Someone pull the alarms!

How many Americans pay attention to bond yields, treasuries, currency, and other fiat jazz? Not many I suspect. It seems, thanks to movies like Wall st and that Kevin Bacon flick, we rely on the Dow to gauge where the economy is at. Hardly. The Dow is nothing more than speculative liquidity. A far greater concern for all of us is the perceived value of our currency. The bond market entices investment by raising interest rates and thereby creating a greater return on these bonds. The higher the yields the worst our situation is perceived by those interested. They're weighing the risks, and these days where our fed chairman is pumping virtual nothingness into a broken bank cartel there are many! All of it hidden behind the veil of economic gibberish that most worker drones are utterly clueless to the freak show going on in that federal reserve den.

The US deficit is 1.6 trillion dollars. No one is buying our shit, it's all being supported by super banks - federal reserve, ECB, and IMF. We don't even have a hope in hell of paying the freaking interest! Do even our politicians get it? Doesn't seem like it, they'd rather play politics and argue over tax cuts, unemployment, and welfare. There solution? Work out a deal to keep tax cuts for everyone - including the wealthy - and extend unemployment. I don't know about anybody else but does that signal an attempt to reduce the deficit? Sounds more like a government trying to keep the slaves hopeful and less rebellious.

The truth is we don't have the productive capacity to recover from the morbid debt situation. We are circling the drain and will eventually default. What I see is a country that has grown slovenly stupid, corrupt, and moribound in the assumption that with enough government spending the economic engine will restart. It takes sacrifice, which no one wants, hard work, which no one wants, ingenuity, we have some of that, and sincerity, which is completely and utterly absent!

Europe is exploding with protests and unrest and things are just getting started there. Ireland was bailed out, a country in which all the economic fundies were saying would never be in the same boat as Greece just a few months before all hell broke loose, and placed the IMF austerity measures on the citizenry who had nothing to do with the mess. Meanwhile, like in our country and others, the banks become enriched. A massive shift in wealth is taking place globally. How? Through the currency. There will be rich and there will be poor, but those in the middle are going bye bye. Over the next several months the bond crisis and fiscal calamity striking Europe will manifest itself with greater and greater violence. Banks will burn, airports will closed down, trains will stop, and the Molotov's will fly. Don't worry, the party is coming here too. Oh wait to our Wally world goons have to pay 4 dollars a gallon for fuel again, and the banks stop working. The money is going to be worthless in the future.

So keep an eye on the bond auctions and interest rates. Oh Ben is going to lose control over his monster. BTW, Ron Paul is now on the board of finance subcommittee....and this should be good.

Little bit of this and a little bit of that...and you've got War!

Like two stag bulls staring each other down, the US and Chinese figure heads have begun their grunting and bellowing behind the close doors of the G20. Why? Well everyone should know why by now: oh Ben Bernakie, our reserve chairman has begun his printing again, his shady wall st manipulations, and his purposeful devaluation of a already devalued dollar. They call it QE2. Most citizens haven't a clue what that means, they only want their current lives to continue as if the future most certainly owes them the same as their parents and grand-parents. No one dares do anything about the current system in which a select few hold tremendous power over monetary exchange rates. 1913, specifically that year in which we handed over the reins of this country to a PRIVATE bank which now holds vast power and sway over our current predicament and the future and security of all Americans. They say Ron Paul will put a stop to this darth sidious force with a FED audit at the very least, or outright abolished. Guess which one I would prefer? Don't anyone hold their breath though, the central bank is THE most powerful force in the global empire, and they plan to nuke the world economy, and force choke grip on anyone that might oppose them.

So while the bauble heads put on a show for the sleeping masses - unless you're French - the real cartel begins setting up the next mass human liquidation. It begins with the instrument of money - currency. A intentional devaluation of our currency is a direct attack on Chinese exports, and sets up Europe to begin falling first. Boy is it too, have you seen Ireland bond spreads? So while fiat currency's around the world begin to implode we'll start to see the greater plan begin to emerge - war and a new world currency. NWO and amero nonsense you say? Yeah, I used to think that was pretty far fetched too, but the same looney's we call crazy for warning NWO and a global currency are also the ones that told us gold was going to go up and up. Popped through 1400/ounce recently, and I won't be surprised when it breaks 2,000 soon. Gold too rich for your blood? Buy Silver, that's going to break 30/ounce pretty soon. Gosh, I can remember when it was 5/ounce back when I was teenager. Anyway, getting back to collapsing currencies and such, we have Ireland imploding as I write this, and the ECB will be stepping in like they did for Greece to impose austerity and a comprehensive bailout plan. The same clowns that said Ireland would never go bankrupt and Greece will survive it's austerity measures will come on various economic shows to tell us the Ireland humpty dumpty dollar shall be made a whole again. What rubbish, it'll be Spain and Portugal next. ECB can step in there too, but with each bailout measure you undermine the currency and financial instruments of a functioning European economy. As this keeps up China's going to find that the only customer it has is itself.

What about us? We are only just now beginning to feel the pressure of financial events that started back in 2008. State fiscal structure will continue to fall apart, the US consumer will find oil, gas, and food increasingly unaffordable, and god help you if you're one of those citizens that have fallen off the unemployment dole. You know, the people the government no longer counts in order to make the unemployment figures look slightly better than they are - 18%! Oh lord, better find a tent city or shack up with the parents. Food stamps, welfare, and food drives are all skyrocketing economic indicators being largely ignored by the rich on Wall st. Speaking of those chaps, they've been riding the QE2 wave for weeks raking in the junk change injection while the serfs out on the street are wondering why the coffee packages are getting smaller, and the price of fuel is almost 3/gallon again.

Hey, if you're not one of the unlucky serfs wondering where you're job went, or why you have to stand in line to get a check, surely you've heard about your state's inability to balance the budget? Right? That's part of it! When real estate values go down, the tax appraisals go down, and when that happens they don't bring in as much revenue. Also, retail consumption has dropped markedly with so many unemployed....oh wait, you want to point out the profit margins of Walmart and Best Buy to say that retail ain't so bad. Oh say now, tell those chains to hire back all the people they layed off back in 2009, or the crimped stale paycheck, benefits, and hourly fucking of their employee's to ensure some board member suits get to continue taking the yacht out! I tell you, the corporate media is damn good and convincing everyone of the supremacy of capitalism and greed. Gordon Gecko "Greed is good," except we ain't Gordon Gecko. We're the dumb peasant who has forgotten to sharpen their pitch fork.

This all comes back to currency, that fiat bill that ain't worth the paper it's printed on. Watch the money, the fluctuations are going to be the drum treble to war.

You can find it all here at www.theoilage.com, a forum that I administer. Come over and learn some techniques that will equip you in "attempting" to survive WWIII.
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On the home front I just celebrated my wife's 34th birthday. Had a delicious bowl of Gumbo, cake, and now snuggling in with the wife. Keep your family close, the stored stuff fresh and dry, and the weapons accessible. The day could be tomorrow.

Escape to Vermont!

