THE TEXAS SCRIBBLER

The months-long drought combined with a downed power line due to today's strong wind started a forest fire in Bastrop County just east of Austin. Ten homes have been destroyed so far, with another two hundred threatened. No rain at all in the forecast, but the wind is expected to subside by tomorrow night.

UPDATE:  At least twenty-three homes and nine businesses taken by the fire through the Bastrop pines so far. More wind forecast tomorrow. SUNDAY: Wind is light and the fire seems to be mostly under control.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 06:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Time was, in the 1880s, when a pharmacist would concoct his own soft drinks. Charles Courtice Alder, at the Old Corner Drug in Waco, came up with a popular combination of fruit extracts and sweeteners. So popular that the store's owner, Wade Morrison, named it after a physician and pharmacist he'd once worked for in Virginia named Dr. Charles T. Pepper.

In 1898, the Southwestern Soda Fountain Company of Dallas bought the rights to the soft drink and renamed itself the Dr Pepper Company. The product sold very well until the early 1980s. The company began looking for a buyer. It turned out to be Forstmann and Little, a New York investment banking firm, (on this date in 1984) whose chosen managers had, within a year, established Dr Pepper as the third most popular soft drink in America. Corporate headquarters remained in Dallas. But manufacturing, after a merger with the Seven Up Company, moved to St. Louis, MO. Now all that Waco has is the Dr Pepper Museum. By the way, there's been no period after the Dr in Dr Pepper since 1950.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 03:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

These are some of the kids who flew the B-29s over the Pacific that napalmed, firebombed and finally nuked Japan into submission. Just in case you may have doubted that they could ever have been so young. Note the babyfaced one in sunglasses. My then twenty-two-year-old father flew B-29s in training in Kansas and Oklahoma but he didn't go on to the Pacific.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

His Big Media and other supporters are still pretending that he really didn't mean anything when he scratched his face with his middle finger and grinned, when speaking of Hillary Clinton in the spring and John McCain in the fall.

But the Jewish intellectuals among them are beginning to see that they've been had on the subject of Israel. That his promises were meaningless. The president who argues that he should get his way because "I won" (a remark reminescent of Richard Nixon) is turning out to be a lying punk.

UPDATE:  On the other hand, there is this mitigating circumstance. Still leaves a lot to be desired.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Why, socialized medicine, of course. And like all good fascists everywhere, Barry and his cronies haven't asked if we want it. Oh, no. There shall be no debate at all this time. That was the Clinton's mistake. Its beginnings were hidden deep in the diversionary Porkulus bill. Too late now, suckers. Not that it works, because it doesn't. But it makes the Progressives feel so good, you see.

A liberal friend who travels to London regularly claims it works just fine there. But she never gets sick. And not everyone there thinks it works at all--especially not if you're trying to get a dental appointment. But, hey, we wouldn't want all those illegals the Dems love so much to have to be demeaned by going to the emergency room. Soon it will be the same for them and us: get in line, get in line. And someone like Henry Waxman will be in charge of it and he'll say uh, why no, you can't have that new treatment. Too expensive, not efficient, etc.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Lightning, as you've never seen it before. It comes in the first few seconds of the video, so don't miss it. Of course, you can always play it over again.

Via meteorologist Mark Murray, KVUE.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

What could be easier to understand? The fellow is not inspiring now that he has the office. Even his polls are lackluster. Not that the Dumbocrats will care. It's spend, spend, spend time for them. "Happy days are here again..."

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In Mexico, these days, it involves more than one person with a gun. Try two in a shootout with bodyguards. Sorry, link went bad. Try this general story on the battles. The only hope for them or us is legalizing drugs here, but our pols are too cowardly to try it.

MORE:  Even Latin American presidents can see it. Too bad they can't convince ours. Indeed, idiots like Eric Holder haven't had enough. He thinks keeping assault weapons from honest people also will help. Riiiight.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Headline refers to the Hildusa (name copyright of Iowahawk), lower right. They say our lives are reflected in our faces. Being a cuckold who was "under fire" in Bosnia is tough work.

