I think it’ll be safe to put my hoodies down to wash. I mean, by the looks of the extended weather forecast, I won’t be needing ’em to ward off the morning chill any time soon.
Our recent run of cool mornings and tolerably warm afternoons has been damned delightful. But even though the calendar says it’s meteorological autumn, astronomically summer still has ten days to go. As if to remind us, Nature is serving Ozarkansas a stretch of 90s, including several days that’ll threaten the century mark.
On the bright side, we’ll have less daylight. (Read that again.) We’ve lost two hours since the Solstice and over an hour since the last time we saw 100°F.
Reduced baking time. So there’s that.
The full moon of earlier this week is on the wane. I had an appealing view of it yesterday morning as it appeared to hover over the cedars.
I grabbed that image, such as it is, with my phone. I was seated at the picnic table and was able to brace it somewhat for a more stable shot.
Years ago, I was known to my photographer friends as “The Human Tripod” — I had the ability to shoot 35mm film handheld at very low shutter speeds, as slow as an eighth of a second, and produce sharp images. Aging, along with a manic thyroid, stole my steady hands from me, so I’ll take my camera supports wherever I can find them.
I brought Smudge outside a half-hour later. Immediately she flushed a whitetail — yes, our daily doe — from the woods around the White Rock trail. We sat down at the table and enjoyed the cool (for now) morning.
Apparently that deer made her way through the woods behind the cabin and came out on the road. I saw her ambling north and tightened my grip on the Heeler’s leash just in time.
I wish you could hear that picture. She would’ve chased that doe all the way to Missouri if I’d let her go.
(As an aside, and in violation of my personal policy not to name anything that someday may end up on my plate, I’ve decided to start calling this deer “Remi.” Please don’t make me explain how I came up with that.)
It wasn’t yet 8am when Smudge and I boarded the Silverado and got underway for Flippin, planning to make stops at O’Reilly Auto Parts and Casey’s. We’d just rounded the first bend when we came upon Remi grazing bushclover on the north side of the road.
She’s a bold (and somewhat entitled) little doe, and she was in no mood to be run off again. The dog and I sat there for ten minutes or so and waited for her to move along.
I think Remi was messin’ with us. We weren’t in any hurry.
A few minutes after we turned onto the subdivision road, in the usual pasture were five more deer.
When we returned from Flippin, the herd had grown to ten — I counted one buck, eight does and a fawn.
My reason for stopping at O’Reilly’s yesterday was to buy oil for the Silverado. What it really needs is an oil change, which I can do myself, but right now my budget tells me to just add oil when it gets low.
And it was low.
Mobil 1™ 0W-20. Expensive shit. One quart went into the engine, the other I stowed in the shed.
While I was down at the shed, an aerosol can of Ballistol caught my eye. It reminded me that I wanted to disassemble, clean and lubricate my old Bogen photo tripod. Ballistol would be the perfect protectant.
I did the work on the tailgate of the truck. The 30-year-old ‘pod was something of a mess, honestly — grease long past its prime gummed up the bearing surfaces, and there was corrosion in places.
I took my time.
When I was done, every pivot, joint and clamp operated smoothly. Evidence of my shameful neglect had been eliminated.
“I want to be very clear that this is a political assassination.”
Gov. Spencer Cox
“We will find you. We will try you and we will hold you accountable to the furthest extent of the law. And I just want to remind people that we still have the death penalty here in the state of Utah.”
Charlie Kirk wasn’t careful — he was courageous.
He had the courage in this ignorant and shallow culture of ours to engage in the lost art of civil discourse. He believed passionately in intelligent debate, and he acted on that belief by going toe-to-toe with his detractors in the public square — emphasis on public.
For that, Charlie Kirk was assassinated.
Yesterday afternoon in Utah, at one of his trademark on-campus appearances, he was shot dead. In public. In broad daylight. In front of thousands of witnesses.
It doesn’t take Dick Tracy to figure out that two decades of leftist vitriol led to this, but I’m sick to death of calls to “tone down the rhetoric.” When I hear “This is not who we are as a country,” I want to vomit. Saying that “violence is not the answer” overlooks that violence is, in fact, the fucking question.
This is the time to point fingers. Name names. Hold to account. Fight back.
If the assassination of Charlie Kirk gives you pause, step aside and sit the hell down. Charlie was brave, not cautious. He didn’t retreat — he advanced with conviction.
And for cryin’ out loud, he was not a “moderate.” No one was more unashamedly MAGA. Though he trafficked in civil discourse, at every opportunity he brutally (and intelligently) skewered the Left — with a smile.
We should be emboldened, certainly, by the life that Charlie Kirk lived. But if the way he died doesn’t move us to righteous fury, we’re not worth a single damn.
Take care of yourselves, Patriots. Stay calm. Stay sharp. Stay free.
#WiseUp #LibertyOrDeath #Ungovernable