Thanks to the generous help from forum members - Lifeaftertheoilcrash - and the perseverance of perpetuity I and my sweet wife have found ourselves deep into New England - Vermont! A mere 1600 miles from the deep south, a place I have called home for all my life. We've been up here for nearly a month now, only now have I really had the time to settle down and do a little blogging for those interested, and I must declare the scenary, atmosphere, and the new job becoming deeply rooted to my soul. Only feeling the tug of home when I worry about our Winter heating bill, or when my wife becomes sadden at seeing her nephew via skype and knowing she'll only see the family maybe once or twice a year.

We know no-one up here in the capacity of just hanging out and sharing anxieties, but thankfully my forum friends around me in these hills are planting, storing, and herding the goats away from prowling coyoty's and they're within an hour or two of me. Their experiences and nearness settle certain transplant anxieties when they crop up, and of course my family and friends are just a phone call away too. I've started work for White River Valley EMS, everyone just calls them Wirva (WRVA)around here, and the shifts are the best I've ever had to sit through in my entire career. First, I come in for my first 24 - really just 18 hrs on the clock - in which I sleep from 1am to 7am (I'm secondary if the other crew gets a call during that time, I'll start getting paid again), then I work 7a - 7p as secondary (second out on a call). I will go home for 12hrs from 7p to 7a, and the final 24 hr shift is a repeat of the 1st for a total of 48 hrs. After which I'm off for 5 whole days. A very friendly family schedule, and I certainly do love it. They are not that busy usually.

The weather has been what was anticipated - COLD. 30's to 40's for highs and lows from upper 20's to lower 20's. A few nights last week it was in the teens already, and November has just begun. It has snowed a half dozen times, especially at the altitude my house is at 1500', but it hasn't yet stuck to the ground for any length of time. Lately, it's been a slushy mixed, and the skies are typically overcast and dreary. Wet and rainy cold days too. This is Fall, it's the transition to the bitterness of New England Winter. I find it charming, but also alarming as I hear my heat furnace regularly kick on and off. The house I'm in is 200 years old, the original owner was the man who built the famous floating bridge in Brookfield. Long hand choped beams support the floors with 4' wide planks for floors and ceilings. The DC living landlords, in their infinite naivity, decided to go with heating oil and propane for heat. Anyone that is truly a Vermonter knows to go with wood heating. To fill my heating oil tank up costs 800 dollars (at today's heating oil prices), and they say we'll go through a tank a month come January and Febuary. I'm deeply concerned about this. Today, I bought the shrink wrap kits for the windows in order to try and seal up this old house. The insulation is missing in places too, but at least the owners are trying to fix that. Their contractors have been a thorn in our side too, ever since we started to unpack around here. We just got use of our kitchen a few days ago, and are still waiting for the garage to be cleared out. New doors have been ordered, better insulated ones, and their proprieter is attempting to figure out how to gain access to the subfloor of the master bedroom. The house sits atop a stone quarried basement and the subfloor under the bedroom has very little crawl space for the spray in insulator.

In the meantime, we have installed studded snow tires on the car, and just had a brake job done that was long over due. Got 140,000 out of the pair on the matrix. Tomorrow I'll be setting up the invisible fence for the dogs, which will allow them more time to chase moose and turkey on the property. Truthfully, I haven't yet seen a moose, though one was seen last year, but I have seen several flocks of turkeys running through the woods in the back. The Canadian geese keep flying their V formations headed south as I watch the Northern skies signal the approach of the Winter soltace.

So it begins. I'll be discussing the effects of hyperinflation, at an economy near you soon, tomorrow.

Politicians have a pulse?

Don't believe me? Take a look: http://www.breitbart.tv/rep-anthony-weiner-loses-it-on-house-floor/

Then take a look at people's comments to it.

americans overwhelmingly oppose the health care bill. yet this communist wants to jam it through. i'd like to tell him where to jam it. socialist pig.

at least weiner is named right

OK, once and for all, let us define what Socialism and Communism are.

From Wiki

Socialism is an economic and political theory based on public or common ownership and cooperative management of the means of production and allocation of resources.[1][2][3]

In a socialist economic system, production is carried out by a public association of producers to directly produce use-values (instead of exchange-values), through coordinated planning of investment decisions, distribution of surplus, and the use of the means of production. Socialism is a set of social and economic arrangements based on a post-monetary system of calculation, such as labour time, energy units or calculation-in-kind.[4]

Socialists advocate a method of compensation based on individual merit or the amount of labour one contributes to society.[5] They generally share the view that capitalism unfairly concentrates power and wealth among a small segment of society that controls capital and derives its wealth through a system of exploitation.

Now that we have defined Socialism, let me clarify something else....there has never been a socialist nation based on the definition as outlined above. Got it? Russia, NK, Cuba.....either dictatorships, or party system power...but certainly not Socialists. Defamation and slurring of the definition by capitalistic propaganda - to illicit an emotional response rather than an intellectual one - has been the bread and butter for polarizing government subjects. We being their subjects of course - the top 1% of our nations wealth. They could give a rats ass about us other then to force us into two propaganda confession boxes - Democrat or Republican. That's how "they" control our vote - the tiny little illusion of freedom they dangle for us, and they do this through politicized propaganda.

Communism

Pure communism" in the Marxian sense refers to a classless, stateless society, one where decisions on what to produce and what policies to pursue are made in the best interests of the collective society with the interests of every member of society given equal weight in the practical decision-making process in both the political and economic spheres of life.

And once again there has NEVER been a "true" communist state...not even close. The ones politicized as such - Cuba, NK, China, Khmer, etc are/or were all authoritarian. The last thing the top 1% of the worlds wealth want is for people to adopt Communism, much less Socialism, for they would have no legitimate claim to the extreme wealth and power they hold. So what do these people do? They educate people that Communism is evil, and that nations that pursue it will be attacked or cutoff from trade, yet if you closely look at the targets of their propaganda - NONE were ever following the parameters of Communism or Socialism. That would take an intellectual initiative from people, and most people react on emotion....like our good politician that started this outburst.

So every time I hear someone say Obama is a Socialist pig, or a Communist, it's a face palm moment for me.

Obama is an ivy league politician who comes to the bar of the top 1% to get his marching orders. All his good friends make up the top corporate world CEO's, the top banking giants, and the elite financial mega powers - ECB, IMF, and the FEDS. His ear is to their lead. It's not to the little people - the subjects of fascist corporatism. The party system - they control both - is their method to play us. A Machiavellian take: Get party A and party B to fight among themselves, and party A and party B will never know what party C (the bankers and to big to fail corporations)are doing.

Just wanted you to understand all these matrix codes. So what was Weiner all hot about? This bill would cost a little over 7 billion, and it would take care of the 9/11 responders, the ill consequences of ground zero. Government spending, you betcha, but the politicians had no problem passing 60 billion more dollars to an already exceeded trillion dollar budget to kill people half way around the world who had nothing to do with anything other than growing some wonderful opium, herding goats, and praying to their god. The whole link to terrorism and 9/11 is just more propaganda. You won't see any of these politicians, bankers, or corporate heads taking up a rifle, and patrolling some IED infested roadside...they have our youth to do that. No...you'll just see them bitch and moan about spending anything on the "little" people.

What is the Matrix?

"It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth."

(Neo) "What truth?"

"That you are a slave, Neo. Like everyone else you were born into bondage. Into a prison that you cannot taste or see or touch. A prison for your mind."