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Obama's little history lesson on the automobile was one cylinder shy of a V-8:

"The country that invented the automobile will not abandon it"

Germany? Now that's talking. Although I think Honda and Toyota make them much better. Oh, wait, he meant Detroit? No. Well, maybe he means the government is going to buy their cars. Consumers won't. Texans like their trucks, however, so there's hope for that segment of their market.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

An Army lieutenant in Iraq is making a fool of himself and dishonoring the uniform by publically questioning the president's right to his office. Some milblog commentors are cheering him on. I think he should be courts-martialed for this stunt. At the least he should resign his commission. He obviously doesn't understand it.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 06:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Or any alert, at all, in contradiction to some emails and other "news" making the rounds quoting completely misquoting State Sen. Dan Patrick. (Well, it looks like he did say there is an alert of some kind, but it's not clear to me what he means, tho it sounds like just the state emergency center's planners in Austin.)

As far as I know, the Texas guard is NOT on high alert or any alert. If it was it would be in the papers and on the television because it would be impossible to hide. If some guardsman didn't let the cat out, his girlfriend or wife would. So, for now, as far as I can tell the state and feds are still just planning for any future trouble on the border.

UPDATE:  But the president is considering sending the guard to the border--for what? He isn't sure yet.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Via Simply Jews.

MORE:  Whatever you hear, tho, even the best and most widely-read blogs aren't the reason for the newspaper industry's continuing demise. It's more like the death of paper. Just can't compete, economically, with pixels. The former is so expensive, the latter is so cheap. Tho obliging governments can slow it down.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Just think, nine more years and I won't have to get up early... Meanwhile, he opened his first present: a new batting helmet for his spring season with the Grasshoppers. Maybe it can break his hitting slump. More tonight when Mrs. Charm makes cowboy hamburgers, etc.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Look south at 1 a.m., using this sky map, to find the green comet. It's supposed to be naked eye visible, but binoculars might provide a better view. And if the urban light cone is too bright or there's clouds where you are, try this photo gallery. Or better yet this live Web cast of the flyby.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

It's no more than that. Just hysterical talk. Political talk, mainly. As VDH points out:

"Over 92% of Americans are still at work. Over 90% are still servicing their mortgage debts each month. For these, the 'depression' so far doesn’t mean a radical need to reinvent America. They plan to stay in their homes, even if they have negative equity in them; again, loss of equity doesn’t mean catastrophe if they don’t have to sell quickly, refinance, or remodel."

Even the 401K debacle isn't critical for many. Mine has fallen only about twenty percent. Hardly depressive.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

For Cobb, this is the "greatest picture in the world." I wouldn't go that far, but I see his point. Whatever you think of Mom and Dad, their daughters are innocent and it's certainly refreshing to see a black face in the presidential limo that doesn't belong to a servant.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hope and change. Well, change, anyhow. January's was the worst stock market performance in 113 years. I notice Barry's dropped his hope routine. Maybe we'll get lucky and he'll remember to at least  talk it again, while Rome burns.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We made the Cub Scout topaz hunt in Mason County this afternoon out in the western Hill Country (didn't find any but it was fun digging for them in a dry creek bed) but skipped the overnight campout. Stopped in Fredericksburg for supper then came on back to find the weather service out there pegging the temp at this hour at thirty-four degrees. Their forecast low will be twenty-three, cold enough to freeze their water bottles. The pack leader said all who stayed would be eligible for the "polar bear" belt loop. Most of them are in tents. Our den leader brought his Airstream trailer. We're glad we're missing it.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Not at all surprising is the White House attack on CNBC's Al Santelli's "Tea Party!" sneer at Barry's mortgage bailouts. Not when you recall Barry's giving the finger to the Hildusa (name copyright of Iowahawk) during the campaign for the nomination and calling Sarah a pig during his run for the White House. The man riles easily and, being an affirmative action baby, he's had no great practice at being someone else's political target.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

PBS's favorite sanctimonious liberal commentator Bill Moyers wasn't just involved in the wiretapping of MLK. He also investigated the sexual preferences of Sen. Barry Goldwater's aides. Where will Bad Bill II strike next?

