Jump to content

Chewbacca Defense

Members
  • Posts

    3101
  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    5

Everything posted by Chewbacca Defense

  1. Any chance they had a mine near by that they were super paranoid/protective over? I've had a couple of friends who had mines up in the cascades, and they got pretty weird if the topic was ever broached with them.
  2. Not sure what ranchers you know, but having married into a ranching family, I have yet to see a "corporate welfare recipient" rancher. I do see the meat packing companies consolidating and using their near monopoly status to drive down the price they have to pay ranchers for their cattle, meanwhile the cost of everything the rancher needs goes up. Not every ranch is like what you see on the show Yellowstone, in fact it's quite the opposite. My wife's family ranch has 1 full time employee, and he will probably be retiring soon. They do have 1 nice truck, but its an hour drive to get anywhere to get anything. They have a "grocery store" that is smaller than most convenience stores out here. To do any real shopping, home supplies, farm supplies etc, its an hour drive to Missoula. The other trucks and tractors are quite old. The cousin that has taken over the ranch from my wife's uncle is married to a gal that works remotely as a HR executive for a high end resort company, so they don't have to depend on the ranch to put food on their table. Pretty much all the other ranches in the valley have the same story (except for the wife with a fat salary part). When it comes time to brand or move cattle, all the ranchers in the valley help each other out. I have even helped out on cattle drives. We have often talked about whether or not the ranch will survive to the next generation. They have already had to fend off attempts to develop the area and someone even tried to build an airport (ok so that part is like the show Yellowstone). It wasn't tied to any sort of resort or ski resort, so it was pretty easy to shut down. That said, the bench across from the ranch house that was completely bare except for grass and scrub brush when my wife's grandfather gazed on it when he took his last breath now has houses on it. They butt right up against the property line of the ranch. Not sure where the corporate welfare fits in all that...
  3. We had one in Northridge park a couple of months ago, which as you can see is completely surrounded by neighborhoods. It is the green patch near the center of the picture. Lots of folks caught pictures on trail cams and security cameras. I'm pretty sure it (or one of its friends) was in the woods behind my house last winter. Went through a period where I could not get the dog to go out in the back yard. She would absolutely panic and try and wiggle out of her collar and drag me back to the house. About 2 weeks later, someone caught it on a trail camera about a mile from my house (down in the valley I live above).
  4. You say that like its a bad thing. How about we shoot for all of Florida being under water. Arizona has water issues...has had water issues for a really long time, yet people keep building there like there is no tomorrow. Sounds like a self-inflicted wound
  5. Baker had to cancel the banked slalom competition this year, and the Memorial Ski to Sea Race just announced they are already planning a no-snow contingency for the cross country and downhill portions of the race. They are hoping to get enough late season snow to make it so they don't have to go to plan B
  6. The emissions crap they put on my VW TDI ruined it, part of the reason I sold it. A lot of folks that live in states that don't have emissions testing are "hitting potholes" that make all that emissions crap "fall off." I was tempted to do it with mine, but in the end I wasn't driving it enough to justify the expense of the new exhaust system and tune. Those cars also took pretty big hits to MPG with all the emissions crap. Folks were able to see 50-60mpg if they drove it right. Folks are lucky to see 50 mpg driving downhill with a strong tailwind. I got 38mpg on a couple of trips to Montana, but for most of my driving I only got 25-28mpg. Not sure the tradeoff was worth it with those emissions rules. Flip side to that, the morons in Olympia put up a bill to restrict tire sales to fuel efficient, low rolling resistance tires. From what I have researched, those types of tires are less durable and have less tread depth. Cool, so we can have more road alligators littering the freeways, and more wrecked cars since more people will end up hydroplaning. Thankfully the bill died before making it to the floor.
  7. oh wow...that's crazy. We used to go to Paul's Place a lot when we went there, especially when my mother in law came to town. My wife grew up in Corvallis, and they went there all the time, especially on trips to/from the coast. I know that place is gone now...Not sure if we would even recognize anything any more if we were to come back down there (its only been 21 years LOL)
  8. A little tidbit....as most of folks on this page know, Philomath Oregon is pronounced fah-loh-muth (something to that effect.) There is also a Philomath in Georgia, a little bit south of Athens, and it is actually pronounced fi-low-math. It's actually referenced in the first and 3rd verse of the REM song "Can’t Get There from Here" When we moved out here, we landed in Albany, but spent most of our time in Corvallis since our goal was to go to OSU. It took us a little while to connect that fah-loh-muth = fi-low-math. There's your useless fact for the day. Carry on.
  9. You want to throw your money away, knock yourself out. I'll even help you with the link: https://www.gofundme.com/f/stand-with-trump-raise-the-settlement They have raised $33k so far. Almost there, 0.01% of the goal, should have the $335M by tomorrow morning.
  10. And I have no doubt that you would feel the exact same way if it was Biden on the hook for everything that Trump has been accused of doing. /sarcasm
