any of Debbie's plants. Wow. I felt like I had had a great haircut or a pedicure. I was feeling all new and fresh, the The Tree now gone. Debbie was obviously going to be very happy to have the tree gone and with no damage done to her plants.
As I walked Kirk to his van, Debbie's daughter came walking down the sidewalk with a nasty little smirk on her face. She was obviously upset and tense. She asked me if I was planning to remove the tree parts in the creekbed. I laughed and said, "No, I'm planning to leave them right there." She did seem to realize that I was kidding, but said that there was 'extensive' damage to their rock wall and plants and that they expected me to remove the remaining tree parts by the end of tomorrow, Sunday that would be.
That, of course, wouldn't fly in The South, where I was raised. No one does major work on a Sunday, church-goer or not. Some serious Christians won't even go to a movie on a Sunday.
I told her that I needed help to remove the tree parts and that I wasn't sure when that might happen. She said something indistinct about it needing to be done immediately and turned around to leave. As she walked away, I said to her, "You know, your mother wanted that tree cut down." She paid me no attention and continued walking away. I called out, "you know the creekbed is a right of way and not your property." I don't know if she responded or not. She was, be now, out of (at least) my ear-range.
I decided I'd best get down there to see what kind of situation I was in (damage to the rock wall and plants?).....
Kirk had, as he would have, being the tree artiste he is, cut up the big limbs and branches into manageable bits and even neatly stacked them up alongside the creekside. There was nothing wrong at all with the rocks on either side of the creekbed. I'm not sure what this young woman was talking about. But, in an attempt to show good faith, I spent about a half hour moving some of the tree bits into a better location for removal from the scene, until 8PM, which is way past my best productivity. And that was that. I have permission from Audie to use a teeny bit of her land to access the creekbed, so I am not tresspassing on their land. They can just wait until I am in the mood to remove the rest of it. I might have been more inclined to get it out fast, had this moody child not confronted me when she has no legal leg to stand on, just more of the same old, same old grousing about their dissatisfaction with what they see in my yard. I have tactfully suggested that she install another fence if what she sees in my yard upsets her so, but she so far has chosen not to. Of course, I know that she is unable to do so without using my land, which I now will never allow. I'm just glad that I will never have to encounter her in the ER where she works. Sometimes, no action is the best revenge.
It started when Marc and I bought the house. We had a potted live "Christmas Tree" that we had had for a few years. There was a nice spot where an old, diseased willow tree had been cut down some years before, so I planted The Tree right in the middle of the stump. My plan was to let it grow up to a height where I could still manage cutting it down when it got too big, but what with a few setbacks, I was unable to cut it down at the time I had planned.
A large part of the reason was my new neighbor, Debbie, a 40-ish, skinny, thin-haired Brit who sport every cliche you can imagine to describe a Brit. Dour, mean-spirited, with absolutely no social graces. This woman would have been charred had she lived in The South.
Oddly enough, she is an emergency room nurse, so perhaps her behavior towards me is a result of pent up anxiety from a stressful job. Maybe she thinks it is acceptable to "kick the dog" (me) when she gets a little to much backlogged anger. Well, I had enough of that growing up, so she is looking toward the wrong person to interact on that level.
Things were bad enough after she moved in with her complaining about every little thing she didn't like about my yard. She actually suggested that my landscaping (I'm a master gardener and sculptor) was unacceptable to her and that I should adopt her style, you know, the typical English Garden where the owner battles nature at every turn. I'd sooner die than have a garden like hers. Now, my neighbor on the side feels pretty much the same way about the way I garden, but they don't understand what they have here. Other neighbors LOVE me because of my garden, knowing that the way I have added plants and changed things actually increased the value of their property. The other two, well.... not so much.
Come forward a couple of years. My husband, Marc, and I had split up, with a resulting financial crunch for me that made it impossible for me to do a lot of the strenuous work on the garden alone, which was how I had gardened in the past. I couldn't afford even a couple of laborers to help for quite awhile. I had already painted the exterior of my entire house over the first year after Marc moved out. Some of the big-time gardening, like cutting down The Tree, simply had to wait.
