Enemy of My Enemy

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When I was a kid we called these "garden spiders" and they would be found amongst the corn rows at about the height of my face.  We were careful to leave them in place to catch and eat bugs.  Big spiders like this are part of a healthy garden.  They are common throughout America.  Zoom in on this one's mouth area and you can see the palps & mouth and several eyes.

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This handsome snake is a species alien to America.  But I bet it devours many a mouse or rat.  Take a close look at its eye and you can see a reflection of me taking the picture, and behind my back is that Vietnamese Catholic Church on the corner of Vine & Township in Elmwood Place.  I can make out the steeple in the snake's eye.

Union Terminal Murals

These mosaic murals by Winold Reiss depict the history of Cincinnati.

Here's one for Lili.  Notice the potter's wheel is belt-powered from an overhead shaft that runs the length of the work space.  This was typical in early factories.  The shaft could be driven by a watermill or a steam engine.  Pretty much anything from a sewing machine to a saw could sling a belt over that shaft and get to work.

Remember Your Umbrella

Remember your umbrella.

Fancy Handles

Union Terminal

Cincinnati's Union Terminal is such a beautiful place.

Sometimes it makes me think of a Crosley radio.  Where are the dials & knobs?

Mercury, Merchandise, Commerce.  It's the same root word in all of those.

Imagine - this was begun in 1929 and finished in 1933.  The Depression  made for less traffic than what it was designed for, but there were still alot of people coming and going.  Imagine the goodbyes.  Some people leaving, looking for a better life in another town.  Some headed for the Civilian Conservation Corp, some to college, some off to the military.

I saw a friend off on his Amtrak trip back to Milwaukee a few years back.  He had to catch his train at 3 a.m.  The Terminal was dark and empty, and we had to get buzzed in to a special door to get to the train depot.  The waiting area had wooden benches sort of like pews.  It had a real creepy lonely feeling, so I hung out with him until his train came.

About the time I was in elementary school, Union Terminal was home to a science museum.  When my class visited on a field trip I saw my first laser.  It was so remarkable that it felt like science fiction.  Now lasers are toys,

Could You Last Three Days?

Red sky at night...

Blizzards, earthquakes, tsunamis, floods.  What's next, a rain of frogs?  No such luck:  that would be a good thing as in "when life gives you frogs, eat froglegs."  What's next is tornado season.  Here it is mid-March and we've already seen thunderstorms in Cincinnati and reports of tornados elsewhere such as Florida.  And the same El Nino system that brough us the heavy snow this winter promises to pump more moisture and energy into our thunderstorms this spring and summer, spawning more twisters.  By the way, floods kill the most people and damage the 2nd most property relative to other natural disasters.

I like this little tale...

The Big Flood

It had been raining for days and days, and a terrible flood had come over the land. The waters rose so high that one man was forced to climb onto the roof of his house.

As the waters rose higher and higher, a man in a rowboat appeared, and told him to get in. "No," replied the man on the roof. "I have faith in the Lord; the Lord will save me." So the man in the rowboat went away. The man on the roof prayed for God to save him.

The waters rose higher and higher, and suddenly a speedboat appeared. "Climb in!" shouted a man in the boat. "No," replied the man on the roof. "I have faith in the Lord; the Lord will save me." So the man in the speedboat went away. The man on the roof prayed for God to save him.

The waters continued to rise. A helicopter appeared and over the loudspeaker, the pilot announced he would lower a rope to the man on the roof. "No," replied the man on the roof. "I have faith in the Lord; the Lord will save me." So the helicopter went away. The man on the roof prayed for God to save him.

The waters rose higher and higher, and eventually they rose so high that the man on the roof was washed away, and alas, the poor man drowned.

Upon arriving in heaven, the man marched straight over to God. "Heavenly Father," he said, "I had faith in you, I prayed to you to save me, and yet you did nothing. Why?" God gave him a puzzled look, and replied "I sent you two boats and a helicopter, what more did you expect?"

If you don't want to be that sap waiting to be rescued, or standing in line for water & food or hoping they let you live in one of their prison camps trailer parks then you'd better be ready before disaster strikes.  Ya know, when the government allowed people to put money into 401(k) and IRA plans for retirement, I interpreted that as saying "Social Security will run out, you're on your own."  Well now they are explicitly saying "You may need to survive on your own after an emergency. This means having your own food, water, and other supplies in sufficient quantity to last for at least three days."  Can it be any clearer?  Preparedness is not just a shopping list.  It's an action plan and a midset as well, but at the very least get your 3-day disaster kit ready!  If you want some decent guidelines from the mainstream authorities, check Ready.gov, FEMA.gov, and Cincinnatiredcross.org.  If you don't trust The Man then visit American Preppers Network and similar grass-roots self-reliance forums.  You don't have to subscribe to anybody's religion, politics or conspiracy theories in order to learn.  Even the Mormons have a lot of good info, especially about food storage.

In addition to all that good info, I want to throw in three pointers.  First, the middle of a disaster is no time to learn a new skill.  Learn and practice your CPR & first aid ahead of time.  Read the preparation instructions on any unfamiliar foods, read the manuals on all your equipment (camping gear, tools, radios, GPS, etc.) and actually practice using it.  Second, take personal limitations into account.  If you can only use one hand then don't pack a can opener (or any other tool) that requires two hands.  Think about medications, mobility issues, strength and stamina.  An evacuation kit that you can't carry is an anchor! If you wear glasses, put your old or extra pair in your kit.  It could save your life!  Third, include something to keep your spirits up.  Crayons and paper can pass the time well.  A deck of cards or  five dice can keep multiple people amused in a number of different games.  Inspiring reading material such as The Hobbit or The Bible can keep you from succumbing to despair.  Remember, this is something to tell the grandkids about!

