AMERICA FOR THE PEOPLE.

About 35 people showed up at a nationwide rally for Bernie Sanders for President. We gathered in a parking lot in Sonora, and flashed signs at the passing traffic. I’ve sat on the fence between Hillary, Trump and Bernie.  Hillary has worked hard in public service most of her life and has done wonderful things for others. But, she has wrapped herself in the arm of an unpopular, disappointing  president. Then, after promising she would not take super-pac money against her own party, she has. Not only wall street money but Monsanto, the GMO giant who spends billions to prevent states from labeling where our food comes from and whether it is genetically modified or not. That did it for me. Establishment politics, the failed machine that is inducing companies to go off shore, avoid taxes and take away good jobs from Americans?  Trump and Sanders are the only two candidates mandating change away from the establishment.

Trump says nothing and Sanders very little about climate change while massive extinctions and weather change are playing havoc with our planet. For the sake of our children and grandchildren, we on the ground, must shed the ingrained deniers, people who refuse to acknowledge science. We must shed a do nothing congress, promoting government shutdowns and working lock-step for their party instead the people. If a working person refuses to do his job, he gets fired. How dare Mitch McConnell state he will not even have a hearing on an appointee suggested by a sitting President, whether he is liked or not?

Trump and Sanders represent desperately needed change. Can they get us out of gridlock? I don’t know.

Environmental issues are foremost in the minds of others I met. Keep coal, fossil fuels in the ground. Support wind and solar. I talked with a bee keeper who lives in a pristine area where his bees are turning his garden and orchard into super  production, in a time when Monstanto and Bayer Chemicals are causing colony collapse across the nation. I’m hoping for a candidate that will make sure the laws we already have on the books are obeyed, like those from the EPA and the FDA and the Forest Service; sidestepping regulations when we are literally in danger of earthshaking consequences of fracking, contaminated water, shortages of clean water, decimating natural habitats for profit over nature. We and our institutions are under attack and they are ignoring our laws. How dare they get away with that stuff? They do it by under funding the organizations we depend on.

The group marched along the highway, and into a shopping center. One man was so angry, I thought he was going to attack us. He called us Communists and Socialists. Bernie is an unapologetic Socialist. The angry man wouldn’t talk rationally with us, like is he on Social Security? Does he use Medicare? Has he ridden on a train or does he drive on our socialistic roads? Has he used water from behind a dam? Come on. We all benefit from shared expenditures. Socialist countries like Sweden and Denmark, and Canada and France and many programs in Great Britain have provided a good quality of life.  Big Pharma will tell you socialized medicine is about waiting in lines for poor quality medical care.  Biased they are. They don’t mention the wonderful government sponsored childcare and education. Roosevelt made sweeping changes that saved people with socialistic programs that corporate America has tried to dismantle ever since. Are we better off? Not hardly when it takes two or three income sources for middle class people to keep the wolf from the door. Not when people with college educations are slinging hash.

Bernie is against the consolidation of big banks, and the notion that Wall Street’s obligation is to make obscene amounts of money while working people are struggling to feed their kids. The system is out of whack. Trump feels the business model is the best way to run a country. Trump makes statements about laws he is going to pass that aren’t practical like building a bigger wall. A bigger wall isn’t going to stop the drug cartels who have already moved across the border. Nor stop people from entering the country unless you fence the entire country and put a net over the airspace. He also bothers me because he makes statements and then denies he made them. Even so, Rubio in five yeas has produced ZERO bills and his absenteeism is compared to Finestein who is 82 and Kirk who has had a stroke.  Cruz is more concerned with moral issues than the planet. He pays lip service when to solving problems for working people. I’d run with Trump over them and figure he’d be smart enough to figure it out.

Suffice it to say, there is no perfect candidate. If there is, I haven’t heard about him or her. So, for the time being, I’m hanging in with Bernie. I believe this is true. He really does care for all.

 

 

 

FLOTSAM AND JETSAM

I had an appointment to see a specialist in Lodi, CA. and in the parking lot was this eye catcher.

 

It may represent youth, or the future, or…whatever. Look at it amid a sea of white, grey, and  two black cars. To me it says LOOK AT ME! I couldn’t resist taking a picture.

I ran from errand to errand yesterday without much time to do anything more useful. I have a rosary plant I got from an aunt in the 1960’s that manages to struggle on. Nearly killed it several times. While cleaning up around my sink, I noticed it had bloomed. After all these years it decided to bloom? Of course the blooms are so tiny, the cropped picture shows the plant bigger than life-size. You can see three more blooms starting on the stem. It brought an unbelieving smile to my face.

Then cleaning up little bits and pieces of useless information on my desk, I ran into stuff I’d tucked away, and here was a pillow menu.

Have you ever?  Are we elitists, or what?

Other useless flotsam and jetsam hanging around my desk are interesting names I see on the road and I’m always curious about how they got their name:

Sour Lake, Grandfather Rd.,Hungry Horn, Flathead River, Lone Elk Trail. I guess Lone Elk Trail is self-explanatory, but why just One Elk?

When we are on the road, I always want to stop and find out about curious names. It must be an old Indian legend,  but the motor home doesn’t stop for such small stuff.

In the car, I can stop sometimes on a whim. So yesterday, I took this picture of a mailbox:

The Cheshire Cat. Cute. I have dozens of pictures of cute mailboxes. I’m ever planning to do something clever with my own. Ah!  Some day.