Via Ace of Spades.

UPDATE:  J. Edgar Moyers is an even better name for him. Love to see the Fairness Doctrine applied to him.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Reading Updike's surprisingly pornagraphic but nevertheless entrancing meditation on the futility of human life, Toward The End of Time, I was reminded of Mr. B.'s sandbox in the back forty. It was Updike's passage on his main character's futile attempt to build a dollhouse that did it. The sandbox, created of two-by-twelves and filled with several barrows-full of white sand, was rather more successful--being less ambitious to begin with. But Mr. B. has outgrown it and it sits out there covered with creepers, the sand become the home of several ant colonies, and begs to be removed. I'll get around to it. Meanwhile, it is, as Updike says of the dollhouse effort, merely a reminder of relentless Nature. Our time is fleeting. The creepers and the ants are forever.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

When she started chewing on Sarah last fall, along with the rest of the worthless snooze media, I finally realized that Peggy Noonan wasn't the far-seeing iconoclast I had thought. Now, as the Seablogger suggests, when she can encounter a continent-spanning technology like wi-fi on a jet flight and somehow equate it to garage-level industry, it shows she's just another empty head with a deadline and no original (much less logical) thought.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Most of what Mrs. Charm's mother forwards me in emails is, uh, not very compelling. But this one is:

"Some employees are simply irreplaceable. Take [First Lady] Michelle Obama: The University of Chicago Medical center hired her in 2002 to run 'programs for community relations, neighborhood outreach, volunteer recruitment, staff diversity and minority contracting.' In 2005 the hospital raised her salary from $120,000 to $317,000 - nearly twice what her husband made as a Senator. Oh! Did we mention that her husband had just become a US Senator? He sure had! And he requested a $1 Million earmark for the UC Medical Center, in fact. Way to network Michelle!

"But now that Mrs. Obama has resigned, the hospital says her position will remain unfilled. How can that be, if the work she did was vital enough to be worth $317,000?

"We can think of only one explanation: Senator Roland Burris's wife wasn't interested."

From the Feb. 9 print edition of National Review.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, the man who helped Bad Bill Clinton with the quid pro quo for a crooked financier's presidential pardon back in 2000, apparently is going to be Obamalot's racial grievance peddler. Holder is proof that no matter how often they receive preferential treatment or how high they rise, some American blacks never quit whining about racism. Well, there is this to look forward to: four years of this shuck from a presidential administration should just about do it for the subject.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Via Treppenwitz. More of these funnies here. Also this one.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Used to be (and probably still is) that any appearance at the LBJ Library by PBS poohbah Bill Moyers drew an SRO crowd. Mainly aging, LBJ liberals yearning for the Great Society. They apparently never knew this side of the old Baptist hypocrite:

"His part in Lyndon Johnson and J. Edgar Hoover's bugging of Martin Luther King's private life, the leaks to the press and diplomatic corps, the surveillance of civil rights groups at the 1964 Democratic Convention..."

That's from CBS newsman Morley Safer's memoir Flashbacks. Liberal fascists do make strange bedfellows. 

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I can say that here about King Barry (so far, anyhow, the Dems' "fairness doctrine" and Web regulation not yet being law) but Chip Harrison cannot in his car window in Oklahoma City. Not without being stopped by the local police and having his house searched by the Secret Service. Guess threats to the Bill of Rights didn't end when Bushitler left office. Hey, whatever happened to "dissent being the highest form of patriotism"?

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

So what if you bought so much house that the payments consumed more than forty percent of your monthly income? Barry and the Dems are here to help greedy you out of your irresponsible debt, and with nary a particle of lasting blemish on your credit report. Don't thank them, now. That's what the fascist Nanny State is for. As long as other-people's-money lasts.

