WELCOME TO MY WORLD

I am currently the Mayor (appointed by the Incident Commander and I don't have to run for re-election) of a small fire town (400 firefighters) about 30 miles north of Hoopa, CA. The town we are by is called Orleans. We are currently taking care of seven fires that are expected to burn together into three before we can get around them and put them down. There are 24 Incident Management Teams assigned to 321 fires in California today. This is where I do my very best work---nobody ever tries to stop me from doing whatever I want to do in these scenarios---it is a good feeling to be respected by your peers.

I am having a tough time getting on the internet as much as I want to so this will have to do.

We are doing great out here but these fires will go on a long while (a long, long while). My folks got more stuff than all the others combined so we are setting good---in this occupation posession is 9/10ths of the law. We don't know for sure but we should only do the 14 day plus travel so we should be home by the 16th---if everything goes well.

You guys keep your blogs up to date--it makes it easy for me to see what you are up to.

ONE WORD CHALLENGE

1. Where is your cell phone? Belt
2. Your significant other? Creative
3. Your hair? Gray
4. Your mother? Old
5. Your best friend? Smart
6. Your favorite thing? Naps
7. Your dream last night? Forgotten
8. Your favorite drink? Coke
9. Your dream/goal? Retirement
10. The room you're in? Basement
11. Your children? Grown
12. Your fear? Failure
13.Where do you want to be in ten years? Somewhere
14.Where were you last night? KMart
15. What you're not? Wimpy
16. Muffins? Blueberry
17. One of your wish items? Money
18. Where you grew up? Haven't
19. What you read last? Parker
20. What are you wearing? Wranglers
21. Your tv? Sports
22.Your pets? Siamese
23.Your computer? Slow
24. Your life? Screwed
25. Your mood? Pissed
26. Missing someone? Kids
27. Your car? Pickup
28. Something you're not wearing? Earrings
29. Favorite Store? Dollar
30. Your summer? Fires
31. Like someone? many
32. Your favorite color? Blue
33. Last time you laughed? Morning
34. Last time you cried? Afternoon
35. Your favorite thing? Family

BEEN THERE---DONE THAT

This has been kind of a tough weekend for me. We really can't go anywhere because we don't have great transportation and the only time we go is to see the kids parents as required by DCFS. I also wonder if it was this hard to raise our children. I don't think it was but I was gone a heck of a lot when they were young and Inklings did all of the hard stuff. I do know that our children were taught what our expectations were and they lived up to them most of the time---when they didn't there was a price to pay and they paid it.

These kids don't seem to understand that the rules are the same today and tomorrow and always---they seem to wake up in a new world every single day with the rules given to them again and again. Maybe someday they will realize that without these rules no one will want to be around them.

It sucks---Grandpa's aren't supposed to be the bad guys that teach kids life lessons---but I am and that is the best that can be made out of this situation.

Guess it is true.....LIFE SUCKS AND THEN YOU DIE!!!!

CONGRESS---MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS

I have been debating writing this for over a week so here 'tis. It is an election year and so every damn elected official in the United States and some that aren't elected yet are on the stump. They are yammering about this and that and anything that can get them on the spot for a few seconds. My point in this whole blog is BIG BROWN.

They are in the process of setting up a Congressional hearing regarding drugs on the race track---are there drugs on the race track? DUH!!!! Do people try to get by with using them when it is illegal? DUH!!!! Do they get caught? ONLY IF THEY RUN IN THE MONEY!!!! Do the others matter? Probably but no one cares if you lose.

So what the hell is Congress getting involved in this whole thing for? Because we all hoped Big Brown would pull off the first Triple Crown win in thirty years---didn't happen so all his other runs had to be drug influenced---GET OUTTA HERE---CONGRESS GET THE HELL TO WORK ON THINGS THAT MATTER---LIKE THE BUDGET WHICH YOU NEVER SEEM TO BE ABLE TO PASS SO WE GET TO SPEND THE WHOLE YEAR ON A CONTINUING RESOLUTION---OR BETTER YET TAKE A SUMMER RECESS FOR THE REMAINDER OF THE YEAR AND STAY OUTTA OTHER PEOPLES BUSINESS---GIVE ME A BREAK.

