Hammer Mill Days

Aren't you sick of the Gregorian calendar? I'm thinking we should start calculating time on the basis of how long we've been blogging. So hell ... call this Year 17. Happy 17! Four more years and we can drink in front of our parents! (Four years of what we've got coming, and I suspect we will need to.) I know you're all wondering what we've got planned for the new year. I know this because I can read your mind like a billboard. Just call me Kreskin. Or Criswell. Whichever works ... just be sure to preface it with "THE AMAZING ... " or I'll have to bring my $3.95 magic set back to the toy store, top hat and all. (Some Christmas THIS turned out to be!) Anyway, as I said, I'm sure you're wondering, and if you are, well, you're not alone, because we're wondering what the hell Big Green is going to do this year, too. Maybe call a contractor to fix the leaky windows in the abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill. (Question: Is a large, jagged hol...

So this week we were treated to Son of Cliven Bundy (Ammon) bringing his band of brothers up to Oregon to take a stand for freedom. The freedom, that is, to use public land as if it belongs to you and no one else. What these "patriots" are taking issue with is the jailing of these Oregonian ranchers who set fires on federal land, once to clear brush, the other time apparently to hide evidence of poaching. They were sent to jail on a relatively light sentence, released, and then ordered to return on the basis of a mandatory minimum sentence of 5 years for federal arson, the latter decision handed down by a higher court. Bundy the younger and his comrades apparently see this as the next chapter in the titanic struggle that began at old man Cliven's ranch, when the Feds impounded his cattle until he coughed up the $1million or more he owed the People of the United States for use of their (a.k.a. our) land. So they holed up in the office of a federal bird sanctuary, toting ...