UPDATE:  This is very funny. This is not.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Nevertheless, it's interesting that the civil unions allowed to homosexuals are becoming increasingly popular with heterosexuals in France. The reason: you can get out of them without losing property or paying alimony. (These people are childless, obviously.) Thus to the conservative "fear" that gay marriage would undermine traditional marriage. The civil union alternative, at least in France, is already undermining traditional marriage. Me, I still can't get exercised over the gay marriage issue. Even if most of them married and divorced monthly, they'd only match what heterosexuals already are doing.

Via The Seablogger.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Mr. Boy is complaining mightily that he can't join his cub scout pals camping out this Saturday in Mason County because "my parents are too old." True, in part. The forecast low Saturday night in Mason is right at thirty-four degrees and meteorologist Bob Rose is predicting a possible further decline into light-freeze territory.

So I told the thirtyish den father that Mrs. Charm and me would bring Mr. B. out for the topaz hunt but then go home rather than subject ourselves to a freezing night in a sleeping bag even if it is on an air mattress. He curled his lip. I couldn't tell who he was more contemptuous of: me or the weather forecast. Youth, bah.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

When even military commentator Col. Ralph Peters says it's time to cut and run, well, maybe it's time to cut and run. Either that or keep trying to get the Russians and Pakistanis to help us build Disneyworld on the Kabul River. As for Barry losing face? Well, he can still blame Bush.

UPDATE:  Barry's base is already turning up the heat on him. Wanna be a war criminal, Barry, or a peacenik?

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Libya, Cuba, and Iran purport to be the UN's human rights champions. While they puff up the Jihadis and other killers. Their only villain? Israel. Bush stayed away from this dictator's monkey show called the Durban Review Conference. Barry has decided the U.S. will play.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The usual liberal congresspeople are always whining about Big Oil. One dingbat even suggested nationalizing the oil industry if they didn't bring their gas prices down immediately. Funny how few complain about Big Corn. Nowadays you can't buy gas without their additive, even if it cuts into your mpg.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:25 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The daily and various other local media, including News 8 in this video, claim the fireball was either a mystery, debris from the colliding Russian and American satellites, or other debris from previous space missions. But Space Weather says it was a plain (albeit unusually large) meteoroid.

"Astronomer Bill Cooke of NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office has reviewed the video and confirms 'it's a natural meteor, definitely.' According to his analysis, the source of the fireball was a meter-class asteroid traveling at about 20 km/s."

So, UFO lovers/believers. Read it and weep.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Conservative bloggers like to believe the reason that so many American newspapers are for sale, and why Time and Newsweek can now be called the skinny weeklies, is because of their biased reporting. Well, maybe. But they've always been biased. Back in the 1960s-70s, they were biased to the right, instead of the left.

Insiders, of course, blame the loss of advertising to the Internet, especially the classifieds, the lifeblood of many fish wrappers. I give this excuse far more credence than the bias. But I also have come to think that it's the basic irrelevance of the content.

Political correctness, like whacking some radio talker when he makes a racist remark, has become the business of the front page, and endless scolding. News, unless it's politically neutral or has a politically-correct peg, is simply no longer news. Like the first Muslim-honor beheading in New York, which is excused and shuffled off to join what's left of the truss ads. Can't criticise Islam. T'ain't PC. Trouble is, PC is boring as well as gutless. So why read those who peddle it? Why not hunt the Internet for the real news? Not to mention the classifieds?

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

He and his client Big Media have said the porkulus bill would cost just $789 billion--almost twice the cost of the Iraq war. The Congressional Budget Office, however, puts the final price tag at $3.27 trillion.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I get these things every five years, thanks to colon cancer running in my family via primary relatives, so I know they're worthwhile. They don't hurt, thanks to the drugs you get. The worst thing about them is the awful preparation fluid you have to swallow by the gallon. Tastes like motor oil.

But I really must demur when some bloggers, including the vaunted Instapundit, say they are foolproof at discovering colon cancer. My father had them for years and they didn't save him. Maybe it depends on the skill of the doc. That would figure. That's why they're called medical "practices."