At that time, about 2 years ago, there was an argument between two of my other neighbors, they live adjacent to Debbie and me. Audie, a 60-something Genius Gardener and landscaper had begged and begged the other neighbors, the Two Dees to remove some materials that they had stored outside their fence that were truly an eyesore. Now Audie couldn't see this stuff from inside her fence, but when you start talking about car parts leaning against the fence, red yet, it's time for a little pow-wow amongst neighbors with everyone on their best behavior, with a mind focused on compromise and negotiation.
The Two Dees claimed that their property line reached all the way over the creek (more of a large drainage ditch really) to Audie's fence. The Man Dee told me about all this, so I took it upon myself to go down to the City to determine the truth for myself. Man Dee was wrong. In a strange turn of events beyond our control, it seemed that the property line was the other way around. Audie's (and therefore, Debbie's) property lines ran across the creek and ended just outside The Two Dee's and my fencelines. This is very odd. Normally, property lines will follow a landmark, like a creek, with the owner on each side of the creek owning into the middle of the creekbed. But I checked it and Man Dee was wrong, wrong, wrong.
The Two Dees and I have had an ongoing disagreement about handling an enormous sycamore tree in their yard that extends far over my property (and Audie's), cutting off a lot of the available sun and constantly dropped leaves and branchs all over the area. Man Dee and I are very allergic to the sycamore. Sycamores are very pretty trees that are known for the debris they generate. They are really considered "junk trees", sort of like privets (several of which The Two Dees also have on their property, which annually sprinkle privets babies around the entire neighborhood. Toss in the car parts and now Audie, who I know from personal experience had been very tolerant about the sun and debris issues, finally gave them an ultimatium about the car parts. She would've been happy with just that. Take away the car parts and there you have it. But NOOoooooo.....!!!!! The Two Dees drew a line in the sand, or in this case, dirt, and refused to removed these ugly materials.
I told them, point blank, that they were wrong about the property lines, but Man Dee stood me down and the next thing I knew, Audie was having a surveyor plot the property line. BINGO. Audie and I proved to be right about the fence line and the issue became bigger. Now Debbie realized that the area which she had thought was mine, was actually hers. Fine by me, I thought. It was just more backbreaking work for me to keep up the creeside, which has the usual problems with invasive plants of various kinds.
There were several, very nasty confrontations with Debbie. She was furious that, when I realized where the property line actually was, I didn't inform her. I asked her when I would've done that, since she and I have not had one pleasant or even civil conversation since the first month she moved in. She had claimed to be "a gardener", but proved to be the owner of a garden, not a gardener. She bemoaned the loss of her previous garden which the new owner had allowed to descend into disrepair, according to Debbie. When I told her that I was planning to cut down The Tree because it was leaning too far over, having been planted in The Worst place possible to provide the needed stability. Oh NOOOOO, she moaned. She loved that tree and didn't want me to cut it down. So I wasn't in any hurry to cut it. She claimed at that time that she loved the tree and the shade and privacy it provided her. After I had so many nasty confrontations about my own garden with her, I began to wonder if her old garden had simply been altered in a fashion of which she disapproved. She apparently didn't realize that The Tree was going to grow. Up and out.
She ranted, she raved! WHY had I not told her about the property line, after all, SHE "has (d) a life", implying that I didn't, so I had an extra responsibility to watch out after her life for her.
I asked her exactly when, since we never spoke to each other, I would have been expected to have told her. I suggested that we never talked and I didn't see that I had any responsibility to tell her anything. Everything I had ever said to her was promptly cut down severely, as though I knew nothing about landscape design or gardening. BAH. She even suggested that she was "paying taxes on that land", not realizing that tax rates here in California are based, not on the size of the plot of land, but on the sales price. But she wouldn't listen to me. She just ranted and raved.
The next thing you know, she was complaining about The Tree now. Parroting what I knew to be the attitude of Audie about the big sycamore tree and the blocking of the sun on her carefully tended property, she claimed that the tree was cutting out her sun. There was nothing back there at the time, so I knew, one again, this was no gardener.
So I, being in the financial straits I was in, left the tree there. She immediately wanted to work on the creeksides, installing several shrubs that she obviously chose to give her the best screen between her property and mine. I asked her to wait to install these plants until after I had cut down the tree, which she now complained about every time we found ourselves facing each other in our backyards.
