Thursday, February 4, 2010

Bare Naked

02/04/2010

I had to go up to Arizona City for training on the installation of an anti-terrorism valve in fire hydrants.  I got some pictures of that, but they were kind of boring and they would rather not have photos of it all over the net anyway.  Passing through Eloy on the way home, I saw that the orchards were bare and thought they might be an interesting subject for today's picture.  As you can tell, I've really started to like the sepia mode on the camera.  I took some in black and white and color also, but I really like the way this turned out.

Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Name Challenged

02/03/2010

Does anyone else have a problem putting names to faces?  It's pretty bad that whenever someone adds me as a friend on Facebook, that I have to go dig out a year book to see what they used to look like.  Then it's OOhhhh.  I know you!!  I know, I'm a bad person.  It doesn't help that I haven't seen anyone from either high school in twenty six years. 

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Free Market Capitalist


I downloaded an application for my iPod called “Political GPS”. It asks a series of questions then plots you on a graph depending on your political leanings. That little green dot that is trying to break it’s way out of the right side of the graph is me. I can’t say that I can disagree with it either. It did say that I am more of a Libertarian than a Republican and described me as a free market capitalist. Okay, so I believe that it is the national government’s responsibility to protect us from foreign aggressors, and pretty much stay the hell out of our lives otherwise. America is one of the greatest countries ever to exist, and it wasn’t welfare and social equality programs that made it that way. It was individuals working hard to provide for their families and trying to always improve that made this country great. I’m sorry if there are deadbeats who don’t want to work but damn it, I’m working hard to support my family! I don’t need to pay extra taxes to support theirs because they think they should be equal to me. Guess what, that guy who is smarter than me, and works harder, should get paid more money than me. I don’t feel entitled to any of the cash in his wallet just because he drives a better car than me. If an executive is making over six figures a year, well he obviously did something to deserve it. He brings enough value to his company do demand that salary. If he didn’t, he would be replaced. I’m tired of people complaining because of companies making huge profits. We are all in this to make a profit. I go to work and perform a job. I get a paycheck for that. That paycheck, minus what my time is worth to me, and the cost of getting to work and back, is my profit. If companies are limited in their profits, then their quality and output will also be limited. And that will be the downfall of our economy. The one that always makes me laugh is when some politician gripes about the huge profits oil companies make on fuel. All the while, the government is taking a larger percentage of the cost of that gallon of gas in taxes than the oil company is taking in profit. And the government didn’t have to take any capitol risk in exploration, drilling or refining. They leave all the risk right on the shoulders of the oil companies and reap their rewards afterwards. We shouldn’t be throwing tea parties to show our displeasure, we should be throwing gasoline parties
Whoa, enough rambling.  I’ll jump right down from my soap box now...........................

End of an Era

02/02/2010

I was very disappointed when the DeAnza Drive In was closed down for good.  My family still enjoyed going on occasion.  As a matter of fact, up until they installed the fat man seats in the theaters, I was most comfortable at the drive in.  There is nothing quite like sitting comfortably in your vehicle while enjoying a movie with the family.  You also never had to worry about disturbing others with the of hand comment or two.  Whenever we would go, it would always bring back memories of childhood in Alamagordo, and preparing for the drive in.  Mom would pop popcorn, and then right before we left, we would go out in the front yard, cover our faces with our hands and get sprayed head to toe with Off repellant!  I always thought that stuff was going to kill me, not the mosquitoes it was supposed to.  If memory serves, we would always be dressed in our pajamas also, so Dad could carry us straight to bed when we got home.  We would of course fall asleep during the movie.  RIP DeAnza!

Monday, February 1, 2010

Gotcha

02/01/2010

This little guy was fast, but I caught him long enough for a picture.