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

G. W. Bush's former deputy national security adviser on the disconnect between what a president like W. wants in the U.S.-Israel relationship and what the State Department actually gives him:

"It is partly because the State Department is less concerned with domestic politics than the White House is, and partly because the cadre of officials who handle Middle East affairs in the State Department are people who are mostly trained in Arabic - and who spend the bulk of their careers in Arab countries - rather than having a knowledge of Hebrew and being posted in Israel. This is not to say that they are anti-Semitic or hostile to Israel, as some people suggest. I think that is actually false. It does mean, however, that they lack an understanding of Israel."

A good read, this lengthy interview. Worth a look - as we wait to see how Obamalot influences the relationship. 

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Cults of personality, such as Barry engendered and is nursing along, are not socialist but fascist. Including passage of laws without debate, as in the return of welfare and start of nationalized healthcare in the porkulus bill. Mussolini made the trains run on time. Hitler enforced a generous welfare program--for the right people, of course.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 06:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

The Connecticut mortgage crook Christopher Dodd has really upped the Socialism fascism ante. He slipped into Barry's phony stimulus bill, which is now only awaiting the presidential signature, a provision capping the salaries of bank executives. Imagine that. The feds will now tell a banking company how much they can pay their employees. These Dems really know how to revitalize the economy and bring the country together, don't they? Let the class wars begin.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Religion of Peace is at it again. It's just changed venues. An old tale told in a new setting. Lucky us.

UPDATE: Meanwhile, this crime has become one more illustration of why American newspapers are dying. They could puff this guy - before he became a murderer in a typically-Muslim fashion - but now they not only can't report what he did on the front page but they try to excuse his method on page twenty-six. Pathetic.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

Given Barry's many policy flipflops since his election, and his Code Pink, etc. base of support, it's not hard to imagine him finding a rhetorical way out of Afghanistan--especially now that the campaign there is becoming harder than ever to win. For one thing, freelance correspondent Michael Yon says the administration's proposed thirty thousand new troops won't be nearly enough.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The lobbyists have its actual language, of course. But you? Ha. Just a summary until after it's voted on tomorrow. Not even the Republicans have read it. So much for claims of bipartisanship. You didn't really believe all that Obama campaign bull about transparency, did you? You did? Sucker.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Looks like Nancy Pelosi's favorite endangered mouse will get $30 million under one of the hidden features of the Dem's near trillion-dollar porkulus bill. You? You'll get an extra $13 a week starting in June, falling to $8 a week by January. Aren't you proud you voted for these Dems? What, you didn't? Well, shame on you.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Turns out Mr. Openness decided in advance who would be allowed to question him at his first "news" conference. If Bushitler had been caught doing this... Well. But Barry? So far not a peep of protest from his snooze media clients.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I'm actually of two minds on the issue of whether Barry's client Big Media ought to be photographing the flag-draped coffins of fallen troops. On the one hand I do not like censorship, such as Barry's congressional minions are preparing to practice in forging a new law that has the effect of quashing right radio.

On the other hand, the CNN questioner at Barry's first presser put Big Media's real interest out there when he asked if the policy of not allowing photographs of the coffins could be overturned by The One: "Ed Henry with CNN, who asked the President whether he thought the arrival of American coffins at Dover should be accessible to the media to 'show America the real cost of the war....'"

If you want right radio to be allowed, then how can you argue for hiding the coffins? Well, one is free speech, the other is honoring the dead by not turning them into a political spectacle. Plus the coffin policy has been around since 1991. It was not created by Bushitler to thwart the NYTimes and Code Pink.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Not to mention the urban variety. And divorce, of course. The Afterlife and Other Stories is a good read--since its pieces are of, not the dead and gone, but the aging and leaving. It's the first read, in fact, I ever made of John Updike material. I must have read a score of reviews over the years but never actually read one of his novels or short stories. At the suggestion of an Israeli friend, I am now embarked on his novel The Centaur, which, so far, seems suitably weird. From the short stories I find I can agree with some of his reviewers that, if not wholly misogynistic, he certainly was wary of women. Which is understandable, I think.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Via House of Eratosthenes.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The "stimulus" bill is actually an elaborate disguise for the beginnings of a national health care system:

"One new bureaucracy [created by the bill], the National Coordinator of Health Information Technology, will monitor treatments to make sure your doctor is doing what the federal government deems appropriate and cost effective. The goal is to reduce costs and 'guide' your doctor’s decisions..."

