Farm News 07-30-06

On the Road Again

I'm not driving to Oregon, as I had planned, but instead went to northern Colorado, looking for the elusive Western Tanager (Piranga ludoviciana). To help in my search I used the Sibley Guide to Birds, published by the Audubon Society. The Sibley Guide is too big to fit in a jacket pocket, but it includes both eastern and western species, a convenience when one is on the divide between east and west. The Western Tanager can be found in eastern Colorado and the Scarlet Tanager, its eastern counterpart, can be found in western Colorado. Tanagers, generally, are not very good on geography.


Additionally, I'm carrying the Field Guide to North American Trees, Field Guide to North American Butterflies, and Field Guide to North American Mammals, all from the National Audubon Society. Joe Collins' Amphibians and Reptiles in Kansas is also in the box of field guides, as is Roadside Kansas. Not yet in my collection is Wildflowers and Grasses of Kansas, by Haddock. Haddock has an excellent web site for identifying wildflowers, too.

To help me see these things I use a Bushnell Sentry spotting scope with two mounts, one that clamps to a car window and the other a tripod.


Butterflies

Wednesday two Anise Swallowtail butterflies, Papilio zelicaon, fluttered past in aerial display of lepidopteran lust, delighting the eye and proclaiming the virtues of planting Bronze Fennel, Foeniculum vulgare. Fennel is the primary food plant for the Anise Swallowtail caterpillars, and it is the only plant I have that is fragrant in January when the temperatures are well below freezing.


Dr. M. Reports on Officer Basic

More lessons


Usually in my posts I try to be funny about my life here in the Army. Generally, I feel privileged to be part of an organization that constantly looks at itself and seeks to improve how it does things. This week though I am exhausted by the unrelenting heat here in San Antonio and the fact that I have 6 more weeks left down here. Oh, and my company STILL hasn’t learned not to form up downwind from the latrines.


So this past week, we headed back into the field for more training. We learned how to collect casualties from the forward edge of the battle back to the various levels of hospitals we have in the Army. Evacuating casualties is very serious business. If reports are correct, we can bring a soldier home from the front lines back to Germany or an American hospital in 36 hours.


Such a feat requires a staggering amount of organization. The Medical Service Corps makes the miracle of evacuation possible. They set up the hospitals and aid stations; they send doctors, often of higher rank off to work and have to make sure that those docs have everything that they need. Plus they train us in all the aspects of Army life so we can succeed and save lives.


Part of training of any soldier is leadership training. Leadership training is so deeply embedded in the Army that our “core values” are defined by an acronym LDRSHIP

Loyalty Bear true faith and allegiance to the U.S. Constitution, the Army, your unit, and other soldiers.

Duty Fulfill your obligations.

Respect Treat people as they should be treated.

Selfless-Service Put the welfare of the nation, the Army, and your subordinates before your own.
Honor Live up to all the Army values.

Integrity Do what’s right, legally and morally.

Personal Courage Face fear, danger, or adversity (Physical or Moral).


And every day I have the chance to live up to the ideals and not whine about it. Every day when I put my boots on I try and think of the millions of soldiers who would have loved the opportunity to bitch about spending $100 on boots designed like ours. My cotton/nylon uniform is hot and sticks to me, but hell, it isn’t wool. My beret makes me look like a mushroom, but makes me look like I know what I am doing. Small pieces of a larger leadership puzzle, but important.


So as my time in Officer Basic comes to an end, and my Vet Track starts, thanks to the Medical Service Corps officers, NCOs and civilians who bust their butts the best way they know how to make sure their doctors don’t get killed when they go downrange. Leading and teaching a bunch of docs, vets, and dentists who are pretty sure they know everything already is a pretty thankless task.

Three cheers for Dr. M! Going through basic at any time is tough, and in this weather it can't be pleasant.

Farm News 07-09-06

Sunday morning, after chores, 72°, light rain starting


Ducks Coalesce


I thought it wouldn't happen until Autumn, but the ducks have merged into one flock during the past week. There are six mature ducks, seven in late adolescence, and eight in early adolescence. The three baby ducks with two mothers didn't survive. Having two mother ducks was probably too much for them.

This big flock of over twenty ducks now patrols the place in a broad skirmish line, throwing despair into the hearts of grasshoppers.


Rabbits

It is too hot to raise bunnies, so the rabbits are biding their time. The females are storing fat to help them rear young and the males are storing testosterone for no apparent reason. At least that was what I thought they were doing, until Saturday morning, when I discovered Suzette running around with a mouth full of shredded paper.

