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A Great Deal Of Standing Water

Friends,

The monsoon season is still upon us and heavy rains once again pummeled the greater Festival of Dirt metropolitan area. I spent the night down here last night to spend quality time with the folks and I’m struck by the new level of hell the valley has become. I left their place a little under an hour ago in the dark and it’s still hot and humid. The Miniature Racecar™ is overheated and so am I.

Good thing there’s a mountain paradise close by, but I really can’t see how people wake up in the morning and say “you know, the Coachella Valley is a wonderful place to live.” It’s just not.

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Kindle – A Wireless Reading Device

Pals,

How long has the Amazon Kindle been out? A year? The Riverside Press-Enterprise takes their first look today…

Barbara Roberts, director of library services/city librarian in Palm Springs and soon to be sworn in president of the California Library Association, saw a Kindle at a conference. It’s another in a generation of hand-held reading devices introduced since the late 1990s, she said.

The Kindle is very useful for travelers who don’t want to tote lots of books, she said.

But Roberts added, “Those who enjoy reading an actual book may not find this as pleasing because it’s an electronic device. It doesn’t have the same feel.

“You don’t turn the pages; a machine does that.”

Ladies and gentlemen, this woman’s gonna be the president of the California Library Association and she’s convinced that a machine is turning pages inside a Kindle. What she fails to mention is which slot one shovels the coal into so that the steam engine robots might continue their endless, unrewarding page-turning duties uninterrupted.

One also has to worry though, that these electronical reader thingys will mean the end of books. Here are some reassuring words from our resident tech analyst…

But hardbound and paperback books will always be around, she said.

“In my opinion, I don’t believe it’s a threat to books,” Roberts said. “Not at all. The hand-held book will always be the method of choice for the majority of readers.”

Whew! What a relief.

– bob

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Separated At Birth

Friends,

Yesterday’s monsoonal downpour highlighted (grim, gray, cloud-covered light. – ed Nice flourish.) a couple observations that should’ve been obvious.

Not actual car. Not actual size. Not actual road.
The first was that if it rains hard enough, there will be rain inside the car as well as out. I turned on the windshield wipers as high as they would go until I realized that rain was coming in nearly horizontally from the side window. The second is that my daily commute is profoundly dangerous and was made more so by the mudslides and the grapefruit-sized rocks in the roadway. My traveling companions and I beat the CalTrans workers and their front-end loaders to the worst spots yesterday. Their trucks rolled over the mud floes like just another ’73 Matador in the Monster Truck Jam of life. My Miniature Racecar™ flew over the jump (!) in a terrible Japanese translation of The Dukes of Hazard.

A little polishing compound and that front spoiler will be good as new…

– bob

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Revenge Of Ted Stevens

Friends,

I may have expressed a little too much glee in the previous post regarding Alaska Senator Ted Stevens’ legal trouble. Now it seems that he’s been able to bring the whole Internet (which is a series of tubes) to its knees (if tubes had knees. – ed Work with me here.) over the last couple days. Even my rock-solid, ultra-reliable DSL provider acknowledged a total system failure on their part last evening.

I guess that’ll teach us snot-nosed whippersnappers to go spouting off, won’t it?

– bob

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Jaunty Dumptruck O’ News! Ted Stevens Indicted!

Friends,

This just warms my heart…

Now who's tubes are clogged?

(CBS/AP) Government sources tell CBS News Republican Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens has been indicted on seven charges related to a corruption probe.

A federal grand jury in Washington has handed up the indictment against Stevens — which the Justice Department is set to announce very shortly.

Stevens, 84, faces seven counts of false statements involving VECO, the oil services company in Alaska, and the renovations done on his home.

They should’ve indicted him for the fine work he did on the Commerce Committee, but we’ll take what we can get.

– bob

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These Are The People In My Neighborhood – Part I

Richard Brooks, from the Riverside Press-Enterprise related a lovely story yesterday about a gentleman who just didn’t know when to say when. A brilliant bit of writing, the story contains just about everything you need to know about San Bernardino County. Let’s begin (the boldface type is ours, you’re welcome. – ed):

A man suspected of fatally shooting himself in the head while playing with guns after he’d been drinking has been identified as a 31-year-old Fontana man, San Bernardino County coroner’s officials said this morning.

