February 27, 2007  Back In Northern Wisconsin
 
The internet affords a great opportunity for travellers to monitor weather, road conditions and stuff like road construction zones and detours. I have most of the D.O.T. sites in my bookmarks, and I monitored these and the weather sites for the week prior to my TX departure.
 
Normally I don't worry 'bout this stuff so much, but past experiences coming up through Missouri and Illinois in late Winter and early Spring have been frought with ice storms that make travel nearly impossible or totally dangerous (Once, while hauling the entire family back North in my 4x4 van, I was following a semi in an ice storm near Lincoln, IL. I-55 was canted for a slight turn to the left. The semi-trailer began heading West while the tractor headed East. It took all of two seconds for the semi driver, me and my entire family to decide to try to claw our way to the Lincoln exit and find a motel for the night). So, when I saw a 2-day window of good weather, I gassed up GeoTruk and headed North. BTW, I paid $2.029 per gallon in TX and $2.499 here in WI!
 
I've been used to long-haul trips since I first got my drivers license (back when they had to chisel them on stone tablets). This trip was 1230 miles done in two parts... 12 hours the first day and about 8 hours the second day including meals and pit stops....lotsa pit stops!
 
Thank heaven for good neighbors... Jim and Carole from down the road watched over my place while I was gone. I got a call from Carole a few days before I left TX and we arranged for her to change the thermostat setting from 40 degrees to 64 degrees. When I got home the cabin was nice and toasty and I was able to get the well pump going and water back in the pipes and water heater. A quick trip to the grocery store restocked the larder.
 
That done, I had four days to paw through piles of mail trying to find those elusive 1099's before I met with my tax people.
 
So I'm sitting here looking at the snow, pondering the logistics of selling off personal property and moving the remainder accumulated over all these years into storage indefinitely. The reality of being a prisoner to a house that's too big for me and far too many possessions really struck me when I arrived home this time. Thirty-five years in one place is waaayyyy too long. This place no longer gives me the feeling of comfort that a home should. Time to move on, to hitch my wagon to that wanderin' star.
 
Now, where did I put that pile of motorhome brochures?
 
Until later.....DKHT

February 15, 2007  Aches, Pains and Some Fun, Too!
 
One of the things that's been bugging me (other than the Big Bugger, GWB) for about a year is being able to get good reception for my mom's TV's. She lives only a dozen miles from two primary stations which are overwhelming in signal strength (ch 3 & 6). Channel 7 is about 43 miles away in the same direction as ch 3 and ch 6, but much weaker because of the distance. There are 5 additional UHF stations from different directions and varying distances. High gain focused element antennas with a rotor is total overkill and would be hard to stabilize in these N Texas winds.
 
Last year I tried an amplified set of rabbit ears from Radio Shack that were totally inadequate. They required constant adjustment and festooning with cleverly placed bowties of Reynolds Wrap (both regular and heavy-duty) and still resulted in poor and iffy reception.
 
So this time, in order to uphold my EE degree and 38 years of above-excellence performance in that profession, and to convince my mother that all that college money spent so many years ago actually served a purpose, I hit the 'net to find a righteous solution. I was amazed at how plain old TV antenna theory had advanced since I went to school (We mainly were doing microwave antenna design back when). It took me about 4 days to do the research online, but I settled on a Winegard MS-2000 series amplified antenna that looks like a 23 inch diameter flying saucer. The next problem was finding somebody that had one ready to ship. A pet peeve of mine are companies that advertise products without flagging them as being out-of-stock. Went that route twice before I discovered Stark Wholesale Electronics, Inc. out of Worcester, MA. This is a top-notch brick-and-mortar dealer with excellent sales and response. Their website offers few frills but tons of info. No toll-free phone number, but if you call, you get a real person directly who knows the stock and can answer all your questions pronto. Their product line is EXTENSIVE and these folks are really helpful, providing a huge diversity of electronic equipment. They're on top of shipping as well, and I saved $25 over the other places I looked at. Tell Willie or Al I sent you (they'll say "Who?"). DKHT rating of 5 big stars.
 
'Course the installation of said antenna in the attic and ultimate hookup to the 4 TV's in the house, including electric power rewiring, required contortions of this aging body that were above and beyond the call. Hours spent on my knees and bent backward working above my head got to be a little uncomfortable... until I tried to climb through the scuttle hole and back to the ladder. Muscles I have not used in ages decided to stage a revolt and no longer function, leaving me clinging to the ladder, half in and half out of the attic. Eventually I was able to slither down to the floor and ultimately crawl to the various TV's, all of which worked wonderfully with the new signal.
 
But that's not what I wanted to talk about....
 