This movie resonates with people at many different levels. For me, it's astonishingly bold and upfront with the truth while remaining cloaked in science fiction fantasy. The meaning lies past the entertainment and strikes a perfect cord with the fabricated reality we call civilization for the analogy is real - the matrix is real.

Let me show you the matrix.

A federal judge today blocked controversial aspects to a law passed by the state of Arizona pursuant to the identification and detainment of illegals. The law is the matrix, every law. The judge is matrix code. Illegal is a matrix code (label). The border of Arizona is the matrix. The right for the police (code) to detain illegals (code) is the matrix. The reality is that none of this exists but in our minds. There is no line in the sand between Mexico and Arizona - it's all earth. The border is fictitious. There are no Mexicans - they are people - same specie as any other homo sapien. There is no US, no laws, no state of Arizona - it's just what people believe - it's a prison for their minds. The matrix is absolutely everywhere, we walk around with civilization formulated and fabricated inside our minds. Right and wrong - completely made up.

The matrix enslaves us. The ones that enslave us are the ones that first formulated laws - the matrix. Story making by way of the whip and spear. The origin of the matrix goes back to the foundations of agrarian civilization, language, story making, dream making, it is all a creation of the mind and for the mind. It is the forbidden fruit.

Your labor is being harvested. Your productivity is being harvested.

Think about this next time you find yourself in a political argument, fighting for the red team or the blue team, when your paying your taxes, or paying some fee at the DMV, or when your working most of your life away inside a cubicle while the CEO of BP (all matrix code) goes to yacht races, plays golf at a million dollar country club, or jets off to France to tour a winery after running a company that ruinously neglected safety concerns and thereby murdering 11 hard working subjects and killing most of the life swimming in the Northern gulf! The system that made all of that possible is fully functional. It is a system of laws to keep you doing what you do, and them with the worlds riches - harvested through your obedience to the matrix.

"Welcome to the real world."

The real world is simply what you "can" or "cannot" do. The rest is the matrix. You have to walk through that door.

"A world without rules and controls, without borders and boundaries. A world where anything is possible."

Looking for escape in Tennessee

My wife said it would be a disaster....she was right.

The drive up to Chattanooga was really a delight as we passed by towns and cities on our way through the MS delta and on into the bible belt of northern Alabama. A nice contrast in accents and hard working people. The summer heat cooked up a few thunderstorms to make driving interesting, but I found it little to be bothered about as the Smokey mountain range came into view. I love rock, especially that dark organic limestone that's famous in Tenn.

I have grown accustomed to using the GPS so I felt a little lost trying to navigate by my toughbooks street atlas. My GPS was stolen last time I worked on an ambulance...yes, even in EMS there are thieves.

After a long day driving we pulled into the Best Western at the Lookout mt. exit, Lookout mt is famous for Rock City & Ruby Falls, both worth seeing if you ever come to Chattanooga. The room was $90 , but too tired to bump from place to place searching, I dished out the dough to the skinny Indian behind the desk. Apparently Indians own the hotel monopoly up here - the country of India that is, not to be confused with "real" Americans: Native Americans . The Patel's and Purohits. I'm always amazed at how all these foreign nationalities manage to come to America and open hotels, restaraunts, and gas stations - India, Vietnamese, and Arabs. I heard once that they get grants to do this, don't know if this is true or not. The room was nothing to brag about - flat wore out King and an a/c that couldn't keep the room cold - and outside I saw a few sullen family's out by the standardized square teacup pool watching their kids exhaust there energies splashing each other. It was hot and muggy, I could hardly tell the difference between there and home. Lookout Mt was on our Eastern horizon hidden behind a smoggy haze.

My wife had a headache and was too tired to go out and find a place to eat, so we ordered Pizza. I enjoyed it - Mr. T's or something - but my wife was less than impressed. It was a hot restless night as I tossed and turned with the anxieties of possibly moving somewhere new.

Monday, it was still hot outside . Not to be made a fool again on an overpriced hotel, I handed the Indian back the card as he asked me how everything went. I lied - "fine, great..." Who cares, it's not like he would lower the price anytime soon or fix the a/c or replace that hard ass mattress. lol. I figured our first stop would be the Lifeguard EMS station in Chattanooga. The hotel had one of those tourist made printouts for the major streets in the area, and I had mapquested the location during the night, so we had some idea where we were going as we drove the Matrix down and around the base of Lookout mt. towards downtown. Wherever we were, we found ourselves in what would best be described as the 1930's, or the town that time forgot. Weeds growing up through the concrete, businesses long since closed, for lease signs in store front windows, and your neighborhood crackhead spasticating at the corner as he listened to music emanating from the fourth plane of la la land. I was shocked at how little traffic there was. The neighborhood we were in reminded me of the New Orleans ninth ward...before...Katrina. Passed up one of those 60's bygone architectural ideas called the projects, and a long chain of drug dealers was ready to sell their goods as we passed by with the doors locked and my trigger finger you know where. Compared to the streets of New Orleans, the dealers seemed peaceful .

We find the weed covered entrance to the Lifeguard EMS headquarters and turn in passing up two homeless wino's acting as guards - I shit you not! The entire headquarters was surrounded by 18' high fencing with constantine wire at the top. Not knowing what to expect I came in to speak with Holly, their human resource gal, and was interviewed by the on duty supervisor. Large stocky pot bellied medic who seemed less than enthused with the day's ongoings. I was impressed with the scope of the station, all recently built, and the organization that was setup - 2 on duty mechanics, large bay for the units, ample spaced stockroom, large classroom for in-house recerts and education, and a com center that was state of the art. There wasn't much to complain about. Holly was busy doing orientation with two new recruits and the supervisor said he would call me in the afternoon to make an offer, so I came outside to the misses - who was PMSing - to take a spin around Chattanooga to check things out while we waited for Lifeguard to get back with me.

Once we made it out of the dreadfully poor section of town we wandered the vacant streets of downtown to see what Chattanooga had to offer. More than anything we were looking for a place to stop and have coffee...maybe a some eggs and bacon too. The aquarium down by the river was new and modern but as it was still before noon, there was few to anyone there. I thought for sure if we head up main st and over by the university we would find a nice little breakfast joint to patronize but alas, all we found was the community kitchen and large throng of unfortunates standing outside the unemployment offices. Very much the same as what you might see in New Orleans downtown near University hosp. I was surprised there was nowhere to eat near the university, at least not breakfast, and despite our best efforts there was no coffee chain, breakfast joint, or otherwise to stop at anywhere we drove downtown. Plenty of lunch and dinner places that were only beginning to open and prepare for evening tourists. I text a fellow latocer - Michelle - who was watching her kids what we were doing. I wanted to hook up with her to talk about the area and possibly make a friend.

I figured the best bet in finding breakfast would be a chain restaurant off the interstate, so we got back on the 75 headed to Knoxville and found a Cracker Barrel near the Hampton pl mall. We were stuffed with blueberry pancakes and eggs, and gotten our coffee fix, it was late enough for Michelle to break away and meet somewhere.