 

 

 

 

 

GHOST TOWN WITH A GHOST

Our travel goal yesterday was to avoid the boom-town of Williston and seek out the little town of Baineville, just on the border of N.D. and Montana. Jim found a website for Buffalo Trails Museum at Epping, which was closed, but we decided to have a look at the area anyway. It was about 10 miles out of our way. The turn-off required us to cross two lanes, a meridian and another two lanes of oncoming traffic and whoops!  The road is gravel? Oh, well, we’re committed. We bumped miserably along popping rivets and screws and bolts, we are sure,  for about ten miles.

we pulled into town and parked next to this ramshackle old building.

There wasn’t a car or a person anywhere in sight. With a one block main street we just walked along taking pictures of this “ghost” town and peeked in the windows.

After a few minutes of poking around, Heather appeared out of nowhere and began watering plants in front of the school.

She took us to the Museum office and introduced us to Shelly. These two women are the only two people who have keys to the buildings we were looking into and even though the museum was closed, they opened up  the buildings and allowed us to tour the complex.

In the front part of the office was a dental exhibit, all items here have been donated by locals. I don’t know the population of the town in 1905 when Epping was founded adjacent to the Northern Pacific Railroad, but in 2010 the population was 100 people according to the census.

In every building, the human figures were made out of papier mache  by a guy named Elmer.

Behind the office was some rolling stock. Kind of reminded me of  a Bonnie and Clyde affair.

My quest for something I’ve never seen before was soon answered. This little wooden horse-drawn wagon is a school bus.

Elmer did a lot of work here. A life sized diorama of his family, with Elmer in bed getting medicine from the doctor, his little brother crying.

This gentleman reading the paper in an exhibit looks just like pictures of Elmer.  In fact, almost all of the gentlemen in the exhibits look like Elmer.

Elmer put together several very authentic box dioramas in which he went to the hill where this Indian village was located, he studied the topography, even picked the grass from the site to make this scene.  He must have been an interesting character.

One building has a unique cement floor.

The one room school house classroom is in beautiful condition.

North Dakota winters require a mighty stove and this one is a beauty.

You’ll notice in this kitchen exhibit the wall paper is made from newspaper, not uncommon in the early 1900’s.

Another item I’d never seen, a painted story hide.

And from the General Store, a marshmallow beater. I can’t quite fathom how I’ve managed my life without one.

The cafe building is historic as is the tavern. Both are open businesses. The tavern was closed but the cafe was open. We didn’t see any activity around the cafe for the hour we wandered the street until lunchtime. Then out of nowhere a few trucks and cars pulled up for the daily special, a cheeseburger and tomato soup.

We practically sat under this buffalo head for our lunch. But, I’m digressing. This is a ghost story.

This exhibit is one the ghost likes to fool with. There is a big space between the two shelving units in this building. Heather and Shelly never enter this room alone because it gives them the willies and they have the only keys. The board was replaced, by a carpenter, screwed in, and, when they returned, it went missing. After three tries, they gave up.

A glass stopper collection was removed for dusting. The girls placed them on top of the case in rows. When they returned, they were disheveled and moved around. Twice. Lights that have been turned out, go on. They think they know who the ghost is.

The man who owned this hardware store hung himself in the open window above so everyone returning from church could see him hanging there. They replaced the window. And the next day it was broken out. They replaced it again. The same thing happened. Now, they just leave it open.

We left Epping glad we braved the bad road and got direction from the girls to a short gravel road to a paved highway that took us right into Williston. We breezed on through.

Everywhere, we see mobile homes in clusters, temporary housing for oil workers. Billboards advertise for house builders needed, jobs, jobs, jobs. It is a boom phenomena. People rent out space in their yards to two or three mobiles.

Road workers needed.

Every half mile or so, we see another well going in.

Bainville was another gravel road town without even a mom and pop store or gas pump. A post office and a church with a few houses. We pushed on 14 miles west to Culbertson, Montana and spent the night in a delightful city park.

 

POETRY AND TAXES

April has been designated National Poetry Month. Don’t know why. I know I love poetry and I’m still mired in tax paperwork so this poem will have to do:

Tax his land,
Tax his bed,
Tax the table,
At which he’s fed.

Tax his tractor,
Tax his mule,
Teach him taxes
Are the rule.

Tax his work,
Tax his pay,
He works for
peanuts anyway!

Tax his cow,
Tax his goat,
Tax his pants,
Tax his coat.

Tax his ties,
Tax his shirt,
Tax his work,
Tax his dirt.

Tax his tobacco,
Tax his drink,
Tax him if he
Tries to think.

Tax his cigars,
Tax his beers,
If he cries
Tax his tears.

Tax his car,
Tax his gas,
Find other ways
To tax his ass.

Tax all he has
Then let him know
That you won’t be done
Till he has no dough.

When he screams and hollers;
Then tax him some more,
Tax him till
He’s good and sore.

Then tax his coffin,
Tax his grave,
Tax the sod in
Which he’s laid…

Put these words
Upon his tomb,
‘Taxes drove me
to my doom…’

When he’s gone,
Do not relax,
Its time to apply
The inheritance tax.

I don’t know the author of this fun poem but it made me chuckle. I may be frustrated with the process, but unlike Pierpont Morgan, I don’t believe we can run a country without taxes.  I love my National and State Parks, my bridges, my roads, airports, trains and universities. I love my clean water, clean air, museums, vast wilderness, clean beaches and…I could go on and on. I once had a friend retired from the IRS. I used to tease him that he must have a hard time making friends. “Not in America,” he said.  For all the complaining I do about current political shenanigans, this is yet a great country.  The yet implies it may be getting worse,  worse than taxes.  Amen.