Good
morning,
Quote
of the day:
“We
are overcome by anguish at this illogical moment of humanity.”
Che
Guevara
I
saw Dale Earnhardt, Jr. interviewed and he mentioned that he had a
two bison running with his cows. My curiosity got the best of me and
I researched where he lives. I could not get an address but I did
get the coordinates which is 35.659 degrees north, -80.792575 degrees
east. I cranked those coordinates into Google Earth and found it.
It is essentially in the middle of nowhere about 35 mile north of
Charlotte and about 25 mile east- southeast of Hickory. There are
two large pastures and three race tracks (two paved and one dirt)
plus an enormous main house and a moderate sized additional house a
respectable distance away. I was able to detect some creatures in
his north pasture but I could not zoom in tight enough to tell if
they were cattle or bison. I counted 27 critters, whatever they are.
In the interview he said his bison were named Laverne and Shirley.
Junior hinted that he was going to get two male bison and begin
raising them. He said he would name the males Lenny and Squiggy. To
all of you that are old enough these names will mean something. I am
envious of Junior but he earned everything he has.
I
have been reading about the history of the western United States and
some of the more colorful people. This particular one moved to
Kansas from Troy Grove, Illinois at the age of 18. He was
acknowledged to be a quick and accurate pistol shot with either hand.
His name was James Butler Hickok and later became known as “Wild
Bill”. There was one event that began his reputation as an extreme
bad-ass. Hickok was in Kansas driving a wagon and the trail became
blocked by a Cinnamon (black) bear and two cubs. Hickok chose to
dismount and shot the bear in the head with his pistol. The bullet
ricocheted off the skull of the bear who then charged knocking Hickok
on his back, rolled over on him breaking several ribs. The bear
tried to smack him with a paw but Hickok shot the bear in that paw.
The bear then grabbed his arm in her mouth...Kickok pulled his knife
and cut the bear's throat killing it. He was sent to a stock yard in
Nebraska to recover. The boss of this yard was a man named Dave
McCandles. He did not like Hickok from the start and was constantly
needling him. Hickok got his revenge by bedding McCandles
girlfriend. McCandles found out about it and he and two others
headed for the barn where Hickok was working yelling they were going
to “horsewhip” him. Hickok warned “If you three come in here I
will be the only one to walk out.” They came anyway and sure
enough, Hickok was waiting with a gun in each hand. Hickok fired
killing two of the three instantly and severely wounding McCandles
who staggered back out and died in the arms of his 12 year old son.
This was the beginning of the legend of “Wild Bill” Hickok. By
the way, Hickok's pistols were Navy Colt, .36 caliber cap and ball
with ivory handles. He wore them with the butts forward. I know,
butt forward seems harder to draw quickly but Hickok was not known
for his quickness as much as his unerring accuracy and fearlessness.
I
have been reading about foreign animals that have invaded our waters
and lands to the detriment of all. One of the strangest is the Lion
fish. This beast is only two or three pounds at best but it is the
most deadly. They are native of the far east but have been located
in the Caribbean, Atlantic, Pacific and the Gulf of Mexico. They
have vertical stripes of black and cream and have extra long back
fins (dorsal) and side fins. Their fins are fleshy but each fin
hides a needle sharp hollow bone that houses one of the most deadly
toxins in the natural world. If you step on one of these critters
and get stabbed the chances are that you will go into shock because
of the pain and eventually die. Even all sharks recognize them and
stay away. No one exactly knows why they headed this way but I think
it is because the Earth is warming including the seas.
Then
we have the Snakehead. This critter is essentially a fish but with a
significant difference. It has very primitive lungs that can keep it
alive for about three days out of the water. Not only that, it has a
mouthful of needle sharp teeth, is very aggressive and a female can
produce about 15,000 fertile eggs a year. This fish has been banned
in the United States but the fish is native to Southeast Asia
(Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, etc.) and they are considered a delicacy to
those Asians that have immigrated here. The Snakehead is smuggled
into the US and somehow a few of them escaped into the waters of
Maryland, a branch of the Potomac river in particular, and they
spread from there. Their aggressiveness and teeth make them
overpowering to our natural fish.