The weather turned a frightful fit after our conversation, and Lifeguard still hadn't called me back...leaving me to worry a little. I headed over to that den of iniquity, the scourge of mankind, that pit of vipers, the Illuminati HQ's - Walmart to purchase a new GPS. Damn shiny and nice inside too. If I was going to be looking at properties, and with so few days to do so, I needed it to get from place to place efficiently. Poof...there went a hundred. Pulling out of the parking lot the rain was coming down so hard that it almost flooded the car. My wife said "is this any different than back home?" A foot of flood water was racing down the hilly terrain with happy vehicle vengeance. We have a Toyota Matrix, the sucker is really low to the ground, and it wouldn't take much to have water come in.

We took Michelle's advice to snag a hotel down in LaFayette, GA - a hop skip across the state line - a Days Inn. Another Indian running the place, but this time the room was $50/night and the bed and a/c worked perfectly. So far, I'm really impressed with how nice the traffic in the Chattanooga area is - not crowded at all - and on our way down to LaFayette, GA we passed through a famous civil war battle field. Cannons, statues, monoliths placed in green grassy fields between the hickory and oak. My soul could still hear the cannons, and the artillery Colonel ordering "FIRE!" I imagined the shades marching across their battlefield under the glow of a full moon.

We drove down the road from the hotel some, took the advice of the Indian receptionist, to eat at a local Mexican restaraunt. My wife was happy TN and GA had fat people. One large bloke sat with his 3 kids across from us, geez must've weighed four or five hundred pounds. He looked very happy though as his kids enjoyed their time with dad. Across from them was a muscle bound marine - semper fi T-shirt - sitting with his cute blond of a girlfriend. The young ladies in GA were gorgeous. My wife didn't like that. So if you ever get to LaFayette, GA, I highly recommend Don lolo (I think that's what it was called, right across from the Sonic), Megadoom approved chicken quesadillas.

During the evening hours I went online and did more property searches and found some more contacts. Tuesday morning, I started to make phone calls to the realtors and the contacts for homes I had found. Still hadn't heard anything from Lifeguard so I emailed Holly as a reminder. We drove up some back roads near the hotel towards a property that had been listed on Craigslist for some time. Something that seemed as though it would work for us, owner financed home on 8 acres. Beautiful contry, horse pastures, and gorgeous half million dollar homes. The one were looking for was far less than impressive, but a doomer gem if it only had cleared land. The home looked rough, cracked drywall, broken windows, etc. The cleared yard though was not even a quarter acre, and it was right up on the roadside, the rest of the land was on a steep slope towards the back and all heavily wooded. Too expensive for us anyway. I called the realtor for Dunlap who was going to show us two properties that seemed right up our ally in price and needs. GPS said it would take an hour or so to get up there.

The drive through Chattanooga was without traffic and the scenery divine. Richly adorned mountains covered in green with mountain streams and creeks cutting through it all, and the valley of Dunlap was to die for. It was ad midst this beauty that the floor was yanked out from under me. Lifeguard called and said they were only hiring PT due to the drop in call volume and that the pay for a FT paramedic was 14/hr. Get the fuck out of here! A nickel for every year of experience. Get the fuck out of here! A Popeyes manager makes 14/hr! It takes 2 years of intensive training to be a paramedic. A paramedic is responsible for intubating people, starting IV's, making life and death decisions, pushing narcotics and hundreds of other meds and all they're going to offer is 14 fucking dollars an hour? I imagine TN has paramedics who do it for altruism rather than a workable paycheck.

So, sitting outside the realtor's parking lot contemplating our next move, I said to my wife I could stay offshore and commute. She wasn't having any of it as she wasn't going to stay up here in the hills, knowing no one, while I was gone for 2 to 3 weeks at a time. Well fuck shit, witches spit, the whole trip was pointless. Then of course the phone rang with a perfect rental home with 4 acres (OK for all our farm animals) at 700/month down in LaFayette GA for offer. Now what?

I'm back home in Pearlington looking at ambulance services in NW GA. Shit, I wish Excelsior would call for a CPNE test date so I can get my nursing license before the end of the year. This is BS.

Earth, Wind, and Fire

The heat is on! Across the globe we're seeing reports of sizzling temperatures, melting Arctic ice, and scorching records. I can just imagine all the right wing Republicans putting their hands to their ears and chanting: "la, la, la, la, there is no global warming, there is no global warming." Oh really? Tell that to the Russians who are literally having their soles melt off their shoes while standing on the asphalt road! http://www.desdemonadespair.net/2010/07/hundreds-drown-in-russia-during-record.html Comrades are so hot they're jumping into rivers and lakes trying to cool off and some of those happy Vodka drinkers end up drowning. What a way to go. Teleport to the good ole USA we have record high temps cooking our good people throughout the Northeastern seaboard. Temperatures that have never been seen since, well since they first put a thermometer in NY city or DC. I won't stoop to poor science like the deniers do in pointing to record cold temps to disprove AGW, and so I'll point instead to the record loss in Artic sea ice...again. http://www.desdemonadespair.net/2010/07/nsidc-june-arctic-sea-ice-saw-lowest.html

Put it all together my fellow humans, and we have raped ourselves straight into hell. The equilibrium of the whole freaking planet is dangerously out of balance, we're talking about the very planet that we need to survive! Call me an alarmist all you want, but we've refused to listen to the scientists, and now mother nature has caught our hand in the cookie jar. Remember when your mama use to slap your hand? The last thing we should want is nature bitch slapping us....oh but I fear she's about to, and in a much bigger way than a few continental heat waves. I think we're setup to see planetary events we haven't seen for thousands of years. The bible says the greatest wisdom is fearing God. I'm not religious, but I'd take that to heart if I were you.

Oh, but there's more, especially in my neck of the woods - SE Louisiana - where I'm dealing with BP's mess everywhere. A couple of days ago oil showed up in Lake Ponchatrain and the Lake Borgne marshes, my favorite stomping grounds to catch redfish and speckled trout. Oil has also showed up in Galveston which makes every state that shares the Gulf of Mexico a equal partner in wallowing in toxic misery. The LA governor is trying to put up these ridiculous sand berms covering a mere 80 miles of coastline, and also a mere fraction of protection, and when every hydrological & marine scientists is warning him of how perilous and futile his efforts will be. But hey, it makes for great publicity to be out their screaming and cursing federal authorities for not doing enough while he stands in the foreground of a dredge building up this silly berm. http://www.desdemonadespair.net/2010/07/sand-berms-dubious-solution-to-gulf-oil.html

Although the dredging doesn't leave a visible change at the surface, it alters the subsurface profile of an area and reduces the bottom friction that formerly absorbed hydraulic energy during approaching storm surges.

On the basis of 22 years of academic training and experience in coastal science and 18 years of policy experience in the Governor's Office of Coastal Activities, I'm strongly opposed to the governor's sand berm project for the following nine reasons:

Oh, but Mr. Bobby Jindal you won't listen to people who have some knowledge regarding this, will you. Nothing like a politically charged atmosphere to get everyone screaming at everyone else while on TV. Meanwhile, the oil continues to roll in, and I'll be the first to tell my compatriots that it will continue to roll in all year long. That's right, all year long, despite any miracle that happens in BP's attempted August kill of the well. I'm sure mother nature will have her word in before then too as hurricanes - Alex being the first to stir things up - will show up to show coastal humanity how foolish they were in pursuing "drill baby, drill" at all costs - well not all costs, we know how cheap BP has been.

