Shop Tip

A non-gun auction yesterday left me with some new tool-toys and a slightly worn Feather canoe paddle long enough for my 6' 1".* I decided to add a metal tip to the paddle, the better to misuse it pushing off rocks and so forth.

It didn't take too long with thin aluminum, copper nails,** and a half-ounce of Gorilla Glue. That leads to today's tip: When you get the Gorilla Glue all over your fingers -- and you will -- you must instantly wash your hands with gasoline, followed by an SAE10-30 rinse. A few minutes later you can use soap and water. Failure to heed this advice will result in social embarrassment for several days. That stuff is more tenacious than epoxy.

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* Harder than it sounds. You want a canoe paddle that reaches from your toes to your nose. Most of them you find in the racks are too short.

** Yes, I know about electrolysis. Three coats of varnish should take care of it.

Is this a trick question?

"What is the ticket price for an Atlanta to Las Vegas flight?"

Sounds simple enough for a top travel writer to answer, but never underestimate the complexity of the free market.

Lisa reports there were 2,472,916 potentially correct answers as of a few days ago. That's the number of times the price of an airplane ride from Atlanta to Vegas has changed so far this year.

This is too hard to keep track of. The government should do something.

Dawn Patrol

With dry skies and a visible sunrise at last, it became time to get back into the habit of personally supervising my portion of the county. (The patrol vehicle was the minivan, preferred to the F150 as less intimidating. This is in accord with modern and sensitive policing practices.)

No serious threat level exists in this watershed at this point in time, so I settled on the mere SW59, positioned on the passenger seat and hidden under a WalMart flyer. I'm CCWed, but why let the subject even arise if I happen to stop and chat with someone through the driver-side window?

I am pleased to report that at 0706 local, all is secure and no ammunition was expended. However I observed evidence of a recent ecofelony:

Our DNR has created a monumental ugliness just down the road.

A beautiful stand of sumac there has irritated official state envirocrats ever since we gave the land to the DNR for a park*.

The DNR first claimed sumac was not a native species. That was hooted down by a panel of experts -- farmers, grandfathers, Boy Scouts, and several ordinary citizens with access to Google.

The DNR shifted to a posture that sumac is an "aggressive" plant which stymies its plan to create an "oak savanna" on the plot. There were other verbal ploys to justify the primary point: me government; me want.

Sometime in the past few days the DNR brought in a bush hog, and what was once a fine stand of natural wildlife cover now looks like something the Ax Men would get fined for. I suspect the next chapter is planting -- at huge expense -- some burr oak seedlings.

Lacking the red sumac berries which they loved, the dear will promptly eat the oaks.

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*And I mean "we." The former owner of this c. 20 acre plot was about to create a sub-division. Most of us didn't want ticky-tacky there. A local rich guy kicked in a hefty sum. The rest of us donated what we could. We got it bought, then passed it on to the state of Iowa to add to the existing adjacent park. There's every chance the state of Iowa will give our heirs cause to wonder why we bothered.

Welcome home Jessica Watson

This is Jessica's day, the end of the voyage, round-the-world, under sail, alone, and unaided.

We need to ignore the elected nonentities and media hand wringers who said her dream should be outlawed, that it doesn't amount to much anyway (now that it is successful), and that she's a headstrong kid with no respect for authority.

Her Aussie -- and international -- detractors should shut the Hell up and concentrate on organizing a giant communal diaper and step-in wash.