Fast forward till now. I had saved up enough money to get my friend and pruning genius to help me cut it down. Even Marc donated some money and time on the project. It couldn't have gone any better. Every time I winced, thinking that my friend, Kirk, said pruning genius, had cut a limb and possibly damaged her plants, I quickly realized that the loose and small branches and pine needles were doing very little damage to the shrubs, only breaking a few (maybe 10) small branches on the shrubs, which were honestly none the worse for the wear.
Marc left to meet his friend for dinner and some music while Kirk and I talked. I gave him a haircut. He had worked so hard on the pruning and tree removal, I wanted to do something to take care of him, the way he had taken care of me in removing the tree. I was so excited. I have been wanting to cut down The Tree for about 6 or 7 years. It was done. And done beautifully. The limbs and branches were down in the bottom of the creek, nicely cut up into manageably-sized pieces, with no damage at all to any of Debbie's plants. Wow. I felt like I had had a great haircut or a pedicure. I was feeling all new and fresh, the The Tree now gone. Debbie was obviously going to be very happy to have the tree gone and with no damage done to her plants.
As I walked Kirk to his van, Debbie's daughter came walking down the sidewalk with a nasty little smirk on her face. She was obviously upset and tense. She asked me if I was planning to remove the tree parts in the creekbed. I laughed and said, "No, I'm planning to leave them right there." She did seem to realize that I was kidding, but said that there was 'extensive' damage to their rock wall and plants and that they expected me to remove the remaining tree parts by the end of tomorrow, Sunday that would be.
That, of course, wouldn't fly in The South, where I was raised. No one does major work on a Sunday, church-goer or not. Some serious Christians won't even go to a movie on a Sunday.
I told her that I needed help to remove the tree parts and that I wasn't sure when that might happen. She said something indistinct about it needing to be done immediately and turned around to leave. As she walked away, I said to her, "You know, your mother wanted that tree cut down." She paid me no attention and continued walking away. I called out, "you know the creekbed is a right of way and not your property." I don't know if she responded or not. She was, be now, out of (at least) my ear-range.
I decided I'd best get down there to see what kind of situation I was in (damage to the rock wall and plants?).....
Kirk had, as he would have, being the tree artiste he is, cut up the big limbs and branches into manageable bits and even neatly stacked them up alongside the creekside. There was nothing wrong at all with the rocks on either side of the creekbed. I'm not sure what this young woman was talking about. But, in an attempt to show good faith, I spent about a half hour moving some of the tree bits into a better location for removal from the scene, until 8PM, which is way past my best productivity. And that was that. I have permission from Audie to use a teeny bit of her land to access the creekbed, so I am not tresspassing on their land. They can just wait until I am in the mood to remove the rest of it. I might have been more inclined to get it out fast, had this moody child not confronted me when she has no legal leg to stand on, just more of the same old, same old grousing about their dissatisfaction with what they see in my yard. I have tactfully suggested that she install another fence if what she sees in my yard upsets her so, but she so far has chosen not to. Of course, I know that she is unable to do so without using my land, which I now will never allow. I'm just glad that I will never have to encounter her in the ER where she works. Sometimes, no action is the best revenge.
Friday, June 18, 2010
"I think it's a tragedy of the first proportion that a private corporation would be subjected to what I would characterize as a 'shakedown,' - in this case, a $20 billion shakedown." - Joe Barton, R-Texas
OK, so now the Dems are going to be putting this quote on every last mailer they send out, but you have to say that they are entitled. What on earth was this guy thinking? To offer an apology to BP on camera during the Congressional hearing on the oil disaster in the Gulf makes me wonder if this guy is mentally 'there'. Barton has held his position since 1985. This would be one person that I could see losing his next election. We know that he is one of the biggest receiver of funds from Big Oil and then he just shoved the nose of the nation right into the pile of oil out there in the Gulf. He and the Republicans deserve whatever comes their way over this.
We now know that the deregulation that allowed the Deep Water Horizon to be built in the first place was one of the deregulatory decisions made in Dick Cheney's infamous meeting with Big Oil just after the 2000 'election'. No wonder he would never say what took place! The damage done over those 8 years will take decades to undo, if it is even possible to undo it at all.