She was pulling out fur and building a nest in her box Saturday evening. This morning she was in her nest box and very busy. There are new bunnies in there, I suppose. I'll look them over in a few days.


Nick Zorro and the FBI

There is a drug rehab facility in Kansas City called Renaissance West, still operating almost forty years after it's founding. It was dreamed up in 1969 by Nick Zorro, a purveyor of LSD to the masses. Nick was one of three young men, all Scorpios if you care about astrology, who, in the mid-60's, were roommates in college. One of the three was a chemistry major and, using his college training, he made up a batch of synthetic mescaline. Up to that point none of the three had experienced any drugs other than tobacco and alcohol. Homemade mescaline, they discovered, was a whole new experience, one they all liked a great deal.

Steve, the chemist, was so pleased with the result of synthesizing mescaline that he next brewed up a batch of DMT, di-methyl tryptaline, often called the lunch break psychedelic. If you treat some marijuana with DMT and then smoke it, the result is an incredibly intense psychedelic experience that only lasts 20-30 minutes.

Nick did some library research and found pictures of marijuana. Lo, he found that it was growing in the ditches all over the country side. So, late one night, he went out and picked a gunny sack full, took it home, and dried it in the oven. They then sprinkled it liberally with DMT and allowed it to dry.

At about this time the three had decided they needed a larger stage for the drama of their experiences, so they moved to Kansas City. The chemist found a job in a lab where he could pursue his synthesis projects after hours. Another, who we will discuss later, found a job in a power plant, and Nick took a job with the Missouri Agricultural Extension Service to promote the virtues of 4H in urban Kansas City.

In those days Nick's hair was hanging down around his shoulders and his costumes were exotic, so much so that he didn't feel that he fit in very well in the local Extension office. He set up his base of operations in the Ecstatic Umbrella, a local crisis center for hippies and the outfit that had convinced the Extension Service that they needed to hire a young person for outreach in KC.

Nick worked hard for a year trying to bring 4H virtues to young, urban outcasts, but when it came time for him to write his first annual report, he felt that the Extension Service would not be able to appreciate his greatest achievement. Nick met with a white poverty area teen gang and taught them some useful skills. The kids in this gang stole hubcaps and such for money, a traditional source of income for poor urban kids, and then used the money to buy vodka, which they injected into their veins for maximum affect, and glue, which they sniffed in the traditional manner. Nick convinced them that smoking pot was healthier and more fun, and then taught them how to grow their own for fun and profit. Nick was a real urban mover and shaker.

A few of the kids were having trouble giving up IV vodka and glue, and Nick could see that they needed help. Viet Nam vets were returning to become junkies and teaching their little brothers to use. At that time the most common treatment for drug addiction was to throw the addict in jail and beat him up a few times. This treatment methodology didn't work any better with young people that it did anyone else, so Nick decided he needed to establish a treatment center.

Nick gave up his job with the Extension Service, left the Ecstatic Umbrella, and set himself up dealing LSD and other psychedelics to angry young black men. He figured that if they got stoned enough they might not blow their tops completely, even though that was the response for which the situation seemed to call. He had a girlfriend, a very nice, middle-class appearing young woman who moved in with him, which absorbed some of his time. His business prospered, Nick became well known in the black ghetto underground, and he devoted a great deal of his spare time to creating a drug dependency treatment facility.

In less than a year Nick had pulled together a group of 'initiators', people who get things started, and they had created a not-for-profit corporation to create and operate a drug treatment facility, to be called 'Renaissance West'. He figured that a drug dealer would certainly know more about addicts than would a cop, and drug dealing left most of his time free during conventional business hours. Nick and his quiet, pretty girlfriend were welcomed into the Kansas City jazz culture and recognized as good people.

Shortly after Renaissance West opened its doors and admitted the first 'class' of dopers, Nick was sitting at home, smoking a joint, wondering what to do next with his free time, and decided to walk around the neighborhood. He stepped out his door and, before he could turn around to lock the door, pistols were pressed against each temple and a third against his forehead. The pistoleros eventually identified themselves as FBI agents, and Nick started down a trail that led to a federal prison.

Federal prisons are much nicer than state prisons. While in prison Nick finished a Master of Science degree in geology and learned to speak Russian. Nick was never one to waste spare time. The prison officials were fairly certain Nick hadn't lost his taste for drugs, a correct assumption, as it happens, so when he was paroled from prison the first condition of his parole was that he successfully complete a drug treatment program. Guess where he went for treatment? Right, Renaissance West.

