Hammer Mill Days

No, we're not having porridge this evening, cold or otherwise. That was Marvin (my personal robot) typing the title for me as he does most weeks. Explains a lot. What's happening around this place? Usual kind of stuff. We're preparing for the warm weather, which typically comes around this time in the northern hemisphere (for those of you browsing in from Madagascar). That's kind of an involved process. We have to put out the fire we started in the basement last November. No, we don't have a furnace - that's for bourgeois rock bands and... what do they call them? .... symphony orchestras. Hell, no - no furnace for Big Green. We just bust up a bunch of old furniture, baskets, hammer stocks (of which there are many lying around the abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill), and other combustibles, chuck 'em down the basement stairs, light 'em up, and keep it going until March. Okay, so... first step, put out the fire. Second, open a few windows. I don't know how m...

It's a little hard to boil down everything that has taken place this week into a single blog entry, so I won't even try. As has become my habit, I will take brief swings at a couple of topics and let the chips fall where they may. Japan Agonistes. Something like a triplet of biblical plagues have settled upon Japan, and all three share a grim history with that unfortunate nation. They are no strangers to severe earthquakes and tsunamis, the latter of which, by no accident, is known around the globe by its Japanese name. Nuclear disaster is, of course, something we first introduced them to at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It bears reminding that the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant was built on a design mapped out by General Electric - one long thought to be vulnerable to this kind of disaster. What possessed otherwise smart people to build such a plant on the coast of Japan is beyond me, particularly given Japan's unique experience with the depredations of nuclear radiation...

Hmmm.... forgot my password. What was the name of that lawyer who wrote me last week? Zul something. Hey - somebody scroll up to last week's post and pass me the guy's name, will you? I need my password back! Ah, got it. Scratched into my computer monitor, right about where the password field appears on the screen. Pretty clever, huh? No one would think of looking for it there! Let's see... what is up at the abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill that might be of interest to you. Little inventory here. I think Mitch Macaphee is working on an experiment (either that or Qaddafi's bombers are getting closer). Matt is either changing strings on a guitar, feeding animals, or transposing our heads with those of lunar astronauts. (A specialty of his.) Johnny White is catching up on his technical manuals, I believe. Marvin (my personal robot assistant) has shut himself down for the weekend, taking a little break from his newly founded religious cult. I won't get into what the Lincoln...

Some short takes. Pretty seriously under the gun these days (figuratively, though, not literally as many just now). Just make mention of a few serious setbacks this week. Wisconsinitis. Got to hand it to the GOP - they are good at the old sucker punch. Gov. Scott Walker and his political allies were determined to curtail union organizing rights, and they succeeded via political maneuvers that their Democratic opponents would never dare attempt on the state or national level. Always the way, it seems: Republicans are willing to push to the wall, no matter how unpopular the position. Democrats tend only to push their own base to the wall. The situation is, if anything, worse in Michigan, where not only are union rights being curtailed but the republicans have passed legislation that enables them to dismiss local elected officials under certain vague "crisis" circumstances and replace them with hired hacks, perhaps corporate subcontractors. Pretty ugly stuff. Of course, as we k...

What time is it? Okay, now... what day is it? Is that so? Right, then... seems like a good time to open the mail. Oh, yes - we get it. Don't think it's like writing to Santa. Just scrawl "Big Green" on the outside of any envelope, drop it in a box, and it will find its way to us... as if by magic. That's right, I said MAGIC. Right. So, let's see... what do we have in the old mail bag? Ah... here's something... My name is Barrister Zul Rafique an attorney by profession, in my quest to find a reliable trustee to manage the assets/estate of my late client valued at only $3.5,000.00 (Three Million Five Hundred Thousand US Dollars) This is the reason why you are receiving this email from me. I shall be willing to supply you with more detailed information concerning this business project upon hearing back from you. I am left with no other choice, but to carry out a discreet search for a reputable person outside the shores of my country and consequently seek your...

I've never been a union member for more than maybe eighteen months as a part-timer, back when I was a 1/8-time adjunct at S.U.N.Y. Empire State College and belonged to the A.A.U.P. (I paid dues to the Teamsters for about two weeks when I had a stock room job at a Caldor in Albany back in 1982 - the kind of job that lasts two weeks when you're me.) Likewise, my dad spent the vast majority of his working life - perhaps all of it - unaffiliated, unorganized, call it what you will. But though he was no fan of Hoffa, Meany, and the other union bosses of his day, he understood the power of labor organizing and was always supportive of it - not out of loyalty to an organization, of course, but from a deep identification with the experience of working people, as he worked hard pretty much the whole 40 years I knew him. I have to say that my sentiments run along the same lines, though I've never worked as hard as my father did. Still... I understand what it is like, what many of the...

Give me that back door religion, give me that back door religion, give me that back door religion, it's good enough for me! That's the song we're singing here at the abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill, now that Marvin (my personal robot assistant) has been plying his new trade as preacher, flock-leader, and chief financial officer of the local diocese of the Space Hippie Sect. Yes, it's a religion he made up using bits and pieces from Hulu reruns he watches in his ample spare time (contrary to common belief, robots are slothful creatures generally, their servos idle nearly 65% of the time). Turns out it was time well wasted, as the converts have been trudging in, eyes glazed, arms extended in front of them, hungry for spiritual guidance. Didn't know Marvin was so good at getting money out of people. Must be new programming... for some body. How do we of Big Green feel about floating our household on donations to a church hastily invented by a renegade robot? Well, not ba...