I found a website that shows the size of the oil spill superimposed over different locations so that people can get an idea of exactly how big it is.
http://www.ifitwasmyhome.com/
See it from your own perspective and you will get even more angry that you probably already are.
I can't seem to stop thinking of all the wildlife that is dying down there. The people's lives will not return to normal for many years, experts are now saying, as they grapple with the unknown. Nothing like this has ever happened, so no one really knows what to do to fix it. There was a similar occurance in Russia where a small 'tactical' nuke was used to seal the leak, but this one is leaking along a fissure, with a new leak discovered 20 miles away from the initial leaks. Now they are wondering what might happen if this fissure is toyed with any more. I used the term 'toyed' loosely, of course, favored over cruder terms that I am really thinking.
Maybe some wunderkind will come along and solve this. But maybe it will continue to gush into the Gulf with disasterous effects that we can now only imagine. My heart hurts.
OK, so now the Dems are going to be putting this quote on every last mailer they send out, but you have to say that they are entitled. What on earth was this guy thinking? To offer an apology to BP on camera during the Congressional hearing on the oil disaster in the Gulf makes me wonder if this guy is mentally 'there'. Barton has held his position since 1985. This would be one person that I could see losing his next election. We know that he is one of the biggest receiver of funds from Big Oil and then he just shoved the nose of the nation right into the pile of oil out there in the Gulf. He and the Republicans deserve whatever comes their way over this.
We now know that the deregulation that allowed the Deep Water Horizon to be built in the first place was one of the deregulatory decisions made in Dick Cheney's infamous meeting with Big Oil just after the 2000 'election'. No wonder he would never say what took place! The damage done over those 8 years will take decades to undo, if it is even possible to undo it at all.
I found a website that shows the size of the oil spill superimposed over different locations so that people can get an idea of exactly how big it is.
http://www.ifitwasmyhome.com/
See it from your own perspective and you will get even more angry that you probably already are.
I can't seem to stop thinking of all the wildlife that is dying down there. The people's lives will not return to normal for many years, experts are now saying, as they grapple with the unknown. Nothing like this has ever happened, so no one really knows what to do to fix it. There was a similar occurance in Russia where a small 'tactical' nuke was used to seal the leak, but this one is leaking along a fissure, with a new leak discovered 20 miles away from the initial leaks. Now they are wondering what might happen if this fissure is toyed with any more. I used the term 'toyed' loosely, of course, favored over cruder terms that I am really thinking.
Maybe some wunderkind will come along and solve this. But maybe it will continue to gush into the Gulf with disasterous effects that we can now only imagine. My heart hurts.
Sunday, June 13, 2010
Well, I have nothing of any real import to say today, just the same ol', same ol' rant and rave about the way things are in the world. About why people are so mislead about the true reality of our existence as human beings. We are so easily led astray from our true course and it makes me so angry. That there are groups of people who would exert control over those with less political power, to be used by them to achieve their nefarious plans disgusts me. We are such cool beings. We can do so many great and wonderful and beautiful things. But so much potential is lost, thrown away in favor of the System that controls us. We literally feed our jailers. It is crazy-making.
I ran into a few of those people today and came home feeling really frustrated and annoyed that people can be so blind.
But, it's no wonder. After reading yet another article about the jobless recovery today, I or anyone can see that disaster is right around the corner. I remember that this was one of the primary concerns in a book I read some years ago about the development of nano-technology. The researchers, during the infancy of this new technology, while excited about what it could mean for the world, finally started to discuss the impact on the economy and our cultural history of individuals working to make a living.
It looks as though the technology has hopped ahead of nano-tech and obliterated millions of jobs, not only here, but around the world, as machines take over more and more of the work that was once performed by human beings; the promise of nano-tech yet to be achieved.
In the book on nano-tech, the scientists reached a conclusion that the way of life would completely change, with most people able to live without working, while others would 'choose' to work in only a few areas of labor that could not be done by machines, entertainment, some food services, art of all kinds, basically for the pleasure of doing the work. Everything that was to be of a higher level of performance or creation would be the last physical function of humans. All other functions would be done by machines. It is a scary idea for anyone with a far-reaching vision. One could easiy imagine the slow, painful transition during the time of changes in our way of life. Anarchy is certainly easy to imagine in this situation.