If you live on the gulf coast I urge you to plan to evacuate PERMANENTLY. I know I am just as soon as I get in from my current offshore project. I'm on the Fugro boat: the Enterprise and they call me "bones" (I'm the closest thing to a ships doctor). We've been headed down the Achafalaya river all afternoon after fleeing Alex earlier in the week. Oddly enough, I spotted a Navy PT boat headed up river towards Patterson. P-301 was pulling its rib boat on board at the stern when I took this shot.



Strange huh? Wonder what they're doing. I'll have to keep an eye out for other military vessels after we get out of the pass and to the open sea. I'm hoping to photograph some marine life, something other than this - thanks to BP.

Oil Catastrophe

We are doing much better today collecting oil. Despite the forcast for rain the day has been nothing but sunshine and a warm breeze. As the Enterprise off our port burns off gas and steadily produces what the top hat is collecting we continue to skim the polluted seas. The ocean is a dreary dead zone, and a endless expanse of zigzagging crimson streaks of oil. The small boom boat relentless seeks each patch while the manager who sits perched high atop the birds nest - we really have one of those - radio's commands to come to port, or come to starboard as we tack towards our prey. Our holds nearly full now, and soon we'll be heading to the barge to offload.

They keep the ships insides the temperature of a meat locker, but despite this I spend most of time inside having remembered what those VOC fumes did to me last time. I have examined a number of crewmen with headaches that are likely related. The industrial hygienist continues his vigil to monitor the VOC's, but never once has a warning been given to evacuate the back decks because of a high reading. The fumes, no matter what the meter may read, cannot be good for anyone. When I need to defrost from the chill I reconnoiter the bow giving myself a walk about. My spirit sinks when I look 360 degrees from horizon to horizon and see no life, no birds, no fish, no whales, no dolphins...not even a jellyfish. I let my eyeglasses defrost while leaning on the bow railing, and stare sojourn at the tea colored chop while mentally absorbing the catastrophe. I imagine the BOP 5,000 feet down spewing a black cloud of death that forms underwater cumulus clouds widening out near the surface catching various currents and chasing away the sharks and tuna. It's all in my head of course, god knows what it must look like down there, and I don't mean just what the ROV's show us.

The crew on board fully expect to order a Christmas tree for the galley and lounge. A disaster with seemingly no end in site. I wonder how many fellow humans now driving their cars, picking up their groceries at the store, or spending that tax check on some new electronic gizmo made by suicidal Chinese slaves ever make the connection to the sin that I stare at from the deck of this ship? "Forgive them father, for they know not what they do..." is the only quote that comes to my mind. I'm just as contributory too, just as sinful, and I hold myself in contempt for knowing not what I do, or what alternative I could drag my love ones into. What possible population could we live in that is bereft of oil?

This is the beginning and the end.

Oil Spill Chronicles

This is as good a time as any to retreat back to my blog, and express all the horror that now surrounds me. A contaminated sea is lapping at the shores not more than a mile from my house, and somewhere out there are pelicans struggling to fly free from the oil that grips them from beneath. A beautiful sea turtle is looking for a hole in the oil to pop up and breath only to inhale a toxic stew of petrol death. The images of pain and suffering seen out there in my recent travels - acting paramedic to a MSRC skimming vessel contracted by BP - has me intuitively sensitive to that which largely goes unseen short of being captured by a greenpeace activist and posted to a CNN livefeed.

It's now been over a month since BP's Transocean rig suffered a catastrophic blowout killing eleven workers and scaring the souls of over a hundred survivors, and still we see no end in sight for stopping this apocalyptic ecological tragedy. When it first occurred people were concerned and mindful, but soon the story became secondary to other events like Fergie taking a bribe or N Korea accused of sinking a S Korean warship; that is, until the ugly goo began washing up into the marshes and staining the beaches of Grande Island. Until that began to happen it was of little concern to all but the fisherman who depended on the gulf for business, or the rare Southern environmentalist - count me as one. The report and video of oil spilled up and down the Grande Isle beach stirred up local officials and recreational anglers like someone hitting a hornet's nest with a big stick. Then, and only then, did the response by BP appear inordinately slow - it was of course, the oil spill was huge - and the finger pointing, demands, and rumors flew fitfully between state and parish officials, the feds, EPA, Coast guard, and even celebrities (Keven Kostner and his miracle machine). Everyone seemed to have an accusation that supported their claim that BP wasn't doing enough - quite obvious - that they could do it better (I doubt it), and every hair brain out of their garage idea that could be conceived of to absorb oil...even hair from the barber shop was balley hooed on the nightly news! It isn't that I don't believe any of these methods can or would work, they do, but there are many more things that go into oil spill mitigation than a good idea. There's logistics, quantity, testing, safety, costs - although this shouldn't be a factor - and on and on. It does make people feel like they're playing their small part, being the hero, or simply hoping to make a killing on a patented idea. Little does everyone know that this spill is being organized, controlled, and manipulated by the orchestrations of corporations and their endless bank accounts. While many people who are employed by BP care about the environment and feel impassioned to defend the wetlands and pelican rookeries, they are easily eclipsed by the power of the corporate entity. That entity is completely apathetic and calculatingly cold. People have a tendency to project their morals on a company that has only one capitalistic goal - profits and the protection thereof. That's the hard truth behind the power.

Meanwhile the oil gushes out from broken pipes, leaking BOP's, and some say even the sea floor! There's endless debate over how much exactly is leaking, the official amount 5,000 bpd - grossly underestimated in my opinion, an opinion based off 3 weeks of direct observation during skimming operations. If it's 5K bpd than why did 10 300 ton vessels skimming for oil in one day haul in 40,000 barrels and we didn't even make a dent in the oil that was spreading across the gulf? Why have scientist found huge plums of undersea oil that still, as of yet, reached the surface? Why have MIT scientists, using fluid dynamic models, calculated a figure far exceeding 5K bpd? I'll tell you why - it's not, it's a made up figure, or one that NOAA calculated by looking at some satellite photo's, imagery that in no way shows the full extent of this spill, and that brings up another issue - dispersant's. BP has been using dispersant's since day one, without consulting EPA, and using a product that has been banned in Europe for over a decade and has never had any toxicological studies done on, but hey, this is BP, they can do anything out there they like - right? The clear demonstration of their corporate power came when the EPA ordered them to switch to a less toxic dispersant and BP refused citing that there wasn't a product that was less toxic and readily available, which if anyone did any research at all (a simple google search shows many products that would easy to get on site too) would show that wasn't the case. Also, it has been established that the company that makes the dispersant has a profitable deal worked out with BP before hand - naturally. The issue I personally have with corexit dispersant is that it makes the oil impossible to skim up, miscilizes the oil into huge red underwater clouds that will likely do untold damage to reefs, fisheries, and oyster beds, and no one knows what it does to the respiratory system of clean up workers - but who cares about them? Certainly not corporations which have a long history of treating people like disposable inorganic machinery. I know because I still have chest congestion from working out in that spill...do I sue BP? I'd never see the money, and so what if I did, it's not like money is useful while rotting away in my deathbed, or will it give me any consolation while I wait for the gamma knife that's warming up to zap a tumor buried in my head. Oh sure, the MSRC vessel contracted a industrial hygienist to measure gas readings - VOC's, benzene, and hydrogen sulfide gases, but the respirators were never utilized when the readings regularly exceeded safe limits. One day out there the VOC's exceeded 120 ppm, twice what is safe, but the project manager brushed it off as too much trouble to get the respirators out. If something doesn't kill you today, corporations will care less if it kills the worker multiple decades later because they know it becomes near impossible to connect the two.