When he graduated from treatment he landed a job escorting Russian scientists on tours of the USA. Down in Albuquerque, while on a tour escorting Russian scientists, Nick dropped into a bar to have a beer one evening. Who should he see in there but his old girlfriend from his dope dealing days!

They slipped into a secluded booth with their drinks and started to catch up. She was first with the questions, and learned what had happened to Nick. Then he asked her what had happened to her. “Oh, nothing, really,” she said.

“What are you doing now?” he asked.

“The same job I've had for years,” she replied, “I work for the FBI.”

Farm News 07-02-06

Sunday morning, after chores, 76°



Baby Ducks

Wednesday morning three baby ducks appeared in the yard, anxiously being watched by two duck hens. I doubt if the two hens shared incubating duties, but they both seemed to be quite concerned about the babies' welfare. Of course, for a duck, concern for a baby's welfare is expressed by a lot of loud quacking and running around in circles; they do not engage in any actions which might actually help the ducklings.

It might be that their nests were close to each other and, when baby ducks appeared in one nest, the duck on the other nest went into motherhood mode. Anyway, for whatever reason, three baby ducks have two mothers following them and quacking loudly.

The babies and mothers are now in a large stall in the barn. If we keep them inside for the first few weeks their chances of survival increase greatly. So, Saturday evening, when I went into their stall with feed and water, just as I have been doing twice a day since before their grandparents had hatched, one of the mother ducks went into a complete panic.

Quacking loudly and repeatedly, she circled the stall once and then actually flew out the gate. These ducks very seldom take to the air, and I stood there amazed. She then ran around in a circle a few times in the barn and then took off out the door at full clip. She continued running around in circles and then making a rapid dash to another area for several minutes. She finally ended up at a water bucket where the three drakes were having a drink.

That duck then entered into one of the most flamboyant displays of duck sexuality I have seen, which is saying quite a bit, considering the way they carry on. That mama needed a brass pole to work on. The three drakes pulled back a bit to give her room, smiled at each other, and lit up cigars. I freshened their drinks and stepped back to watch.

When I finally grew tired of the show and left for the house she was still at it. The three old drakes were still there, watching, sipping their drinks, and smoking their cigars.


Independence Day

For years we have had a party of some sort on July 4th. This year we are taking a break. We're getting too old, I think.


Ting Chronicles: The Storm Troopers

Again, this week, one of the drakes grabbed Ting by her top knot, dragged her from her nest, and sexually assaulted her. Poor Ting. “It is just as it was when the Nazi Storm Troopers invaded my poor native Poland,” she said.

Now, Ting has never been out of Jefferson County, Kansas, and, although her breed is called 'Polish Crested', they were developed in the Roman Empire, not Poland. Ting likes to think she identifies with the oppressed because she has suffered much in her own life. It's all nonsense, of course. She could easily escape the drakes.

It appears, though, that the stress has been too much for Ting's 'delicate condition' and she is no longer incubating her eggs. Maybe she will hatch chicks this fall, or next year.


Tales from Local History

Being an uncle is great, much easier than being a parent. This is especially true if one is so fortunate as to have identical twin grandnieces, little cuties who celebrated their third birthday this week.

Of course, I went to the birthday party. The preschoolers there would have added up to several truckloads, all running around looking like a demonstration of Brownian motion. We elders sat on our lawn chairs in a shady corner, enjoying the field of children and young mothers, while we swapped stories. Several of the stories included references to the CIA House.

The CIA House was a hippy collective rooming house near campus, a wonderful place that had once been a nursing home and could accommodate a large number of young people. Obtaining a precise count of the number of people living there at any one time would have been as difficult as counting the preschoolers imitating Brownian motion: they wouldn't stand still to be counted.

During the disturbances that occurred in 1970 or so, some branch of law enforcement decided that the CIA House was being used as a headquarters for the insurgency. They were wrong, of course, because there was no headquarters. Spontaneous insurgencies don't have leaders, just participants.

I was living in Kansas City at that time, but, not wanting to miss a good uprising, I hopped on a borrowed motorcycle and went to Lawrence. By the time I arrived the National Guard was blocking all the main entrances to the city to prevent any reinforcements from reaching the insurgents. I hadn't ridden all that way just to be prevented, so I came into town on a county road, wheeled into the back yard of the CIA House, and parked the bike.

There was a ladder leaning against a porch roof on the back of the house and, as I knew that a friend lived in a room with a window overlooking that roof, I slipped up the ladder to the roof. The window was open and, inside, nude and sitting cross-legged on the bed, was a very pretty young woman, the friend I wished to visit. She had just rolled a joint and, when my head popped above the edge of the porch roof, she leaned forward and held the joint out in my direction. No gentleman could decline such an offer.

