Little House in the Desert

The picture, taken yesterday, shows the current status of my project in Hereford, AZ. The grey block columns will support the two cargo containers that will form the second floor of the small two-story abode. The columns are half way to their eventual height of 8 feet. All the grey block columns have 5/8-inch steel reinforcement and will be filled to the top with concrete to give good support for the 5,000-lb containers.

The tan block walls are "dry stacked" and waiting the application of surface bonding cement (SBC). The SBC, applied just 1/8- to 1/4-inch thick, contains fiberglass filaments which hold the blocks in place. The tan block walls are just 32 inches high and will support 2 x 4 framing up to the underneath of the containers.

With all that block so close together, the current look is "brick sh*t-house!" Since this valley regularly hosts 40-50 mph winds, a building needs to be substantial. Since all the blocks will be stucco white, I think the final look will be whitewashed Mediterranean under boxcar. :-)

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Treason

So… if the country doesn't shape up and reduce its debt, Standard & Poor is threatening to downgrade the rating of U.S. Treasury bonds. Why does this bring to mind Joseph Heller's satirical novel Catch-22, in particular Lt. Milo Minderbinder and his M & M Enterprise?

For those of you who haven't read Catch-22 or disremember, Minderbinder was a U.S. Army Mess Officer in Italy during World War II. Much like our current crop, he was an entrepreneur without a conscience; he would do anything to make money. As CEO of M & M, he contracted with the Germans to have his squadron bomb its own air base. Minderbinder was subsequently charged with treason, for which he was exonerated by demonstrating how capitalistically profitable the venture was.

As for Standard and Poor, isn't their pronouncement tantamount to an attack on the U.S. Treasury? Isn't this treason? Isn't this biting the hand that feeds you? What authority has S & P to evaluate U.S. Treasury bonds in the first place? What impertinence? That's like a child rating his mother's brownies.

Furthermore, doesn't S & P bear a heavy burden of responsibility for the current economic mess we're in? Seems I remember S & P was instrumental in propping up the house of cards called "collateralized debt obligations," with their mindless, misbegotten AAA ratings? So long as they were paid, S & P was happy to endorse these stacks of bound-to-fail mortgages. Maybe, just maybe if we weren't in this Great Recession, our governments (local, state, and federal) would have the resources to take care of their current obligations.

And maybe, S & P should back off, sit down and shut up!

Want to know more about S & P's role in the Great Recession? Read All the Devils are Here and/or The Big Short. Better yet, read Catch-22.

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Prisoners of the Storm

Prisoners of the storm, Dulce and I watch and listen to our keeper. Rivulets form on the window; the wind howls at the corners of our shelter; menacing clouds roll over the mountains to the West, an evil presence that will soon envelope us. Eyes, brown and blue, survey the desert landscape. Bare, squat, thorny mesquite trees wave stiffly in the breeze. Dry grasses bow to the earth sweeping the dense brown crust.  As the rain increases, shallow streams form, obediently following the Tao of least resistance. Birds urgently seek protection in heaps of brush. Though the rain still falls, the sun breaks through–the Devil is beating his wife? A rainbow appears, Roy G. Biv, messenger of God's promise.

She knows none of this. She continues to stare though there is nothing to interest her. No coyotes to growl away; no javelina at which to lunge; no rabbits to race. She has no name for tree or bird. She can sense the rain, but it has no meaning for her. The scene through the window is what it is. At last she grows tired, rests her great jaw on my thigh and sleeps. My experience is surely richer for language to impart meaning which may be preserved and shared. But what wouldn't I give for a glimpse of the world with her innocent brown eyes --a vision pure, unadorned, immediate.

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January 2010 - Hereford, AZ
(photo by Judy Rupel)

Be prepared!

For an involved reader, a bittersweet literary postpartum follows from the completion of a truly great novel. The resolution of the narrative hangs in the air like the final chord of a symphony. You long for more, already missing the characters, their lives and their emotions. However, upon finishing Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese, you may feel washed up, wrung out and left to dry–the book falling to the floor as you collapse with an exhausted sense of relief. The events of the closing chapters of the book are heaped upon the reader in a barrage that evokes a yin and yang of human emotions designed to tear your heart to pieces and leave you choking on your tears.

Love in all its manifestations. Regret and guilt. Passion, betrayal and forgiveness. The righting of old wrongs, returns to sacred places and reunions with cherished loved ones. Mysteries solved, misunderstandings resolved, on and on... There's no way to prepare for the emotional onslaught of this powerful and authentic story.

On rare occasion I will read again a really good book –The Magus, Catch 22, The Sot-Weed Factor, Catcher in the Rye. Though Cutting for Stone is surely one of the finest literary works of this era, it will take a great deal of courage to re-enter its roller-coaster maze of human emotions. I don't think I could take it. Not again...

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Understanding politics

Every man for himself – Republican

We're all in this together – Democrat

Take your pick!