Tomorrow, BP prepares to conduct 12 hrs of testing before initializing a live top kill which I expect to fail. Even BP is preparing for just such an eventuality - as if they already know. The president has ordered BP to keep the live ROV feed up during the procedure, originally BP was against this because they know that if they fail their stocks will plummet on the news. Concerned citizens will watch in hopeful rapture.

Here's a link to my offshore experience with pics and video (found on utube - pelican rescue: megadoom911) http://www.doomers.us/forum2/index.php/topic,67380.0.html

Kamikaze

"It is impossible to introduce into society a greater change and a greater evil than this: the conversion of the law into an instrument of plunder." Frederic Bastiat

BOOM! "Burn baby burn," I thought after watching someone fly a plane straight into an IRS building in Austin, TX. Mr. Stack's bold suicide sent shock waves throughout the country after filing an online manifesto for the reasons why - http://www.doomers.us/forum2/index.php/topic,62363.0.html
If he hadn't killed a innocent father of 3 in doing so, I might even say he was heroic, but that wasn't the case. A vigorous debate ensued on latoc regarding his laundry list of complaints aimed at the tax law. Oddly, I found myself identifying with him and his desperate cornered grief, even though his murderous act was wrong in so many despicable ways. A man at the end of his wits. Surely, something we'll see more and more of as our governmental structure falls more under the sway of money and banks. The wealth in this nation are jumping to the life boats, and demanding the less privilege and ordinary stay on the sinking ship. People who lose everything, lose it.

This brings into the question freedom, society, governments, and morality - all in one, and that question is why? Why must a governing body that has demonstrably shown it's incapable of serving and obeying the people extort taxation on its citizens? Why must we pay property tax? Doing so means we never really own the land. We pay taxes for the services government provides, but those services now serve mostly the rich, the corporations, and the military industrial complex. People, like me, have become like a tax crop or a financial "battery," something akin to the Matrix where everyone was reduced to a battery. I don't believe we need the kinda military monster we currently have - military bases all over the world, vast strategic armaments, and a ponderous monstrosity that is a mountainous battalion. We don't need 3 million census workers when the NSA knows what my favorite color is, and I'm quite sure we could get what we need from the demographic consumer files Walmart or Monsanto has on each and every human "battery." I also shouldn't have to pay the billions our country spends to aid and abet foreign countries, like the 7 billion Obama signed over back in September to Pakistan. How dare you spend my productivity like that! Why should I have to pay for the health care of congressman and senators when they endlessly bicker whether to provide health care for me because of what it might do to wealthy insurance companies. If I dare not to pay my taxes, guess what, I go to jail. Freedom?

I daresay that if this country had stayed within a budget and stopped using debt as a vehicle to expand and conquer, I would be more willing to fork over some tax money. If my government would listen to me and serve me I might be more willing. Polling shows that the government, especially the last two years, has repeatedly ignored public wishes - TARP and bank bailouts, GM bailouts, the ME war, and on and on. Additionally, we can no longer vote these rats out because corporations can contribute an infinite amount to who we get to see on the ballot. Once in office they follow the Jerry Mcquire meme - "show me the money," and we, the people, have none.

It boils down to the foundation that got this tyranny started - taxation without representation.

Maybe Mr. Stack was thinking "give me liberty or give me death" when he soared into that IRS building. Truly tragic set of circumstances the end of civilization brings.

The Truth

The truth? People can't handle the truth.

The truth is most of us are going to die very soon.

The truth is the TV's, the computers, the cars, the trucks, the planes, the food, the water, the health, the clothes, the a/c, the microwave, the hot showers, the dinners out, the very veneer of civilization is about to be ripped assunder!

People can't handle that. We have become like babies - fat squisshie blobs that need to be fed and told everything will be all right.

We will have to be put through the fire to be of any use again - "God must char the wood before he can write with it..."

If you're planning for a retirement, watching your kids grow up - get married, get a job, buy a home, raise a family, or anything that this generation has come to know as modern life is about to end. Many will read this and interpret it as the ramblings of another nutty survivalist, branch Davidian, occultist, anarchist, prepper, or whatever the latest talk show host wants to call people who tell the truth. It's a long time coming, the end of the world, and I don't mean the end of the planet, but the end of Western civilization. We refuse to see, to learn from our mistakes, to wise up and live as peaceful intelligent spiritual beings - our potential, but instead we choose to consume ourselves, to take the Kalimar, the kiva of death and bring about the annilation of all order and judgement.

Our cup runneth over in blood, and we will drink a bitter wine indeed.

Chicken chase

An unusually warm sunny day down here. Mind you I'm not complaining but the sun's intensity was quite miserable against the side of my face while painting the outside patio wall. Soon it will be Summer when the horse-flies, gnats, and mosquitoes will come out to dine on many an irritated person, and the stifling heat will drive the heat hardiest inside to the shade and luxury of air conditioning. The swampy muggies around here get the best of anyone, and our Winter - a cacaphony mix of warm and cold, short and boring, is typically bipolar to the extreme. So while the heat had me sweating today, I was freezing just two days ago. The peas and beets my wife and lovingly planted weeks ago were ready to go in my stylized pots - leftover steel bathtubs that I painted yellow to match the house trim. Taking bags of top soil and mulch from piles that I had tended to since October I mixed the organic humus together in a large wheelbarrow.






Two large trellis were stuck in the back of the planters, and the peas planted in front of them, their future climb. The beets I stuck in front of these as I imagined them to be very decorative once everything fills out, a bonus to their practical value.

The ducks continue to grow each day, but I lost 4 two days ago from an accidental escape, as they ended up in the mauls of my dogs. Six left and I think I've worked out the kinks to their pen, and I always take the time to corral them into a secure coop for the night. Coons, possoms, and owls patrol as I write, the night a time for hunting. The chickens, still a small flock - 3 hens, 1 rooster, roam freely in the backyard on days that I or my wife are off. The beetles, crickets, warms, and doodle bugs probably run for cover when these perfect insect predators come pecking forth from their coop. The rooster, who I've come to call Bubba, crows most of the mornings as a cliche or when I come fussing with a hen or their eggs. He magnificiently looks out for the "girls."

One of the hens, who I named mrs. Trouble today, found an ingenious way to fly up and out of their pen by slipping through a small crack in the poultry wire that had come exposed when I slid the metal roof to the side for more protection from the rain. Additionally, she has been in the habit of roosting towards the early evening away from the "good crowd" who conviently go back into the pen for safety. She roosts deep in the heavy thickets that surround the pen and in the pre-Katrina woods. A cluster of small tree's, blackberry, and devil vine network in and out of the old wood, a nightmare for a big lumbering man animal like myself trying to corral her back to where she will be safe for the night.