What else is Barry hiding in his gotta-have-it-now-or-else legislation? Beside expanding the welfare rolls once more? Ain't this no-debate Democrat liberal facism grand?

UPDATE:  Re welfare. Indeed, the Clinton welfare reform is dead. Welfare's return is here. Just a little sleight of hand, folks. Call it a "stimulus." Heh.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Rain is good. We're supposed to be getting more of it this afternoon and into tonight. But there's also a watch out for tornadoes that could be popping out of the severe thunderstorms. Not good. Fortunately it's mostly northeast of us.

Via the Seablogger.

UPDATE:  The thunderstorms swept through about 10 p.m., leaving behind about a half an inch of rain and some pea-size hail. Fortunately the storms, with wind gusts to sixty mph, were moving pretty fast so were gone in about fifteen minutes. Looks like Oklahoma got the tornadoes.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Wind's really picking up at the rancho, gusting to twenty-five thirty-five out of the southeast whence normally cometh our rain-making Gulf moisture. Indeed, the forecast is for thunderstorms overnight. LCRA meteorologist Bob Rose thinks we may get some real rain over the next three days, possibly the most we've had since mid-November.

In fact, Rose, noticing that the southern Jet Stream is becoming more active (and thus capable of guiding Pacific storm fronts our way), is thinking something I was wondering about the other day: that the 2008 drought might just finally get busted later this month into March. If so, it would be by a flood, of course. Floods are the way droughts break hereabouts. But we'll take it.

UPDATE:  By 9 a.m. Monday, according to LCRA's hydrologic system of rain gauges, one-half to three-quarters of an inch of rain seems to be the norm over the area since midnight. Nice to see water ponding in the gutters again.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Got an email the other day, at Scribbler AT Texasscribbler dot com, from an Infantry OCS grad from another class and a year earlier than mine. He was trying to track down his old classmates and unsure how to go about it. I hunted a little and found that the alumni association has a new site, which should help him and anyone else with the same aim.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Bubble Nebula, ten light years in diameter, a mere eleven thousand light years away. Striking, isn't it? 

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

In dark-sky locations, that is, well beyond the urban light cone. It's a pale "fuzzy patch" in the constellation Libra just before dawn--including at the Comanche Springs Astronomy Campus in Northwest Texas. And the photos and videos keep proliferating.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The WaPo, one of the Democrat Party's favoite house organs, goes after the RNC's new chief Michael Steele, alleging this and that, and pretending it was all "inadvertantly" provided by a U.S. attorney. Sure it was. And when's the big expose coming on Barry's tax-cheating administration? Sorry, Michael, but as you well know, this is what black people get when they stray from the Democrat's plantation.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, according to Henrik Svensmark:

No sunspots = more clouds = lower temperatures.

The Central Texas winter, which began quite early last year, should be more or less over by March 1. Let's just hope.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Barry obviously doesn't remember the words of his own inaugural address. Fear, it seems, is really where it's at. Oink, oink.

Via Instapundit.

UPDATE:  Ninety-three percent spending and just seven percent stimulus? Yup, a lying Dumbocrat bill.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Comet Lulin's portraits are accumulating. Should be a binocular object tomorrow morning as it was today.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I don't usually bother to tout comets any more, having once had to do it for a living when they generally proved a disappointment. But this green one looks to be unusual, with a Juipter-sized atmosphere, or coma. Of course, coming no closer than thirty-eight million miles away on Feb. 24 will keep it from seeming all that large.

