Skeeter Davis - "The End of The World" (1962)

Coping with the premiere of Season 4 of "Better Call Saul." Thinking this would be a good song to feature:

Sovereign Citizen is Apparently a Literal Arsonist Too

Firing squad for the bastard:

Reporter J.J. MacNab, who is currently a fellow George Washington University’s Program on Extremism, has written a lengthy Twitter thread reporting that Clark’s Facebook page shows that he is a long-time conspiracy theorist “who believes in just about every kooky conspiracy out there, including QAnon, Pizzagate, Jade Helm 15, flat earth theories, NESARA, Jesuit [conspiracies], shape-shifting lizard overlords. You name it, he believes it.” Tied to these conspiracy theories is Clark’s apparent adherence to “sovereign citizen” ideology, an anti-government worldview that has sometimes motivated political violence.

Dance Scene From "Kites" (2010)

A friend suggested I should write a guide to all filming locations in the Albuquerque area, not just "Breaking Bad." So, I'm scoping out movies filmed in New Mexico. There are lots and lots of such films, such as this Bollywood film from 2010 with great dancing.

Hamlet 2: "Rock Me Sexy Jesus"

Really surprised. This movie was filmed at West Mesa High School in Albuquerque, my alma mater:

Flat-Earther Fear

Crisis Actor

Making Ballet Toe Shoes

Gazing Into The Abyss

44th Anniversary of a Glorious Day

Following high school graduation in the summer of 1974, I took a trip around the western U.S. and parts of Canada with my friends David and Jeff. We climbed several mountains and did lots of hiking.

The Watergate scandal was at its height. I was anti-Nixon, David was pro-Nixon, and apolitical Jeff was exasperated, joining whichever side of the argument seemed most entertaining at the instant. We argued and bickered incessantly.

Forty four years ago today, at beautiful Lake Louise in Banff National Park in the Canadian Rockies, we learned from hikers that Nixon was resigning. We hurriedly returned to the lodge there, and tried to locate a TV, but there weren’t any: TV signals from Calgary couldn’t penetrate the steep glacial valley. Instead, we watched Canadians station themselves at trailheads and inform out-of-touch American hikers of the news, and listened to the whoops of joy. The thrilled Canadians just grinned.

Forced A Bot To Watch

Ankle Bracelets

Anxiety Companion

Forgot ID

If Only I Had Checked Myself

Strange Bedfellows

If a war lasts forever you end up with strange bedfellows. In the War on Terror, the U.S. fears the Houthis so much that it is now allied with a branch of Al Qaeda:

The official story is that the United States is supporting Saudi Arabia in a two-front war in Yemen against both a group called al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and the Houthis (Iranian-backed Shiite rebels). But a blockbuster report from the Associated Press Tuesday contradicts this official story. Instead, the AP reports, Saudi Arabia regards the Houthis (and Iran) as a far bigger threat, so have adopted the policy of co-opting al-Qaida fighters and forming a de facto alliance with AQAP. The American military is well aware of this alliance but has decided to ignore it.

California, Home of Orange Luminescence

Tornado, North End of Eagle Nest Lake, NM

Well, Crap

🔥Today's simulated wildfire smoke forecast across the West. This illustrates the total smoke in the atmosphere.#idwx #orwx #wawx #cawx #utwx #nvwx pic.twitter.com/iLAlDNehgM

— NWS Boise (@NWSBoise) August 7, 2018

Cough, Cough

Women Laying in Ponds Distributing Swords, 2020

Managing A Chronic Condition

Monday, I’m at the Ethel McLeod Hart Senior Center, across the street from Harlow’s, for a rather vague-sounding insurance-company-sponsored seminar about how to manage your (fill in the blank) condition. I hope they have good ideas about (fill in the blank). For generations, people have become invalids without the proper training or management, and we can’t have that. If good management fails, I can cross the street and get plowed with the 21-year-olds at Harlow’s.

What’s interesting to me is that the insurance company sponsoring the seminar isn’t my insurance company. I don’t know what it means. Maybe it doesn’t matter. Maybe it does.

This is all very vague stuff. Sharing and encouragement and targets. Six weeks too. Like struggling through spider webs. But maybe I need it too. I’ll stick around.

Lake County Fire Footprints for 2015, 2016, and 2018

It seemed to me Lake County, California has been the center of a lot of fires lately. Here is a map of fire footprints for 2015, 2016, and 2018. (I was having some trouble with file sizes, so 2017 fires aren't even here.) Still, it's clear fires have mauled the hills on every side of Clear Lake over the last four years.

Well, the Terrorists Came to Taos

But it was just sad:

Authorities swarmed a filthy compound in rural New Mexico on Friday and rescued 11 children, ages 1 to 15, after an armed standoff with one of two men, who have since been arrested.

Eight members of the Taos County Sheriff's Office converged on the residence in Amalia, described by authorities as a "makeshift compound" surrounded by tires and an earthen berm that had no electricity or running water, after securing a warrant to search the remote property for a missing 3-year-old boy who was allegedly kidnapped from Georgia by his father, 39-year-old Siraj Wahhaj.

Instead, deputies found five adults and 11 other children who "looked like third-world country refugees," living in squalor with little food and no clean water, according to Taos County Sheriff Jerry Hogrefe.

"I've been a cop for 30 years. I've never seen anything like this. Unbelievable," Hogrefe told ABC News Radio in a telephone interview. "These children were hungry, they were thirsty, they were filthy."

Nine Year Limbo

In August 2009, in the wake of the economic downturn, my friend Joe the Plumber lost the house he was staying in and asked to store a bulky Golds-Gym weight lifting machine on the floor of my garage. This morning, nine homeless years later, after having lost or having had stolen so many of his other possessions along the way, and after finally having got a new place following years of living in his van, and camping beside the American River after the police towed the van for failure-to-register, Joe finally reclaimed the dusty thing. Let no one stand between a man and his exercise machine!