Hey fellas, hold my beer and watch this!

Roman Hernandez died at his home about 3 a.m. Sunday along the 14000 block of Parkview Drive, said coroner’s spokeswoman Sandy Fatland. Police originally listed the victim’s age as 29.

I don’t know what’s better, Sandy’s last name or that they got the late Mr. Hernandez’ age wrong even though they found him in his home. Hopefully, deputy coroner Chuck Rumptown will be on the case to sort out this mystery.

Hernandez and some friends left a Fontana bar about 2:45 a.m. and continued drinking at his home, police investigators said in a written statement.

To avoid forgetting other details, the investigators have tried something new in writing down statements. Eliminates confusion.

After the shooting, the friends left without calling police, the statement says.

Whoa! Hey fellas! Where’re you going?

Several hours later, at least some of the friends reported the incident at a local fire station. Police found the victim’s body at his home.

Aww. That’s what friends are for. Right?

C’mon back to see us real soon, y’hear?

– bob

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Tin Ear Alert: Gas Taxes Too Low!

Um, right.

It seems that Americans have been cutting back on fuel consumption, which is fantastic. We’ll cut back on unburned hydrocarbons entering the atmosphere, send less money to foreign powers that we don’t particularly agree with, what could go wrong? I’ll tell you, bub. Sure, you’re pretty smug about that electric car of yours, but what about the crumbling bridges!

That’s right. We’re paying fewer taxes into the highway transportation fund because we’re buying less fuel. Apparently, that’s bad. The solution bandied about by the usual suspects is that, clearly, the gas tax must rise to compensate for the shortfall. We’re using less gas because it’s too expensive, so the solution is to make it more expensive. The president, meanwhile, thinks we should just outsource the problem and sell the highways to private companies so that they can collect tolls. In an unconfirmed story by an unnamed official, the administration is also considering hiring trolls to live under bridges and ask drivers three questions before they may cross. If this fleecing continues, there may be a lot of takers for the new Federal Onsite Highway Overpass Metering Engineer jobs.

– bob

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Stopping On A Dime And Giving Change

Well my dear friends,

The transition of the fleet is complete, with the Mighty Dakota now parked in front of one of the local Mexican restaurants, and the first dump run in the Jeepster under my belt. I’ve learned some things. First, that when you see a vehicle you used to own sitting in a place other than your driveway, it’ll take a long time to remember it’s not stolen. Second, what is the etiquette for delivering bits found while cleaning the garage from said not-stolen pickup to the new owners? Will a quick phone call do or should I just pop in? By the way, does just popping in make me a stalker?

Lastly (for now), should all four of the Jeepster’s brakes work, or is the one okay?

– bob

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Will You Take Cash?

I asked if the buyer would be able to pay with a cashier’s check or money order. He balked and said, “will you take cash? Is that okay?”

How many bugs had to die for this?
Yeah, that’ll be fine. Thanks for asking!

– bob

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A Note From The Idyllwild Weather Clam

The Weather Channel is seriously bumming me out. Have they lost their minds? I’ve mentioned that they’re crazy before, but this is too much. I was cruising over to their site this morning doing research for my sidebar and after putting up these numbers, I’d have a hard time believing anything they say, if I didn’t already disbelieve them. Case in point…


Left hand…


…meet right hand.

Sheesh. John Coleman would be turning over in his grave—if he was dead.

– Your Idyllwild Weather Clam

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Um, Is This A Problem?

Friends,

My craptastic ad selling The Mighty Dakota hasn’t really drummed up a lot of business around here. Not really inspiring…

1996 Dodge Dakota, standard cab,
4 cyl., 5 speed, tool box and bedliner incl.
$2,000, [phone number redacted].

Suggestions when I redo the wording?

– bob

DISCLOSURE: I missed the deadline for last week’s paper and had to beg to get this rubbish in. Let’s pump this up, shall we?