Two-Party System, Downfall of America

So, former wrestler Jesse Ventura agrees with me. The rich part is that my theory compares America's so-called opposing parties to two professional wrestlers. The Democrats & Republicans are just like Hulk Hogan and Macho Man Savage, roaring and blustering and talking trash and throwing each other around the arena, all according to script, taking turns winning according to the script. After the big tussle they go backstage and pat each other on the butt or whatever, then they each take their cut of OUR MONEY and pass the major part on to The Man. We as the audience or as voters are left excited, entertained, and a little more stupid than before.

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And believe me, there is an astonishing amount of money that flows through those parties. Where does it come from? Chances are, not from you, but from the Fat Cats. Where does it end up? I'm not sure, but I bet it doesn't flow anywhere toward you. Who does it benefit?  What does it buy?

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You might call yourself a Democrat or a Republican but I bet you're not really, not any more than somebody  who wears a Bengals jersey and watches a game on TV is really a Cincinnati Bengal.  Their marketing fools people into identifying with them, cheering for one team versus another when they're all part of the same league, getting rich taking money from the regular folks.  Politics has become a crooked sport in America, a rigged game.  I oppose spectator sports on principle and encourage you to muscle up and participate yourself.  Start your own team.

Introducing The Sentinels

My sons Dylan & Derek played their first show with their band The Sentinels on Saturday night at Play By Play Cafe.  The boys did a good job.  The have shows lined up at 3 more venues, including a little road trip to Dayton.  Fun stuff!

New! Improved!!

Greetings, dear Readers!  It turns out I'm not just posting this blog for my own gratification.  In response to your comments and requests I have done a bit of remodeling.  I switched to a whole new layout which puts dark text on a light background for better readability.  It may not look as cool & hip and the photos don't pop the way I like but I'll just have to wear black turtlenecks and my beret more often.  You may find the font to be just a touch larger as well.

I also added a gadget for sharing this blog on Twitter and Facebook - Use that gadget RIGHT NOW!!  I need as many people as possible eyeballing the ads on this page.  And would it kill you to click an ad now and then?

I also added a gadget that Google-searches That Crashing Sound and all that web stuff on my list.  As my postings accumulate it will help find particular items that interest you, your wheat amongst others' chaff, so to speak.

So spread the word, stop back often, leave me some comments.

Hubbard History Pt 2, etc.

Death certificate from Kentucky Vital Records Project

My oldest son Dylan is 23.  He's all excited this week because he & his younger brother Derek are getting ready for the first show of their band The Sentinels.  Dylan & his gal Sarina are expecting a baby girl this June.  It's strange, tragic too, to think that my great-grandma Mary Lee (Brummet) Hubbard was just 23, the mother of two young boys (William & Colonel) when the Spanish Flu Pandemic of 1918 took her life.  World War I was just winding down in Europe when the flu hit.  More than a fifth of all people in the world were infected, more than a quarter of all Americans got it.  Ten times as many Americans died from the flu than from the war!  Of all the U.S. soldiers who died in Europe, half died from the flu instead of the fight.  People age 18-34 were hit much more frequently and much harder.  Many young adults would sicken and smother in their own mucus in the space of a day or so, and no real effective treatment.  Awful, just awful.

  I don't know how much news the Hubbards heard down there in Pulaski County, Kentucky, but the world was totally transforming.  Empires were colliding and crumbling, emperors & kings were being murdered or deposed, kingdoms were converting to republics, little duchys and territories and what-not linked up into countries.  The map started to look like something we might recognize.  Britain occupied Palestine and later just arbitrarily draws lines on the world map, sowing the seeds of future chaos in places we now know as Israel, Kuwait, Iraq, Pakistan, India.  Yes, the British Empire has caused us some headaches over the years, to say the least, and many lives have been lost in cleaning up their messes.  But I haven't figured out any way (yet, other than their traditional rivalry) to blame them for Russia's revolution, which produced the Soviet Union.  That sure filled the heart of the 20th century with misery, until we finally had to go deep into debt and create monsters like Osama bin Laden to weaken them.  And then... and then... and then...  The Law of Unintended Consequences produces some fascinating results.

Now you went and got me rambling about the state of the world, when what I meant to talk about was Hubbards.  After Mary Lee died of the flu, her husband Monteville had to get on with life so he married Dolly Hicks to take care of his two boys and to have some more babies.  More on all of them later.  But little William was lucky enough to grow up and meet Ida Belle Farmer and marry her.  Her parents were caretakers of this house in Stanford, Kentucky.

My mom, Jackie, was born in the upstairs bedroom of this house.  I remember sleeping up there when I was real little, under a pile of handmade quilts thicker than me.  You had to go down those funny narrow steps that turned a corner so one was like a triangle.  Downstairs was like a sitting room but it seems that there were also a couple of beds.  The center of the front wall was dominated by a pump organ which is now at my brother Scott's house.  You had to go out on that porch to the left side of the house to get to the kitchen which was further back.  It had a kerosene stove with ornate glass cylinders for the fuel.  If mom can get me the address of the place I'll try to add an aerial view from Google.