Blackberry throns are not pleasant tearing across your arms and face. This is when every farmer must think to himself "chickens are stupid," but this isn't entirely true if you watch these magnificient farm animals. I find that they exhibited a strange earthy intelligence, a sense of awareness of life between death. There nightime coma is a mystery as is the rooster's crow. Mrs. Trouble had me stomping through the thicket around and around the pen trying to steer her to sanctuary, and after fifthteen minutes of madness, yelling, and unhitching my skin from thorns, I had her back in the pen. There they would stay for the next two days. Some bad weather was due to come in on Thursday, adding to the mud that was everywhere.

Another State of the Union

Here we are a year later, and what as the president done for us lately?

Continues to spend a trillion dollars a year fighting Muslims, goat herders, and children. Expansion of the war in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and now Yemen. Iran will be next.

Guantanomo still open.

Healthcare bill brokered by insurance and pharmaceutical companies.

Multiple bailouts for "Too big to fail" companies. How can this be a free market?

Deficits added to, national debt ceiling increased, wall st crimes gone unprosecuted, glorification of Ben Bernakie, co-conspirator to the housing bubble, no real curbs in industrial emissions and green house gases, no real energy plan that takes into account production/demand oil economics - except maybe Iraqi oil contracts, refusal to sign the land mine ban, and nothing has been done to curb rising unemployment.

Wall st rallies while people get layed off, foreclosures rise, and credit cards are defaulted. Allowing banks to hide toxic assets with mark to market rules - banks set their own rules.

I could go on, but why bother, most people are still enamored at his skin color. There's only one good thing I can say about Obama, his wife planted a garden, and that's about the best advice he could give citizens - plant a garden...before it's too late.

Here are some latoc comments regarding the state of the union - Picasso Moon answers back....

I liked that he said that we had a surplus in 2000, and that when he came into he inherited this HUGE deficit. And pointed out very succinctly that the deficit was not made by him. And that he also brought up that the policies that the Republicans were wanting to continue were the same ones that got us into this mess in the first place.

Neglecting to mention that in 2000 the surplus came as a result of the TECH BUBBLE, when it burst so did the "surplus". And the deficit since he has been in office has grown by over a trillion, more than 3 times the deficit of any particular year. The policies he wants to pursue are little different from those the Republicans have. What do expect from Geithner, Summers, Bernanke?

I liked that he pointed out some of the things that Health Reform WOULD do for people... and how it would require insurance and drug companies to stop (reduce ) their greedy practices.

No it would not, the present bill was drawn up with the active collaboration of the insurance and drug companies, including even Billy Tauzin, while single payer advocates weren't even allowed near the White House.

A certain worry

It's a Monday, a fresh start to the final week in January, and the relentless march towards collapse. Topping the headlines for the day -

Haitians torch bodies in the streets - What can you say? The Haiti earthquake is a small glimpse of the horror that's about to befall the world. This is what collapse looks like, in all its ugliness, with all its misery, and certain dispair. Bodies in open pits, the smell of death everywhere....it's hell on earth. Most of the world looks on with morbid curiosity, feeling glad it isn't them, and after a few text messages donating ten bucks they feel better. Hear me now...Port ta Prince, Haiti will not be rebuilt before we are all living lives among the rubble.


Obama proposes freezing domestic spending for the next three years- This one had me laughing. Why am I laughing? Well for one thing this will amount to looking for some change in your sofa pillows and paying a tiny extra on your next credit card bill, a bill for the US that amounts to trillions of dollars...not billions. This proposal is suppose to save 250 billion over 10 years. Are we kidding mr. president? That's nothing in the face of spending 1 TRILLION dollars each year fighting foreign wars, and this doesn't include franchising our military hardware, foreign government stipends, and other imperial pursuits. Most Americans have no idea that domestic spending amounts to a pittance of what is spent on National Security and fighting an endless war on the "boogey man." A war that could end with two simple actions taken by us - 1) Stop all support for Israel, 2)Pull out of Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan (at least stop sending drones over the border to kill innocent familys along with leftover cold war CIA created Jihadist). Course then we would have to worry about that oil thingy that tout TV says we don't have to worry about.

DOW - 23.88 (That's it? After a 400 pt drop last week?)

Meggido, a latoc member with a scandelous history, scandelous in the sense of believing the Dow would rally to 14000 in the Fall of 08' has encouraged everyone to jump in while the market takes a transitory dip and then heads to new highs. I couldn't tell you whether he will turn out to be right or not, if we go hyperinflationary (no signs of that - yet) that shouldn't be a problem, but if fundamentals are ever made transparent then the Dow rally of 09' will crumble.

Homefront news:

Headed for a cold night, but the 8 week old ducks don't seem to mind. I have the younger ones under tarp and heat lamp for the night. My coworker and friend at work is preparing to buy a backhoe/front end loader that should come in mighty handy in clearing some of my property. I have all kinds of drainage issues and soggy land condtions that will make making a duck enclosure and aesthetic pond very difficult to setup.

It was another hard day at work. I transported a pt that is slowly and painfully dying of cancer. We've watched her go from being able to get up and sit on the stretcher - taking her to radiation downtown, to chest tubes, heparin drips, and a ventilator. She still fights on. She is 52. We still managed to illicite a smile and a laugh talking about the Saints and an old movie being played on a cheap TV University felt fit to stick in her room. With the recent win of the Saints I don't see how any of the locals could see the doom that creeps at the cities fiscal edges. New Orleans will be singing in the streets while the buildings burn and fall to the ground.

Lessons in January

It's mid January and still here. The ducklings are growing their first real feathers and swiming like, well like ducks, and the chickens are starting to produce more eggs much to my wife's delight. A stack of pea's has germinated on the window sill, twisting towards the light while the Sun filters through the broken tree trunks left over from Katrina. It has been a very productive weekend. From getting my hardwood floors installed to the mulch piles turned and the trash burned (left over boxes from my floors). Didn't discover the meaning of life but did get four green colored chicken eggs started in the incubator. I'm trying out my egg turner for the first time too.

Discovered a festering pair of sores on the bottom half of my dogs throat while giving her a bath yesterday. For weeks I thought she had rolled in something dead, like some rats she's been known to chase down, but instead she had these weeping necrotic sores caused by the electric dog collar. Not really sure why she would develop them now, after years of wearing one without incident, but maybe her advancing years has lowered her immunity and allowed an opportunistic infection to set in. A good lesson to the apocalyptically minded, like us, that infection can quickly do you in. It also revealed what was missing from my medical pantry, an unbelievable item - AAA ointment or neosporin. I had equipment to intubate or suture someone but didn't have something so mundane as neosporin. That quickly was remedied with a quick trip to Walgreens and the purchase of 4 bottles. It just goes to show you that the best prepared medical personnel can missed something so common and so important. I could kick myself. Plus it revealed how important it was to organize my medical supplies rather than dig through a 2' deep box that my wife had put together. We are still renovating this home of ours and things are discombobulated.

Outside tonight the air grows crisp and cool after a brisk cold front swept through last night. I can hear the town's revelers and drunks firing off fireworks leftover from New Years and shouting at the night sky - THE SAINTS WON! They are finally going to the Superbowl, and it reminded me of the Gladiator scene where Maximus kills the Emperor, the Roman drunken hordes screaming and throwing confetti, while the Roman Empire crumbles at the border. The border is definitely crumbling my friends.