We finished the joint, passing it back and forth through the open window, as the leaves grew greener, the sky more blue, and the sounds of the insurgency became more operatic. The young woman put on some clothing then, and we both descended the ladder in search of adventure at the uprising.

There was a sizeable crowd gathered in front of the Rock Chalk, a bar next to the campus, so we joined them, sitting on the curb facing the street onto campus. A pipe appeared and was being passed along the curb sitters when a police car rounded at the corner. The police car turned our way and slowly made its way down the street.

A cop was driving the car and three National Guard troopers were inside with their rifles pointing out the windows. All four tires were flat and the car was slowly thumping and bumping along, wobbling from side to side on its flat tires, accompanied by cheers from the onlookers. The young woman took a hit from the pipe, passed it to me, and said, “This is the triumph of Dadaism.”

Yep. Looked that way to me.


A Reader Writes and tells me I'm not looking at reality about immigration.

What a plan! While we're at it, why don't we give car thieves the cars they stole?

This ISN'T about compassion. This ISN'T about racism. This is about 66 million new people added to the population ("legal" immigrants only) (source - Heritage Foundation).

Where does their healthcare come from? Are you willing to be turned away from the ER because they're busy treating people who came across the border illegally? Are you willing to see more hospitals close their doors because they are forced to treat people who have neither health insurance nor money?

Where does the lumber for their homes come from? Are you willing to clear cut the remaining national forests?

Where does the oil come from for their vehicles? Are we really going to invade Venezuela? Or are they going haul us around in rickshaws like coolies?

Where is their water going to come from? Are you willing to subsist on collected rainwater because water resources are getting dangerously scarce already?

Where are their social services going to come from? Are Alex and Steven willing to become social workers at low pay because we will be desperately in need of them?

Where are the millions of jobs going to come from for people who typically have little education and are being encouraged not to learn English by our politicians? Do we really want 66 million gardeners and maids with whom we can't converse? How does that fit into the flat world?

Where is the law enforcement going to come from for a group of people who statistically have 2 1/2 times the crime rate of the typical population? How many MS13'rs are you willing to have as neighbors?

20 years ago a meatcutter made $19 an hour. Now they make $9 hr. Can you live on $9 an hour? Do you really think they can - over the long haul?

Tell me where the planning is to integrate 66 million plus new bodies into this country over the next ten years.

This is about population and resource planning. When they come for your home because 30 of them could live there and only two of you live there, where are you going to go?

Does overcrowding mean anything to you?

When resources become scarce, civil strife is near. And it will get very, very ugly!!

And last of all, why the hell does Mexico get a pass on all of this? They can just go on being totally disfunctional because we won't saying anything? They get to guard their southern border and we're just supposed to open ours?

Do you enjoy being laughed at? Well, I hope so because Vincente Fox and his buddies are rolling in the aisles laughing at us - and who can blame them?

Can you say Estupido?

And, another reader says:

My thoughts on immigration are based in large part to my experiences in working in the areas of construction & fast food when I was much, much younger. That & also, my observations, having lived in the beautiful metropolis of "Stilwell," which is a wonderful play on words in itself. Moving from "Stilwell" to "Wellsville" could give some literary type a lot of food for thought...

On immigration reform: as I've shared w/our students here at the middle school, what would happen if all of a sudden, next week, we shipped all the "illegals" back to Mexico, or wherever they came from? What would happen to the industries like roofing, construction, fast food, landscaping, etc.?

Several years ago, when a bad storm hit our neighborhood, I counted six roofing crews redoing roofs in our subdivision. Not a single worker spoke English. The crews would climb up on the roof by 7:00 a.m. or earlier, & would eat their lunches (and dinners) on the roof, & would come down when the sun went down. They worked their tails off, & from what I saw & heard, all customers were happy with the end result.

When I was 22, I moved to L.A. to live, & while applying to law schools, worked with some friends in the pool & spa industry. When it was time for a really big job (i.e. lifting a tile spa into a hole in the ground off a truck), my buddy & I would drive downtown into Los Angeles to round up the day's supply of labor. Imagine my surprise to see the streets lined with hundreds & hundreds of available "workers" for the day's work. John would point to six or seven of them, they would hop into the back of his truck, & we would head to the job site. After 3-4 hours of labor, he would buy them lunch, pay them cash, & drop them back off downtown. As a native Kansan, this was all pretty new to me.