Then
there is the Asian carp. This pest arrived in the US about 12 years
ago somewhere near Cleveland, Ohio. It is a vegetarian but it spawns
at a rate two or three times more than the native fish. They grow up
to over 13 pounds which makes them having no natural predator. They
have crowded out nearly all of the native fish in several rivers that
branch off the Mississippi in the Ohio area. There are fishing
tournaments in some of those rivers where they use dip nets. These
fish are so numerous and jumpy that when a boat approaches they leap
out of the water by the hundreds and the trick is to net one of these
fish in mid air. But believe me, if you get hit in the face with a
12 pound fish...you will know it. Nearly all the boats that use
these rivers have extra strong and extra high windshields in front of
the driver that is to protect the driver from getting knocked out by
one of these fish. For reasons unknown to me, they are not eaten and
considered a “trash fish”. I guess it is because they are
vegetarians and that effects the flavor of the flesh. A carp in this
part of the world is considered considered a trash fish also. But
down on the Gulf coast one of the most eaten fish is the mullet.
They are vegetarians also but fried or smoked, they is nothing better
but they must be fresh . I guess it is a matter of taste...my
favorite seafood in order is as follows: Raw Apalachicola oysters,
spicy steamed 16-20 headless shrimp from Joe Patti's seafood market,
grilled grouper, smoked mullet, fried crappie, white perch and bass.
Back
in 1992 a lady named Addie Mack had an emergency health problem and
went to the emergency room. One of the workers in the emergency room
named William Garner took Addie’s driver’s license and apartment
keys from her purse and while she was being treated. William went to
her apartment and stole her TV, a boom box, a VCR and various other
things and headed out. He met 6 children from 14 to 6 months that
had been asleep. He herded them back into the apartment bedrooms and
set the place on fire. I am going to repeat that, he set the place
on fire. Five of the six children were killed by smoke inhalation.
There was one survivor. William was captured, tried and convicted of
5 counts of murder and sentenced to death. In 2006 at 10:43am this
animal’s heart ceased to beat due to a lethal dose of drugs
administered by the State of Ohio Bureau of Prisons. This jackass
refused breakfast on Tuesday but listen to what he had for Monday
dinner:
Porterhouse
steak, onion rings, fried shrimp, barbecue ribs, potato wedges
w/cheese, sweet potato pie, chocolate ice cream, Buffalo chicken
wings, tossed salad, Funyuns and Hawaiian Punch. I think he was
trying to kill himself by gluttony. Today's prisons no longer offer
a special “last meal”...they get what everybody else has for that
day.
It
looks like Larry, Curly and Moe were headed north on highway US 276
near Traveler’s Rest, South Carolina. In the lead was a funeral
car and a Chevy. The funeral car and the Chevy slowed for a car
turning left ahead. A Ford was next and he was going way to fast and
struck the Chevy which slid forward and struck the funeral car. A
fire/recue truck arrived behind the Ford to help the injured and
suddenly with no one aboard, the fire truck began rolling and smashed
into the Ford. Eleven people were slightly injured. The Ford was
ticket for driving too fast for conditions. No mention was made of
the fire truck.
This
Date in History July 16
1945
In 1939 Danish physicist Neils Bohr came to America and called a
meeting with other physicists including Edward Teller, Enrico Fermi
and Albert Einstein and reported that the Germans were just within a
few years of developing a nuclear device that could be used in
warfare. Enrico Fermi went to the physics department at Columbia
University and discussed the possibility of the development of a
nuclear weapon. Einstein already convinced that it was possible,
drafted a letter to President Roosevelt and hand delivered it to him
stating his fears that the Germans may be able to deliver a nuclear
weapon before the United States. Roosevelt was convinced and called
in US Army officer Brigadier General Leslie R. Grove to head up a
program known as the Manhattan Project. Grove’s mission was to
round up the best physicists in the world and get them to work
developing a fissionable material that could be used in a bomb.
Groves, though being an engineer, was no scientist and named the
brilliant but at time obtuse physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer as chief
scientist. Oppenheimer began to gather around him some of the most
brilliant minds in the world and they set up shop in the desert near
Los Alamos, New Mexico. A sustained chain reaction nuclear explosion
could not be done without a test of a controlled nuclear chain
reaction. This task was given to Italian emigrant Enrico Fermi who
was teaching physics at the University of Chicago. Fermi built a
radioactive pile under the stands at a squash court on campus. He
had radioactive material separated by carbon rods that would absorb
any stray neutrons. Fermi ordered the carbon rods withdrawn 6 inches
at a time and monitored the reaction with a Geiger counter. Fermi’s
test was a complete success. A controlled nuclear chain reaction
had been achieved. One of the scientists that witnessed the test
sent another scientist that was not there a telegram saying “The
Italian navigator has landed on a foreign land, the natives are
friendly.” From there they had to determine what would be the best
fissionable material to use for a weapon and in what mass and shape.
