The NRA and here we go again

For those of you who don't know, the 2nd Amendment went through a number of drafts before the rather twisted amendment was agreed upon. Somehow the right wing in our country has perverted the evolution of the amendment/amending sequence to an individual's right to own guns, buy guys, keep guns, strap guns to their hips and go see the President of the United States and recently visit a movie theater.

If are living in Colorado there is a time in your not too distant future when you will go shopping on  a Friday night and you will be treated to the spectacle of 18 year olds packing concealed and loaded handguns with NO NEED for any registration. Perhaps if there were a data base, some loony couldn't acquire 5 guns and some TNT.  They can't drink but by God they can shoot. A couple years ago The NYTimes of course ran a hand wringing editorial about it which will do no good because those who worship at the shrine of the misunderstood 2nd amendment don't read the Times and if they hear about it poo-poo it as being too liberal and therefore not to be believed.

We've been treated to any number of pundits pointing out that if a few folks in the theater were "packing" weapons they could have fired back in some sort of perverse Lone Ranger style - nothing like a gun fight in a crowded theater.  This argument is without merit as there is no reliable data past NRA opinion that having a gun protects you from someone nuts who just want to shoot and kill.  I can see the home breakin in the middle of the night but I can't and won't concede the let's take a gun to the theater mentality. Nor should you.

For your reading pleasure, here are the three drafts to the 2nd Amendment that were written prior to the final. After reading them, let me know if you don't think this entire debate is entirely off track.

I. The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed; a well armed and well regulated militia being the best security of a free country but no person religiously scrupulous of bearing arms shall be compelled to render military service in person

II. A well regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, being the best security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed; but no person religiously scrupulous shall be compelled to bear arms.

III. A well regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, being the best security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed; but no one religiously scrupulous of bearing arms shall be compelled to render military service in person.

There you go gun-rights honchos. Now explain that away when you apply your strict construction theories.

Dust Bowl

We took a little break from the writing desk for no other reason that it was too darn hot. Dry too. You read it here first.

We ran across this picture the other day. It is from Life Magazine in the 30s and some of us with too much time actually found the place on Google maps - street view. But then again, Oklahoma or parts thereof, look pretty much the same for miles on end so who is to know if we got it right or not.

We are longing for some rain and this afternoon holds promise. That rain that makes things "mud lucious and puddle-wonderful" as e.e.cummings once wrote (at least we think so but are too hot and lazy to go look it up). But right now we have dust. Not Oklahoma in the 30s dust, but it seems that way.

Very low tide



courtesy of the Suffolk Times.

 The picture ran in the Suffolk Times; a tribute to man's stupidity.

We have a lot of water views here and watching the boats in the harbor or navigating up or out the bay is actually very pleasant. Most are in some sort of hell bent hurry to get where the fish are or aren't or they like the "full throttle" sport which, at $4+ marina prices, seems a bit short sighted. The sailboats glide a bit more slowly of course and don't seem to be in such a scurry to get anywhere.

One such sail boat comes by frequently to take the southwest wind at the close of day and we exchange waves on occasion and they all seem dressed for croquette rather than boating, they raise a toast in glasses that literally explode in glints and gleams in the sun and it is, in all, rather civilized.

The boat in our picture above got where it was because someone raised one too many glasses in salute to the fair weather. Simply, it is alleged that the "captain" was drunk. We think now back to our sailboat fellow and his natty crew, drinking toasts for the sail home. Hmmm.

Our driver's education teacher in high school made a point of warning us that 1 out of 10 persons passing you on the road have had a drink. I guess we all are guilty of that at some point and it is a lesson of course to consider.  But when folks get in a boat they seemingly forget that the exact same behavior (raising a glass to a state trooper - although courteous as you pass them by) is a ticket to the pokey.

Anyway, with the 4th and the fireworks and the full harbor and the celebrating, just use your brains some tomorrow night and if you see someone else who has checked his brains at the door, for crying out loud, say something.

Botticelli

About 600 years ago, give or take, the Italian painter Botticelli composed this masterwork - Primavera - spring.  A hundred years ago, another Italian master, Respighi, composed a piece of music inspired by the Botticelli work.

It is a heavenly morning; cool, crisp, blue and a day to think thoughts of great things, beauty and good will.

Have a nice one.

...a little rain must fall....

Looks like our heat wave is over for a bit.

We were talking this a little while ago, during the midst of the thunderstorm, that there was something very reminiscent of childhood when it storms in the morning. Not so much the lightning but the rumble and vibrations of thunder. We like the echo as well as it seems to roll on forever.

We were watching the History Channel over the weekend and with the 4th of July coming up it is 149 years ago this 4th that the battle of Gettysburg came to its climax and Pickett's charge and all that senseless gallantry and wasted courage. War brings out the best and worst in man.  Anyway, prior to Pickett's charge, Lee had lined up a huge group of artillery to fire on the Union's positions to soften them up for the charge. The sheer number of cannons exceeded anything ever in the history of continent and supposedly the ground shook and the sound made it to Philadelphia.

My father fought in the South Pacific and remembers being on a ship before the landings and having all the battleships (seemingly) on earth go ker-pow all at once and it striking him that there was never on earth such an infernal noise. To the day he died he said he never could hear a rumble of thunder without thinking about that event.

I think about thunder in my mind's eye at a lake cabin in northern Minnesota 50 years ago, not being able to go fishing because sure as shooting we would get hit by lightning, and it being so dark we had to turn on the kerosene lamps as there was no electricity except that in the air.

Moonglow

It has been reputably reported that the moon is covered in dust.  Not our dust. Not our tumbleweeds in the unswept corner dust, nor the dust the mother in law finds on every visit try as one might. This is the finer stuff - little nano-grains of dust caused by the surface being pelted with meteors.

The astronauts of  nearly half a century ago noted that when they tromped around on the surface this nano-dust floated up and because it had so little mass it just floated for a bit like when you shake your rugs on a airless summer day.  The moon's "room dust" is chock full of little pieces of glass - again the work of the meteors smashing things with such force that they pulverized the moon rocks and the heat made something like glass.

We have no idea why this little factoid is of interest.  Perhaps because it was so close last month or just because - well just because. The adventure of landing on the moon seems utterly remote to us now; to think that an entire generation has never seen it live.  Instead of moving forward, our moon-heart skipped a beat.

Belling the Cat

We all come from a long line of "if onliers", as in "if only he/she would do this or that".  Catching ourselves in one of these wish lists is fine as far as it goes but to dwell endlessly on the "if only I would win the lottery" thinking is...., well it reminds me of a fable:

"Long ago, the mice had a general council to consider what measures they could take to outwit their common enemy, the Cat.  Some said this, and some said that; but at last a young mouse got up and said he had a proposal to make, which he thought would meet the case.  "You will all agree," said he, "that our chief danger consists in the sly and treacherous manner in which the enemy approaches us.  Now, if we could receive some signal of her approach, we could easily escape from her.  I venture, therefore, to propose that a small bell be procured, and attached by a ribbon round the neck of the Cat.  By this means we should always know when she was about, and could easily retire while she was in the neighbourhood."    This proposal met with general applause, until an old mouse got up and said: "That is all very well, but who is to bell the Cat?"  The mice looked at one another and nobody spoke.  Then the old mouse said:

 "It is easy to propose impossible remedies."