BIG BROWN DIDN'T BREAK DOWN

OK now we know Big Brown did not break down but we have all kinds of issues out there in media land and lots of questions regarding the ride he got from the jockey. Here is my take---for what it's worth---the horse took a beating getting to the outside from the rail---both on the front legs and the back legs getting to the first turn. No matter what the outcome of all the Bull S_ _ _ and all the Congressional hearings and all of the other stuff the jockey rode a good race---the horse got in trouble and ran up on the horse ahead before the first turn and then bumped another horse hard getting to the outside. Call him a wimp if you want to but Big Brown is just a horse---a great horse but---just a horse. He isn't the first and won't be the last to quit a race because he got smacked around---it is a good strategy for the jockeys to box him in and make him earn an outside hole---in doing so you often take the heart out of the horse---which is what I think happened.

MY $0.02---There has never been a single incident in the history of the United States where a congressionally mandated solution has ever, and I do mean ever, been the correct solution---so my vote is they get out of the spotlight and let the racing commission run the races---

WHEW

This is a really busy week at work and I have been in meetings or trainings for most of the last four days---I just finished up another one and decided to walk away for the day.

I have been personally sued for not hiring someone and for trying to do some work this week but the agency will defend me on both counts---it sucks to see your name on the complaint no matter what---I never thought that would bother me but it does.

Right now it is really tough for me to blog because my mind is a complete blur with all of the stuff that is going on both at home and at the office so you'll probably see some stuff here that doesn't make sense to you---I assure you it made sense to me when I wrote it.

HANG IN THERE BUDDY---FRIDAY'S COMIN'

FINALLY GOT 'EM ALL

Last night I made a run to a town 60 miles south of us to meet our grandson's foster parents and finally bring him home for what ever time we have them. It was a good feeling to finally have all of them in one place. I think he was happy to finally be with his brothers and sister again.

It was nice of his foster parents to bring him over. It saved me about two hours of driving and got me home before dark. The wind on the Interstate was bad---real bad---it was blowing ash up from the big fire last summer that burned from Minersville to North of Fillmore---biggest fire in Utah history---anyway it was blowing dust everywhere and it looked like we were driving into a storm until we got there then it was just dust and ash---the automatic lights on the car came on it was so dark---

BIG BROWN GOES DOWN

Big Brown didn't come through as predicted earlier---in fact he failed to even really start the race. The jockey said when I asked him to run I didn't have any horse---if you don't know what that means it is that the horse was through. In my experience which isn't vast but I have ridden a few---the bumping he took in the first part of the race to get to the outside is enough a lot of times (and may be what went wrong this time) to make a horse quit trying. He ran up on the back legs of one horse---which is a very scary thing to do since getting the front legs tangled almost always results in a crash---the back legs tangled will result in a horse missing a couple of steps but the fronts will put you down. Then he bumped hard trying to get to the outside---one more tough thing for any horse is to keep getting bumped.

OK enough of that already---he didn't pull it off---it's a damn hard thing to do. He's still my pick for colt of the year---Nick Zito also should get trainer of the year 'cause he knocked him off with a 38-1 long shot. Luck? I don't think so---look back at the number of triple crown contenders he's knocked off at the Belmont---he's a pretty damned good trainer.

If I ever have another good race horse his name will be LAST BY TEN---think about how that will sound as the horse rounds the final turn in first place---I have wanted to name a colt this for at least 35 years.

Thank God it didn't Break

TG had a long boarding accident over the weekend. She got tore up pretty good and has a lot of scrapes and bruises. She finally went to a Doctor to see about her torn up hand. They sent her to X-Ray to make sure it wasn't broken. It wasn't---thank God.

Guess I'll be a little more careful on my choice of words from here on!!!!