They decided that an isotope of Uranium (U-235) would do the trick.
Now they had to determine what mass (size, weight and shape) would be
the best. This meant that is if the core had too much mass it would
be very unstable and might explode on its own; too little mass and it
would not explode at all. They finally arrived at the conclusion
that about 40 Kilos (30 Pounds) and a spherical shape (about the size
of a golf ball) would be best. For safety purposes, they kept enough
Uranium to reach critical mass separated in different rooms. The
scientists decided a test explosion was required to see if all of
their engineering had worked. On this morning at 5:45a a light
brighter than the sun flashed across the New Mexico desert and the
nuclear age was born. The test was called Trinity and the device was
hoisted atop a 200 foot tall steel tower before detonation. The
steel tower was vaporized, y'all...vaporized. The United States now
had an Atomic bomb and word was sent to President Truman who was on
the way home from the Potsdam conference with Stalin and Churchill
and was aboard the USS Augusta. Truman released the bomb to be used
at the discretion of the military. Twenty-two days later Hiroshima,
Japan all but disappeared from the face of the earth. Remember me
telling you that the scientists tried to keep pieces of near critical
mass apart? A few days before the ”Enola Gay” took off to bomb
Hiroshima the US battleship USS Indianapolis arrived at Tinian (near
Saipan) bringing the last part of the bomb. This part was not
installed in the bomb until the aircraft had been airborne for
several hours. After all, you can’t be too safe with something
this nasty. A day or two after the Indianapolis departed Tinian, it
was torpedoed and sunk by a Japanese submarine. It was several days
before the Indianapolis was due back home in the Philippines so no
one was looking for her. Nearly all of her crew of 850 were able to
abandon ship but there was not enough life boats for all to get
aboard so some of the sailors just held on to the sides in rotation.
This sounds like a good plan except that those waters were thick with
man eating sharks. After the US navy discovered the Indianapolis was
missing and began a search several days had past. The Navy recovered
about 160 survivors, the rest were killed by sharks. Later the
Captain of the Indianapolis committed suicide.
1779
On this date US General George Washington ordered Colonel Anthony
Wayne commanding 1,200 troops to retake the British Fort at Stony
Point, New York. Colonel Wayne was not pleased with the number of
troops he was given so he decided to try and kill as many of the
enemy as he could as quietly as he could. He sent his troops in
among the sleeping British and told his men to bayonet them in the
throat so they would not make a sound. Sure enough Wayne’s troops
killed 95 Brits before they knew what was happening. Needless to say
Wayne was successful in re-taking the fort with a minimum amount of
casualties. After this slaughter Colonel Wayne was given the
nickname “Mad Anthony” as indeed he was. But he ended up being
one of our most efficient combat commanders during the Revolution.
1863
The draft riots continue in New York after the issuance of the
Emancipation Proclamation. Irish Immigrants, mostly dockworkers riot
in New York City. They were afraid that the blacks would take their
jobs. Soon after, the dockworkers went on strike and sure enough the
City brought in recent immigrant blacks from the south to take their
place. So they were indeed right and in the heat of these events,
the riots turned violent and the strikers turned their attention to
the blacks themselves. There were many lynchings and outright
murders. The reason for all this turmoil was that A. Lincoln had
said that the US needed to raise an army to combat the Confederacy
from seceding from the union because we need to stay together. This
was acceptable to most of the people in the north but after the Union
army had received one ass-kicking after another by the Confederates,
the people in the north said “To hell with this slaughter, let them
have their own country.” So Lincoln changed horses and issued the
Emancipation Proclamation saying this war is to set the slaves free.
That is a long way from preserving the Union and Lincoln’s
administration began a draft. This meant that men in the north were
going to be drafted to set the slaves in the south free to take their
jobs in the north. That is except those people that cough up $300
and then they did not have to go. No wonder the poor Irish rioted.
I would have too.
Quotable quotes:
“The
trouble with the French is they don’t have a word for
entrepreneur.”
George W.
Bush
George,
I like you but sometime I think you are an idiot.
“I’d
move to Los Angeles if Australia and New Zealand were swallowed by a
giant tidal wave, if there was bubonic plague in Europe and if Africa
disappeared from a Martian attack."
Russell
Crowe
Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow
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