Quiet Neighbors

We have two Colorado Blue Spruce trees in our front yard.

One, a taller, sparer tree lives slightly West of the best water. She’s the Mama tree, producing Spruce-cones, protecting the Papa tree from the harsh West wind, and giving of herself – to the point that she almost died of thirst one summer while her mate prospered.

The shorter, plumper, fuller Papa tree to her east provides a home for birds of many species. His many branches hide them so well that we can’t find the nest if a chick falls in the spring or summer. He is very prosperous, our Papa tree, and grows out, not up, so Mama can catch the early morning sun on her cone-laden upper branches.

Respecting their natures, we put the bird-seed in the Mama tree and stay away from the Papa tree, so as not to disturb the many families.

When we did a bit of decorative landscaping last spring, laying down fabric and bark in a newly-created aluminum circle, Papa was careful not to scratch my back with his low branches. He kept his sharp needles away. Mama, on the other hand, was much more interested in protecting her babies and wasn’t so worried about my back – or the weeds and grass we removed from around her trunk. Her needles were sharp, although not hurtful. I do think she was grateful that we’d noticed how thirsty she was and remedied the situation. Grateful, but wary.

So far from their mountain home, and such good neighbors. It would be heartless not to be thankful for the pleasure of their company.

If It Looks Like a Duck...

and talks like an ultra-conservative, maybe it's Bruce Tinsley's Mallard Fillmore. But when it comes to his views on what's racist, maybeee...

The Trailing Edge version of "What's Racist Today" says:

Number One: Endlessly calling attention to the race of one of the leading candidates for President when there are so many real issues we need to consider...

That would be racist.

Or do you object to what Senator Obama and Senator Clinton are really doing - calling attention to those serious issues when your favorite party wants us to ignore them and keep hiding under our beds?

You know. Access to healthcare, the state of our economy, a break for the working poor, the US standing in the world... Stuff like that.

Or is that left wing liberal thinking?

Hi you two. How have you been this last month or two? Did you miss me? Me neither.

But I missed you.

Somebody told me last week that Lent has been over for a while, so I can be as righteously indignant as I want.

How about that? Lent ends when Easter Sunday celebrates a new way of thinking about God.

Hoodathunkit?

Speaking of new ways of thinking, I’ve been thinking about the revolution in politics in the good ol’ US of A.

We Democrats are actually registering to vote.

Try a browser search on Voter Registration if you don’t believe me.

Of course you’ll have to wade through the statistics state by state, so don’t blame me if you miss the next 47 appointments and commitments you have.

If you get to page 12 of your search engine choices, let me know what’s there.

In any case, Democrats can't possibly win according to recent press releases.

Perhaps the unbiased free press thinks this is because we are contemplating electing a woman or a member of a minority group. Senator Clinton is not a member of a minority, by the way, because "in 2005, women and girls outnumbered men and boys by 4.4 million—150.4 million compared with 146.0 million" according to the US Census. Minority is an accurate designation for Senator Obama, according to same source; about 67% of US residents say they're white, not any other race and not Hispanic, and Senator Obama says he's not in that group. (These are admittedly old statistics, but not the sort that change very fast, so let's proceed.)

But that's probably all beside the point anyway - or at least it's beside the pressing point, to coin a pun. The point is that Obama and Clinton are arguing over details, as candidates in the same party do, and methods, as everyone does, and our independent, unbiased reporters think this is dangerous to their success.

Personally, I have a preference. And I'll bet it's just as well justified as yours. If we disagree, is that dangerous to our success?

Meanwhile, back at the Republican election campaign:

According to Roger Hickey as posted on Our Future Community aka Campaign for America’s Future, Arizona Senator John McCain “…wants voters to think he is going after health care cost inflation. In reality, he wants to dismantle the employer-provided system that now covers over 60 percent (or about 158 million) of non-elderly Americans, forcing millions of us who now get fairly decent health insurance on the job to instead buy whatever they can find on the individual market controlled by unregulated and predatory insurance companies. And he would drive health care costs upward, not downward."

Speaking as an ex-employee who has had to pay first about $680, now more than $800, per month (yes, I did mean PER MONTH) for health insurance ever since health issues forced me to take early retirement, I don’t think McCain has a very good idea. I had the luxury of paying that amount for health insurance only because COBRA required my employer’s insurer to make that insurance available to me. Otherwise, my insurance would have been whole dollars cheaper. But then, of course, my existing conditions – those pesky ones that forced me to leave my job – would not have been covered for the first year. Or at all. An insurer can always exclude them altogether if not a COBRA or employer-provided insurer, you see.

Does either of you live outside the US of A? I forget. If so, please enjoy your healthcare. And contact me for an explanation of all this insanity if you'd like to have a headache.

Or if you might reconsider trying to emigrate to our wonderful land.

None of this applies to you if you plan to remain in perfect health for the forseeable future.

Oops. That sounded a lot like righteous indignation, didn’t it?

So glad that Lent is over.