Yesterday was the opening day of the Farm and Ranch Exposition at the MPEC center in downtown Wichita Falls. Oh yeah, there's stuff about seed and hay balers and whatnot. But the big tractor dealers brought in their newest models....sigh! There were Case, Massey, John Deere, Mahindra, New Holland, Branson, Montana, Kubota and Cat dealers there showcasing their best rigs, with front-end-loaders, 4 wheel drive, rear-end PTO Brush Hogs, box blades and dozer scrapers. I was in tractor heaven, and my sore muscles soon gave way to the excitement of touching the silicon coating on the tractor tires! Oh the Joy! The nifty thing about these shows is that you can go in looking for a 25 to 50 horsepower small farm tractor and wind up drooling over the huge behemoths that sport several hundred hp, a climate controlled cab with GPS and Bose surround sound, laptop computer with in-motion satellite internet access, cruise control with auto pilot, a beer cooler and an expresso machine. The only thing missing was the pungent odor of manure (that REALLY takes me back, but I think my brain may have confused some memories).
 
Back at the house I spread out the 40 pounds of brochures, put on my headphones and popped in my cd "Yodel the Cowboy Way" by Riders In The Sky, with Ranger Doug, Too Slim, and Woody Paul (this album preceeds the fourth member of the group, Joey the Cowpolka King). These guys have been performing cowboy music for over a quarter century. They sing the tunes of Gene Autry and Roy Rogers and a lot of their own songs in addition to the traditional stuff; a real fun time for anyone who remembers watching the singing cowboys track down rustlers on a 7 inch black and white TV screen.
 

 
So, for a far too brief time, I was transported back to the days when I listened to cowboy tunes on the old Admiral phonograph while longingly browsing through the Sears and Monkey Ward catalogs, imagining my life as an eight-year-old cowboy, totin' my trusty Red Rider BB rifle (the original one with the wood stock) ridin' the range on my trusty cayuse (a palomino) as we shashayed through the (benign and non-political) bushes and shrubs. Only now my Sears catalog was replaced with a plethora of glossy brochures touting mechanical beasts capable of cleaving and dominating this stuff they call North Texas dirt. If only I could yodel.....
 
Happy Trails, 'til we meet again.....DKHT

February 12, 2007  He's a Lunatic!!!
shouted by the shop keeper Schermerhorn in the 1969 release of "Paint Your Wagon"
 
Who would've figured that character would foresee GW Bush in this day and age?
 
On February 1 we lost a very special columnist and author, Molly Ivins who succumbed to a long battle with breast cancer. Molly, who frequently referred to GW as "Shrub", not only had a satirical wit and keen insight into politics, but stated her opinions quite cleverly in over 400 newspapers that carried her articles. I recall enjoying her candid comments on the editorial page of our local N. Wisconsin weekly paper...The Lakeland Times (Minocqua, WI) until the paper's management of pro-Republican idiots pulled her column and replaced it with another super-conservative, making the count 2 Republican pundits with no opposition on the editorial page (maybe they learned that trick from the Fox Network) So much for freedom of speech and unbiased reporting.
 
Molly wrote two notable books, "Shrub: The Short but Happy Political Life of George W. Bush" and "BUSHWACKED: Life in George W. Bush's America". Her cutting take on the foibles of the Shrub administration will be dearly missed.
 
Molly, we'll miss you, but we rejoice that you've gone to a far better place that will never see the likes of George W Bush.
 
In honor of Molly, although lacking in her satirical cleverness, I'd like to review a few outstanding features of the Shrub administration.
 
We've already touched on the GW-induced war in Iraq that began over non-existent weapons of mass destruction. His continued meddling has proven key to bringing this region into civil war and now seems to have drawn in Iran and Syria and reprised Afghanistan's participation. And don't fall for that false rhetoric that if we do not infuse more troops, there will be chaos. Wake up and smell the coffee....there already is chaos in Iraq. Major factions promise to kill any and all American troops sent there as well as our Iranian allies(?). GW and his millipede followers (I reference millipede because, beginning with Cheney, then McCain, Gates, Rice, Bodman, Chertoff, Bolton, Hadley, Portman, Boehner, Snow, Blair, Howard, et al, heads are stuffed up preceeding buttocks until it appears as one creature with a lot of legs and one delusional head) have coerced facts into misinformation and continue to do so. GW big stick has been wacking the hornet nests of the mideast until the swarm is becoming overwhelming.
 
Once no WMD's were found, why didn't we withdraw our troops? The good old U S of A has spent trillions of our hard earned tax dollars on developing the most sophisticated high-tech weapons in the world and yet we continue to be sucked in to a ground war! Even with our high-tech aircraft and missiles, our pilots keep hitting the wrong targets, probably out of faulty intelligence information, poor communication and, perhaps, the fatigue of flying so many missions without a break.
 
GW admitted mistakes have been made in the first four years of the war, by him (he's worried that criticism of his leadership will ruin the morale of our troops after that admission?). He has displayed his own shameful ignorance since first elected. He was AWOL for one whole year of his reserve duty. Yet he expects us to believe that suddenly he has become intelligent...last I heard, brains could not be injected like BOTOX to create a quick change in the makeup of a person (GW is against stem cell research, so a huge brain transplant would be required to get him a low-end triple digit IQ).
 