Indeed, at only an anticipated fourth or fifth magnitude, it may be so dim that it requires dark country skies to see it at all. Even if it is brighter, observers deep inside the urban light cone are unlikely to see anything. On the cone's fringes, however, you can start looking on Friday if you like, when Comet Lulin is expected to be a binocular object in the runup to its flyby.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The fraudulent "peace process" imposed on Israel with the Palestinian Arabs will no doubt continue under Obamalot. It was disgusting enough to watch Condi Rice play the discredited game. As always, it has zero chance of success. Simply because the Palestinians are not interested in much of anything but mass murder. The names may change, but the old game remains the same.

Via Treppenwitz.

MORE:  The Hamas TV bunny Assud calls on his child viewers to liberate Tel Aviv and Haifa "from the filth of the Zionists." It doesn't get any clearer than that.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Computer age-regression of old paintings and photos of people is probably about as reliable as those dubious computer models that can't accurately predict Texas weather but purport to predict the planet's future climate. Even so, it is at least a thought-provoking technology when applied to the mother of our country, Martha Washington.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Having sold the family sloop, we no longer pay much attention to the ups and downs of the reservoir called Lake Travis. It has been quite low in previous droughts, but seems to be trying to set a new record in the ongoing one. It is now at six hundred and fifty-five feet below above mean sea level, which is roughly twenty-six feet below normal. Worse, it is forecast to continue its plunge to around six hundred and twenty feet. 

Nevertheless, in the interest of soothing hysterics who worry about the droughts of global warming (though it is the potential rising of sea water rather than the falling of lake surfaces that has them upset), this has happened before, and quickly (say, within thirty days) has come back to this. So, in other words, unless you own a lakeside home (which is now a gully-side home) there's almost certainly nothing to worry about. What goes down has, historically, come right back up.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Topaz is the state gemstone of Texas. And hunting for topaz, on a Mason County ranch famous for it, is to be the star attraction of the late February campout of Mr. B.'s cub scout pack. He always sleeps well on these deals. Mrs. Charm and I do not, but the topaz hunt should help enliven our spirits. Especially if we find some. There will be, also, the charms of Mason County, to savor. All in all, we're looking forward to it.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

We didn't hear much about the Iraq elections. A few purple-finger photos, but that's all. Why? Too quiet. Besides, making a big deal about it would only make W. look good and Big Media would never do that. But the Marine, MG John Kelley, who until recently ran Al Anbar province notes that, for its people, this was the first free election of their lives.

MORE:  On the other hand, there's an outside chance it could all unravel again.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

...John Theon of NASA, says Hansen's global warming data is bosh. No surprise, there. When science turns messianic, it's time to watch out. Hansen has even declared that energy industry execs who question his data should be jailed. Sweet reversal.

UPDATE:  Ah but, meanwhile, in Obamalot, the warnings continue as if nothing had changed. How brilliant.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So far, just two weeks into Obamalot, there have been many reverses of campaign promises, a dozen lobbyists appointed, and tax cheats galore. The Affirmative Action presidency rolls on. Whatever comes next surely can't top this. Change it is. Hope? Zero.

UPDATE:  Another pledge broken. Hopenchange was just a slogan. Surprise, surprise. VDH, meanwhile, is more fearful than before about what four years of this could mean.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I always seem to get these ideas when it's past or too early in the season for them. But later this year when the oaks at the rancho once more plague us with piles of acorns, I'm going to collect and boil them. Then mash them up with some white flour and make the bread. It's said to have been an early colonial staple.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Reading, recently, of the Post Office's plan to cut deliveries to five days a week, I was reminded of what they did to us in the old neighborhood before we bought the rancho out here in the hills. They decided one day that we had the wrong address and so they changed it. But without telling us or anyone else. So no one knew to use the new address and, while we wondered at the lack of mail, we fell behind in our bills, including the utility bills.

The city utilities subsequently refused to use the new address, and a flurry of fruitless visits to the Post Office ensued. The P.O. finally relented, and changed back to the old address, making us wonder why they had been so absurd as to change it in the first place. We never found out. We suspected it had something to do with all the catalogs we received unrequested, which the delivery person (a woman) was tired of hauling.