In southern Johnson County, I'd say about 85-90% of all labor in the areas of landscaping, roofing, construction, & fast food is from south of the border. Like I said, could you imagine what would happen in our country if all of a sudden we deported all these people?

Well, there are two views of immigration. I don't have any solutions, but I know that unless we regard immigrants, both legal and illegal, as humans and not statistics that we will not be able to find a good solution. Also, the world is flat; if you don't believe me, read The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman. The Great Wall of China can no longer stop the exchange of ideas, people, and capital.


Dr. M. Reports on Basic Training

In the Field

A time comes in every soldier’s life when the Army will put training to the test in the form of a Field Training Exercise; otherwise known as an FTX. If you enlist in the Army, this means they will train you for a month in marching and drills as well as conditioning and running. If you happen to go in as a doctor it is slightly different.

After two weeks of training, mostly consisting of Power Point presentations we formed up at 0500 on Monday morning to board buses to go to “the field”. Assembling a bunch of doctors at 4:30 in the morning and expecting them to have all their gear is an iffy proposition at best. There was much running back to the rooms with sounds of “Oh, I didn’t know I needed my Kevlar”. Our helmets are constructed of Kevlar (and possibly with lead because they are so darn heavy). And thus begins the lessons for the week.

If the Army is transporting you, you must wear your Kevlar. Fortunately, the Kevlar is heavy enough that when you sleep, you can rest your head on your M16 and just balance the pressure, keep your neck straight and sleep traveling over dirt roads.

Never trust a sergeant when he tells you something is not physically challenging.

The best boots cause blisters, so tape your feet before you go into the field. Duct tape works best. Your socks glide right over it and your skin doesn’t feel a thing. Should you not have followed the above advice because you didn’t hear it until the middle of the FTX, fear not, there’s always another one.

In order to protect troops from Nuclear, Chemical, or Biological attack the Army has invented a lot of nifty gear. The jacket and pants won’t let the tiniest bit of air in. I think they tested it in Minnesota in January and found it quite cozy.

One of the best ways to feel cool in Texas in the summer is to don above mentioned gear, run around in the sun simulating a gas attack and then take off the gear. No spring breeze in Maine ever felt that cool.

If you are in the student chain of command, never ever make your buddies do push ups. Especially if you don’t get down and push with them. The rest of your summer will not be a pleasant experience.

MREs aren’t actually food. They just simulate food. However, if you are hungry enough, you’ll still eat the “meat”.

You simply can not take an omelet and turn it into an MRE. No one will benefit from the experience.

If the “cheese” packet says mix by pressing the packet between your hands, it’s good advice to follow. No one actually wants to know what makes up pasteurized processed cheese food.

If they hand you a weapon, memorize the serial number and don’t loose any of the bits. Even if the weapon was last used against the Viet Cong and the magazine falls out.

Listen to your instructors when they tell you how to unjam your weapon. Remember, it was made by the lowest bidder and the advice will come in handy when you need it.

Never go out into the field without a GPS. Sure, they will test you with a map, compass and protractor, but you will just get lost anyway.

If you do get lost, find a buddy and start singing. This generally puts you into fits of giggles over how much your feet hurt and how many bruises you can put on your body in a week without actually having anything fall off.

Never ever form up downwind from the latrines.

No matter how sore your feet are, and how feebly you are walking, you can still smile and encourage your buddy to keep going. Your smile might be the one that gets them through.

Hang in there, Captain. You're probably becoming a little frayed around the edges by now. Just remember, you are collecting stories to tell your grandchildren.


Kill a Criminal for Jesus
I was so happy to hear that our good Christian Attorney General won his case in the US Supreme Court to re-instate the death penalty in Kansas. Our Governor, who should know better, said that the death penalty will “. . . bring closure to the families of victims.”

When did it become the business of a democracy to provide revenge for victims? Shall we follow the Pakistani example and allow the brothers of a rape victim to rape the sister of the rapist? Of course not.

The purpose of the law is to provide a peaceful, equitable society, not to obtain revenge for the victims of crimes. Any right to vengeance must be laid aside as part of the price for living under the rule of law.

It amazes me that most of the support for capital punishment comes from people who call themselves Christians. Maybe they think that while Jesus was hanging on the cross he said, “Hey, capital punishment is essential to bring closure to the victims.”

It also amazes me that most of the supporters of capital punishment also think that government is too big, powerful, and intrusive. You can't get much more big, powerful, and intrusive than executing your fellow citizens. Personally, I don't trust government enough to give it the power to execute people.