Suddenly GW has a workable plan for Iraq....why did it take so long for him to have this immaculate inspiration? And why aren't we able to stem the influx of Iranian-supplied weapons and sophisticated road bombs that kill our ground troops, and missiles that are shooting down our helicopters? Just where are the insurgents getting their vast supplies of weapons? GW's only plan is to send more troops into harm's way, throw extra money to them and cross his fingers. This is not a plan, nor the way to support our troops.
 
So, during Shrub's administration, he has amassed a federal deficit from 5.7 trillion dollars when he took office to 8.9 trillion dollars* for which we pay a record amount of interest. The typical American citizen's share of this debt is in excess of $28,000, based upon an estimated population of 300,936,707* when I composed this (*see the national debt clock and the Treasury Direct website). An additional 2.9 trillion is in Bush's budget. However, while an immediate funding for the Iraqi war is 100 billion with roughly another 140 billion for 2008 and another 50 billion for 2009, nothing is budgeted for the war after 2009! Do you get the feeling that GW already knows we will have to withdraw by then?... But, wait.... GW will be out of office by then, so he can't be blamed, right? Interestingly, Congress capped the federal deficit to 9 trillion back in March of 2006.
 
Meanwhile, G Dubyah's budget balancing plan includes massive reductions in Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Healthcare (including privatization of many of these programs, which will line the pockets of GW's pals in those industries) as well as a freeze on school funding (GW didunt need skool, and it shows) and a plethora of other federally funded programs to assist necessary and needy programs, including disaster relief (FEMA has proven to be a disaster, and the folks in Louisiana and, more recently, central Florida, certainly need relief from this bureaucraticic agency). No, George Dubyah's personal pyramid scheme is it's own disaster, and needs to be immediately ended.
 
If you find sense and truth in what I hereby present, I implore you to contact your Representative and your Senator and let them know what you feel in your heart about these travesties.
 
Otherwise, find yourself a big sand hill that you can bury your head in. Maybe the Wizard of Oz will give you enlightenment and courage.... but then it hasn't helped John Howard one little bit.
 
Until later.....DKHT

February 1, 2007  Update from the Red Gooey Goo
 
A great big Howdy to all you little pards and buckaroos out there from your hard ridin', hard ropin', hard drivin' trail boss, DKHT.
 
I moseyed out to the ole DKHT spread last week. With GeoTruk, er, GeoSteed in 4 wheel, er, 4 hoof drive, we passed thru the main gate for the spread. Picture, if you will, the entrance to the famous Southfork Ranch of TV's Dallas fame. Then picture what it might've looked like before it was settled and before any gates or fences were put in... That's what the main entrance to my "ranch" looks like... a rough dirt road flanked by scrub trees, rocks and prickly pear cactus, or cactii if you prefer. It's justa whole danged lot of cactuses.

 
I haven't gone back to this homestead since just before the weather turned cold, snowy, rainy, icy and just kinda miserable, which is sumpthin' us old cowpokes take in stride, but we sure don't go seeking that stuff out. No sir-ree! But just a few days prior to that stretch of ill wind I'd been out there to plant a few trees.
 
There's something you have to realize about Texoma dirt. First of all is the fact that it really isn't dirt. I've been a lot of places in my life and times, and I know dirt when I see it. This stuff ain't dirt. When I went out to plant those trees, I took a dirt shovel, a spade, some steel T fenceposts and a post driver to provide guidance and support for these willowy young Red River willows. Had I taken a jackhammer and some dynamite I just maybe could have made a dent in this "dirt". Texoma dirt is a curious entity. When dry it's like concrete. When even dryer it forms a gritty powder that gets picked up by the North Texas winds which will take the paint on your car down to primer and turn your cabin windows opaque. However, just add a few drops of water and it turns into a clay based sticky ooze.
 
While the main entrance road was actually recovered by my bulldozer guy from an old abandoned gravel-based road from the early area development, it was pretty rough yet firm for the bulk of the way in. Then you hit the new construction which was made of Texoma dirt, water added. GeoSteed began to shashay just a bit, but then recovered after making the turnaround. I unmounted (one of my favorite Lee Marvin phrases from "Paint Your Wagon") and immediately sunk up to my ankles in the red gooey goo. Weird stuff, this. If you pick up one foot, you find it covered with about 16 pounds of Texas, while the other foot sinks and accumulates of 32 pounds of Texas, and so on. While scraping off my boots I saw a small mammal run across the low spot on the back acreage and disappear in the quagmire. It dawned on me that the reason Texas has so much oil is that so many critters, over several millenia, have trod on the same dirt one day only to spill into the ooze the next day. Lambrea Tar Pits eat our dust, so to speak.
 
OK, so I'm just getting used to what will be my new home. I have a bunch of natural wildflowers that will be beautiful come Texas Spring. When I can sow some stabilizing grass and flower seed in the gooey areas, my personal Ponderosa will be a home I can look forward to after spending weeks or months on the RV trail.
 
Meanwhile I'll just pass the time with Pecos Bill swapping stories and getting ready for Super Bowl Sunday.
 
GO BEARS!!!
 
Until later.....DKHT