People are terribly identified with their jobs. Without them, people feel like nothing. People who feel like nothing, become nothing. Things are not looking good at all right now. No not at all.
But, then again, if people could realize that they are capable of unimaginable creations, maybe that could just be the key to saving the lives of millions of people. They will have to rethink their lives and identities though, something that will be a painful transition, for sure.
I ran into a few of those people today and came home feeling really frustrated and annoyed that people can be so blind.
But, it's no wonder. After reading yet another article about the jobless recovery today, I or anyone can see that disaster is right around the corner. I remember that this was one of the primary concerns in a book I read some years ago about the development of nano-technology. The researchers, during the infancy of this new technology, while excited about what it could mean for the world, finally started to discuss the impact on the economy and our cultural history of individuals working to make a living.
It looks as though the technology has hopped ahead of nano-tech and obliterated millions of jobs, not only here, but around the world, as machines take over more and more of the work that was once performed by human beings; the promise of nano-tech yet to be achieved.
In the book on nano-tech, the scientists reached a conclusion that the way of life would completely change, with most people able to live without working, while others would 'choose' to work in only a few areas of labor that could not be done by machines, entertainment, some food services, art of all kinds, basically for the pleasure of doing the work. Everything that was to be of a higher level of performance or creation would be the last physical function of humans. All other functions would be done by machines. It is a scary idea for anyone with a far-reaching vision. One could easiy imagine the slow, painful transition during the time of changes in our way of life. Anarchy is certainly easy to imagine in this situation.
People are terribly identified with their jobs. Without them, people feel like nothing. People who feel like nothing, become nothing. Things are not looking good at all right now. No not at all.
But, then again, if people could realize that they are capable of unimaginable creations, maybe that could just be the key to saving the lives of millions of people. They will have to rethink their lives and identities though, something that will be a painful transition, for sure.
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Day One
Well, I have finally caved and here it is. My blog. Everybody knows I like to talk and this is the best way to talk to a lot of people these days. It gives anyone who wants one a dais. I was kind of surprised to see some of the cautionary stuff in the terms of use. I guess there is another new world of which I’ve been fairly unaware. I do know people with blogs and I read theirs. I guess it kind of feels like a big commitment and put myself out there with my vulnerable little underbelly exposed.
But, hey, I ain’t getting any younger and I have a lot to say, so here we go.
Today, I have been working around my garden, but thinking about the oil spill. Of course, I had seen this coming many years ago and I’m certainly not surprised, but that doesn’t mean I’m not feeling regret, disappointment, anger, fear, etc. on the matter. They’ve now discovered that there are plumes under the water that we haven’t even seen yet. This is a disaster with far-reaching and long-acting impacts on many different aspects of the culture. Some of them will be good, like living with a smaller carbon footprint, some of them will be hard, like living on less money, but there will be good things as well. Even living on less money is a good thing, spiritually and emotionally. It will take us out of the pricey and addictive electronic technology that we can live better without.
I heard today that video game addicts have been seen to have the lungs of a 60 year-old smoker! What a world we have.
I may end up having to have several blogs, I see now. One for friends, with blah-blah in it, one political one and one philosophical one. But, for now, I'm lucky to have just the one as I stumble into the future of communication.
But, hey, I ain’t getting any younger and I have a lot to say, so here we go.
Today, I have been working around my garden, but thinking about the oil spill. Of course, I had seen this coming many years ago and I’m certainly not surprised, but that doesn’t mean I’m not feeling regret, disappointment, anger, fear, etc. on the matter. They’ve now discovered that there are plumes under the water that we haven’t even seen yet. This is a disaster with far-reaching and long-acting impacts on many different aspects of the culture. Some of them will be good, like living with a smaller carbon footprint, some of them will be hard, like living on less money, but there will be good things as well. Even living on less money is a good thing, spiritually and emotionally. It will take us out of the pricey and addictive electronic technology that we can live better without.
I heard today that video game addicts have been seen to have the lungs of a 60 year-old smoker! What a world we have.
I may end up having to have several blogs, I see now. One for friends, with blah-blah in it, one political one and one philosophical one. But, for now, I'm lucky to have just the one as I stumble into the future of communication.
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