Yet, all the while, UPS and FedEx cheerfully delivered our packages to us at the old address, never knowing what the Post Office had done and was refusing to undo. That's private enterprise vs. government. I'm glad I'm too old to have to worry overmuch about the Dem's coming national health care. If I should live long enough for it to fully ensnare me, with its inevitable absurd rationing and possibly fatal delays, I'll start using the VA. At least I'll enjoy the camaraderie of other veterans who are well-schooled in government absurdities.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 04:25 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Not just one special day each year, but every day. You can't fire a rocket at a daycare center without one.

Via Simply Jews.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 04:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Speaking of suckers, why should we spend our money to bail out a bankrupt California which has spent decades looking down their oh-so-much-better noses at the rest of us? They have it all. They just can't pay for it.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

With Barry's apparent plan to withdraw from the war on terror and the foreign jihadis, domestic jihadis could become more of a problem:

"...multiculturalism, political correctness and the greed for votes, makes our own government turn a blind eye to the poison within our ranks. I’ve written and spoken about these phenomenon myriads of times to point out that the Wahhabi/Salafi ideology is built on hate and spews a nasty political message, blatantly ignoring the spiritual message of Islam."

A long, a good read, a FrontPage forum with five women, all to one degree or another terrorism experts.

UPDATE:  Need proof? How about this: Hamas burned an Israeli flag on the steps of the Minnesota state capitol on Jan. 5. What in the world are they doing in Minnesota?

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Not Barry, Nancy, Harry & Charlie--and Barry's appointed tax cheats Tom and Tim. They spend your money, sucker. Meanwhile, their FEMA ignores Kentucky and Big Media ignores it all (note that the AP story at the link buries the lede in the tenth graph). Not enough poor black people, like in New Orleans, I guess.

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Not the world's most beautiful landscape, just a part of my old AO, a bit northeast of LZ Baldy--courtesy of Panaramio and Google Earth. GE has vastly improved its Viet Nam offerings of late, to include the mapped and photographed locations of most old LZs, firebases and airfields. It's obviously a country, and no longer a war, but some things are hard to forget. Thanks to the vast library of the Internet, you can revisit them whenever you're in the mood.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Now here's a cool Vietnam veterans project I read about in the current issue of VVA Veteran: The Library of Vietnam.

It's a string of children's libraries, with books, computers and Internet connections, mainly across the middle of the country (the northern end of the former Republic of South Viet Nam), financed, stocked and built by American and Vietnamese veterans and others who want to help and are able to donate money and/or time. Begun by one Americal Division veteran, Francis (Chuck) Theusch, who got the idea from a Vietnamese interpreter while visiting the My Lai massacre memorial in 1999. A good excuse to revive this haunting song.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Like a lot of people, I was smitten by Texan Renee Zellweger the first time I saw her. (And by one of the Zellweger look-alike moms I subsequently saw at one of Mr. B.'s first little league games.) But I knew the Hollyweird Renee was a few tortillas shy of an enchillada even before she married (and quickly divorced) that Hat Act Chesney--I wonder, did he take that stupid-looking black straw hat off in bed? Probably not.

So I was prepared for Renee's latest big snoozer: her crush on that worm of a one-term ex-president Jimmy Carter. But, for me, the real news comes from Ace of Spades: the poor creature has turned over her bank account to Scientology. She's another believer in Xenu's imprisonment of sinful souls in volcanoes--one of the least toxic idiocies of the fraud. Don't tell Jimmy, Renee. Southern Baptists (as you should know, having grown up in their midst) ain't fond of that malarky. But me? Well, I've already got two former Infantry OCS buds who believe in UFOs, though only one of them asserts that the UFOs are actually running everything. So good luck, Renee. You're going to need it.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Personally, I couldn't care less who wins the Super Bowl. But Mr. B., for whom all things sports are important, is rooting for Arizona. So, by all means, fight fiercely Arizona. You probably have the best-looking cheerleaders, anyhow.

UPDATE:  Didn't matter, apparently. Steelers won. Mr. B. forgot to watch, maybe that was it. I didn't care to.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)