Duckarama

Quack, quack, so goes the duck.

Cute little suckers as I watch them piddle around in their box, already splashing in the water with their little flipper feet, and imagining them waddling by my - as of yet - undug pond. I found these Mallard ducks on craigslist for $2/piece, the whole crew for $20. I bought them from a police officers wife down in English Turn, a small semi-rural forgotten district of New Orleans near the Algiers levies. The road to her house was fraught with deep pot-holes and drug dealing hoodlums roaming the streets just a mile from her house. She should tell her husband to get to work! Alas, she and her husband had a beautiful home on 3 or 4 acres, a huge back yard with outside play equipment and two little rugrats playing in the recent rain puddles. The kiddies were wearing booties and heavy jackets as it never made it much above freezing today, record cold not seen since the early eighties here, and their mother couldn't chastise them enough to encourage them to go back inside where it was warm. The ducklings were milled together under a heat lamp in a small cage. She had been keeping them in the garage and away from the cold. I couldn't help but take them all. Some of them should be good eating by Christmas or........sooner, depending on how fast we all need to be eating food that's not procured from the soon to be empty food shelves. I didn't have the heart to bring up doomerish conversation as I looked around at her little homestead brimming over with 4x4's, atv's, and a mountain of plastic Chinese junk. I'm sure she was happy. So after placing some hay and wood chips in my box, I grabbed the squirrelly suckers one by one and put them all together so they could cuddle for warmth. It was a long drive back home.

I would give these guys a good home with a nice pond before one day sacrificing a few for the dinner table. That's my plan anyway, just like the chickens out back who are as of right now bravely facing the bitter night. They sit on their roost gathered together under a clear starry night, the Artic North wind blows in between the pines, and the vultures that call my property home stare down at them with what intent I do not know. The ducks have been brought inside, and they chirp and splash in the water behind me as I surf the net looking for my doom fix, and my bread maker churns away making me some honey bread. The first loaf didn't turn out too well, too salty.

I've done pretty well with chickens, three successful hatches, a murderous rampage by a neighbors dog, and lots of eggs that attest to my homesteading prosperity. Hopefully my fowl thumb will show itself.

Dire warnings

It's all over the internet tonight, or at least the sites I frequent, all tied into a nexus of doom that indicates a world war is developing.. Furthermore, a significant military buildup, by a number of nations, is developing in the Gulf of Aden. Pakistan's refinery are unable to maintain the national energy infrastructure and it may be lights out on a otherwise failed state, which is dangerously on the precipace of a Taliban takeover, and by a most unfortunate set of circumstances - a nuclear power. A frightening geopolitical setup is developing when you consider the recent false flag terrorist attack, a failed CIA operation - the evidence is over-whelming this time, that is justifying the military buildup in and around Yemen. A number of war games, simulations, and drills are being planned and conducted now and into next week revolving around two key natons: Israel and Iran. The saber rattling is taking on a sharp hue of reality - that war could be immenent. This, following Israel's recent ambassador recall over the holidays to discuss the "future." I wonder what future they envision. Their eunemical rabbi's pushing for policy changes that would make Israel even more imperialistic and dogmatic, which ironically is through ethnic cleansing of Arabs. Oh what religion and this god has wrought!

That isn't but half of what's coming across the wire and what I'm digging up spidering through the global news into the cold early hours of January 5th. The icey cold is settling in outside, a frigid January for a southern Mississippi town, so located in a marshy delta at the bottom of the Pearl River basin. I pray my chickens snuggle on their roosts and continue to lay, for with all that's going on in the world right now I might need their services real soon. I've brought my dogs in too, and they lay quietly on my couches watching me look for the truth.

Wall st. rallied again today on upbeat manufacturing news, but why was that up I wondered? Christmas sales were either flat or lower than in years past. Chinese domestic demand for vehicles could be the culprit. The bond market is signally great alarm with insiders running for the exit. The market ticker has a good explaination on the situation: www.market-ticker.org. Oil was robust today as speculators bid it up to 82 a barrel as a frigid artic air mass descends on a number of countries plunging them in various degree's of record cold. I don't think this will help the scientists trying to standby their argument for global warming, although surprisingly, the Chinese feel differently about this in believing the extreme cold is in fact related to AGW. Interesting analysis if you care to google it. I still believe the over-whelming body of science that says AGW is real and getting worse. This winter will likely be a temperature anomaly, a dip in the upward trend.

There is a Russian theory being circulated concerning a certain "electric" comet that was spotted zipping towards the sun a few days ago, and at the same time Russia unveiled a multi-million dollar plan to come up with a strategy with modifying the future Earth impact trajectory, a comet/asteroid heading for the Earth. I'm glad someone is taking it seriously, especially since it's happened more than once in Earth's past, and most certainly will occur again. Though by judging what humans have been doing for the last few thousand years I might be inclined to say "bring it on," and let the damn thing plow into us and thus rid the Earth of our ad hominem cruelity. For the smartest animal species we sure act like some of the dumbest and by all means the meanest.
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Maverism, my new religion

Well, would you look at that, it's 2010. A whole decade into the 21st century and the drumbeat of human civilization beats on, a palpitation or fibrillation here and there, but beats none the less. Cars driving, planes flying, ships sailing - or at least they use to, and bombs keep falling. People go to work, they sleep, eat, shit, have sex, build, tear down, laugh, cry, fight, scream, hit, grow old, get sick, and die. The planet spins about an invisible axis, the stars burn furiously in the empty regions of deep space, and gravity pushing and tugging everything to and fro. The earth trembles beneath us, the seas crash against the shores, the winds howl from every direction, and the living breath moves over all of it. As we enter this new decade, we are surrounded by power, forces beyond imagining, and I am reminded of how fragile we are as a civilization and as a human being.....in fact we are Dust in The Wind. I fear the very foundations of our world are about to be shakened and come crumbling down around us, as shocked as the Atlanteans were, we will cry for mercy in the dark days ahead. The last decades events (Katrina, tsunami, earthquakes, 9/11, wars, etc) were but warnings, this decade will be the real deal! I'm not speaking as some prophet, but as a person of average intellect and awareness who says with his own personal certainty, that our civilization is about to be tested like it has never been tested before (in recent memory). They say Karma is a bitch. Well if she is, than she's in heat. Civilization, population, and life depend on one comprehensive quantity - resources. In the last 100 or so years we have behaved as though those resources are unlimited, but the facts that many of us refuse to face is they are not. We will pay for our lack of wisdom. We are quite literally billions passed the carrying capacity of this planet.

What we need now is a maverick, and more than one, to spring forth from this human hoard. A maverick that can cry out from the wilderness and begin the awakening! A person that goes against the prevailing paradigm, a person that thinks outside the box, and strikes forth a bold individual plan of enlightenment, and that will begin with me. It will be my own belief structure. I will chronicle my journey in developing this new religion, a religion built around a future that I believe is sustainable, noble, and balanced with truth. Today, I fast, cleaning out my body and meditating on what changes I plan to make to the universe inside me. Care to join me?