Dark thoughts on an upsetting winter
Today please consider my profound observations below, lest the depthy mood I’m now in dissolves once again into retirement’s comforting incoherence and lengthy nap.
*Stafford County keeps growing, although there may seem to be way too many of some of us nowadays. But this is no sermon against illegal immigrants, except for the flying kind. To wit: There are far too many Canada geese. Bless these beauties, nurtured so they may fly into airplane engines and keep our aerospace industry in fine fettle. Otherwise, why should we tolerate the near-quadrupling of their numbers in recent years? Just shoot them. That’s the ticket.
No don’t, honks the organization Geesepeace. It campaigns for humane methods instead, such as teaching the resident geese to learn once again how to migrate themselves to elsewhere. I’m not making this up.
The same skepticism of mine also applies for our Bambi hordes in the area this winter. They are bidding to wreck untold numbers of neighborhood shrubs, undoubtedly to the delight of Meadows Farms nursery..
Our deer, like those geese, are also becoming settlers instead of transients, right here in my back yard. My pup Lollipop and I were venturing towards the rear of our est ate the other evening near dusk when, wouldn’t you know, we spotted five large, fat deer browsing casually nearby, barely noting our presence before strolling away. What gall. I say it’s better to shoot them, since they are much more dangerous for area motorists than those Canada geese will ever be for airplanes.
* Our precarious economy-- I’d rather not think about it. I recall bitterly those authoritative past assurances by really smart and rich analysts that blue-ribbon stocks would stay valuable no matter what. Well, “what” matters now. Such foresight ranks right up there with experts’ claims that the globe is warming. The recent fates of most of even the best blue chips (think GE, Merrill Lynch, AIG, Citibank) have pained my pocketbook. And alas, the probable coming of a nationalized U.S. Bank is an unfortunate symbol of our financial times. (And here let me mention a prescient column of mine last fall chronicling the numerous name changes my own two banks had undergone over the years. Then within days, my Wachovia became Wells Fargo and who knows where things will end. In Washington, probably.
*Things change-- Va. Gov. Kaine claimed last fall that the environment would be a key focus of his final year as governor. With the financial situation now spiraling into the toilet, the greenies’ wishes--such as the promotion of smaller carbon footprints (how quaint the sound)-- will remain in the sh oe box. The scientists, by the way, who have loudly proclaimed the coming ravages of a warming globe (now cooling instead) have shown no better forecasting skills than those Wall Street experts who hawked safe investments.
*Inauguration asides-- Remember those good old days, back in January? D.C. police placed signs along 5th and I Streets, announcing a “ Prostitution Free Zone" for the duration of the Obama ceremonies. Forgive the taxpayers who may have erroneously presumed the new administration had already come up with a handy 2009 version of last year’s tax rebates.
There was also the threat of lawsuits, given a predicted shortage of outdoor toilets on the Mall and the prospect that they wouldn’t be gender neutral. No doubt this problem landed in the lap of our new Number Two in Washington, Joe Biden.(re: the Patriot blog).
* Second black president--Some folks once called Bill Clinton our first black president, but it was obvious to see he wasn’t. Now ours is the real McCoy. So he’ll surely attend to all the concerns of African-Americans who did so much to get him elected.
Don’t be so sure. Obama can count voters, as the primary races showed. And one reality is there are more Hispanic than black Americans and multiplying rapidly. They have special problems that blacks don’t--the stain of illegal immigration and the barrier of language. Granted, many=2 0blacks also face a language barrier. Have you, as I have, been on an elevator with several black youngsters talking among themselves? For the life of me, I couldn’t interpret their jive English. Let’s hope Obama’s eloquent diction will prove instructional.
Whatever. Stafford’s Hispanic population has more than doubled since 2000. And according to projections by the Pew Research Center, the U.S. will see a tripling of them by 2050, making us a white-minority nation within three or four decades. Sorry I’ll miss it, Amigos.
But we old codgers also must adjust even now. Overheard: “What did you get for Christmas?” Answer: “Wii.” We? ....We what? Wee-wee? Oui? No. Oh. Wake me when it’s over.
*Stafford County keeps growing, although there may seem to be way too many of some of us nowadays. But this is no sermon against illegal immigrants, except for the flying kind. To wit: There are far too many Canada geese. Bless these beauties, nurtured so they may fly into airplane engines and keep our aerospace industry in fine fettle. Otherwise, why should we tolerate the near-quadrupling of their numbers in recent years? Just shoot them. That’s the ticket.
No don’t, honks the organization Geesepeace. It campaigns for humane methods instead, such as teaching the resident geese to learn once again how to migrate themselves to elsewhere. I’m not making this up.
The same skepticism of mine also applies for our Bambi hordes in the area this winter. They are bidding to wreck untold numbers of neighborhood shrubs, undoubtedly to the delight of Meadows Farms nursery..
Our deer, like those geese, are also becoming settlers instead of transients, right here in my back yard. My pup Lollipop and I were venturing towards the rear of our est ate the other evening near dusk when, wouldn’t you know, we spotted five large, fat deer browsing casually nearby, barely noting our presence before strolling away. What gall. I say it’s better to shoot them, since they are much more dangerous for area motorists than those Canada geese will ever be for airplanes.
* Our precarious economy-- I’d rather not think about it. I recall bitterly those authoritative past assurances by really smart and rich analysts that blue-ribbon stocks would stay valuable no matter what. Well, “what” matters now. Such foresight ranks right up there with experts’ claims that the globe is warming. The recent fates of most of even the best blue chips (think GE, Merrill Lynch, AIG, Citibank) have pained my pocketbook. And alas, the probable coming of a nationalized U.S. Bank is an unfortunate symbol of our financial times. (And here let me mention a prescient column of mine last fall chronicling the numerous name changes my own two banks had undergone over the years. Then within days, my Wachovia became Wells Fargo and who knows where things will end. In Washington, probably.
*Things change-- Va. Gov. Kaine claimed last fall that the environment would be a key focus of his final year as governor. With the financial situation now spiraling into the toilet, the greenies’ wishes--such as the promotion of smaller carbon footprints (how quaint the sound)-- will remain in the sh oe box. The scientists, by the way, who have loudly proclaimed the coming ravages of a warming globe (now cooling instead) have shown no better forecasting skills than those Wall Street experts who hawked safe investments.
*Inauguration asides-- Remember those good old days, back in January? D.C. police placed signs along 5th and I Streets, announcing a “ Prostitution Free Zone" for the duration of the Obama ceremonies. Forgive the taxpayers who may have erroneously presumed the new administration had already come up with a handy 2009 version of last year’s tax rebates.
There was also the threat of lawsuits, given a predicted shortage of outdoor toilets on the Mall and the prospect that they wouldn’t be gender neutral. No doubt this problem landed in the lap of our new Number Two in Washington, Joe Biden.(re: the Patriot blog).
* Second black president--Some folks once called Bill Clinton our first black president, but it was obvious to see he wasn’t. Now ours is the real McCoy. So he’ll surely attend to all the concerns of African-Americans who did so much to get him elected.
Don’t be so sure. Obama can count voters, as the primary races showed. And one reality is there are more Hispanic than black Americans and multiplying rapidly. They have special problems that blacks don’t--the stain of illegal immigration and the barrier of language. Granted, many=2 0blacks also face a language barrier. Have you, as I have, been on an elevator with several black youngsters talking among themselves? For the life of me, I couldn’t interpret their jive English. Let’s hope Obama’s eloquent diction will prove instructional.
Whatever. Stafford’s Hispanic population has more than doubled since 2000. And according to projections by the Pew Research Center, the U.S. will see a tripling of them by 2050, making us a white-minority nation within three or four decades. Sorry I’ll miss it, Amigos.
But we old codgers also must adjust even now. Overheard: “What did you get for Christmas?” Answer: “Wii.” We? ....We what? Wee-wee? Oui? No. Oh. Wake me when it’s over.
posted by Ben Blankenship at
8:29 AM