  11. Russia was a boogeyman for both parties until very recently. Now, with the Trump brand of Republican party, Putin's apparently a great guy. Let's not forget that Trump said he believed Putin over our own intelligence services back in 2018. Back when it was the USSR, I think both parties held similar positions against them. Both countries sought and achieved treaties to slow the growth of nuclear weapons and development. And both parties sought to defeat communism. And even in more recent times, it's not just Democrats calling out Putin and Russia. John McCain didn't really beat around the bush: “Vladimir Putin is a thug and a murderer and a killer and a KGB agent,” McCain said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” on Dec. 11, 2016. Although, I realize he's not the right kind of Republican, and had the audacity to get captured and become a POW, so his word probably means nothing to you. Mike Pence had this to say in 2022: "There can be no room in the conservative movement for apologists to [Vladimir] Putin. There is only room in this movement for champions of freedom," he said. "Appeasement has never worked, ever, in history." Oh wait, he's also the wrong kind of republican. He couldn't "do his job" on January 6th. Paul Ryan seemed to think they were the boogeyman back in 2018: “There is no question that Russia interfered in our election and continues attempts to undermine democracy here and around the world,” said Ryan, a Republican from Wisconsin, in a statement. “That is not just the finding of the American intelligence community but also the House Committee on Intelligence.” Ryan continued, “The president must appreciate that Russia is not our ally. There is no moral equivalence between the United States and Russia, which remains hostile to our most basic values and ideals. The United States must be focused on holding Russia accountable and putting an end to its vile attacks on democracy.”
  12. He still has to pony up the money BEFORE he can ask for an appeal and put it in a bond (I believe the judge dictates the terms). Either way, he has to come up with the money, and soon. I believe there is an option that someone can pony up the money on his behalf, but given Trump's propensity for f*cking people over and not paying his debts, anyone willing to cover him.....well lets just say a fool and his money would soon be parted.
  13. Probably a good idea. If nothing else, its good insurance. I'm sure you have good insurance on your car collection and shop, I guess I would not treat this any different. Something else just popped in my mind.... I assume they will maintain it...but what does that mean/include. You don't want it to get so bad you are having to crawl in 4 low just to get to your cabin. You'd think they wouldn't let it get that bad but you never know... Also, liability...if some log truck driver goes flying off the road, need to be sure they can't sue you, or the government can't try to come back on you as the property owner for hundreds of gallons of spilled diesel (for example) that gets into a stream....stupid crap like that. Maybe you should be asking for them to carry some sort of huge insurance policy or bond....a lawyer would be able to help you with that. Maybe some discussions/consideration for timing, how long will this project last. If it goes past a certain point, what then? Probably nothing, but if they tell you 2 years and 5 years later you still have a bunch of log truck tearing through your property. And what about if you wanted to do something with the property near where they are going to cut the road. Would you be limited? Maybe you wanted to carve off a parcel of land near that road for a good friend or family member? My extended family (held by the estates of my grandmother and her sisters) had a chunk of property in Georgia that was extremely valuable except for the fact that it did not have a right of way. I think it took 10-20 years to get a right of way deal worked out to be able to realize the full value of the land. Within the family we had some very smart, very high dollar real estate, developer and business investment folks working the issue. We had it "almost there" more times than I can count Your situation is the opposite of what my family was up against) and I doubt it will get as contentious, but still shows it can get big in a hurry.
  14. When you say you have them by the balls, is there any sort of imminent domain claim there? It doesn't sound like it, but worth throwing it out there....
  15. Wish they had full immunity? maybe... Try to hide any activities that might be illegal or at least violate the spirit of the law......sure. Outright give the rule of law and constitution the middle finger? Nah....I think Trump stands alone there, especially to the extent at which he is trying to take this. While I of course have absolutely no idea what that man is really thinking, I am sure he would really like the immunity thing, but recognizes its not going to happen. But what will happen with this nonsense is he is and will continue to trigger delays, which he hopes will push all of this to after the election. That's his endgame as I think he thinks he can find a way to win...probably not through votes, but through manipulation of the system by way of the courts and other means. If Trump got what he wanted with the immunity thing....Biden could literally walk up to Trump on national TV and slit his throat Game of Thrones style and not face any repercussions whatsoever. I would like to think that someone....anyone...has pointed that out to him. I personally do not want ANY president to have that kind of freedom from prosecution.
  16. Yeah, I remember hearing about lots of accidents as a kid in Georgia due to hydroplaning. I had a '77 Datsun 280Z in college, and I was driving on a freeway just south of Atlanta when an absolute frog choker rolled through. My windshield wipers got completely overwhelmed by the spray/"rooster tails" shooting out from the side of the tires of the cars on either side of me (there was a ton of standing water on the road). I had so much water splashing around, it got up onto my exhaust manifold and popped a stud bolt, creating an exhaust leak at the head. It was an inline 6 motor with a single piece exhaust manifold. I ended up pulling off the road, which probably wasn't too safe either, but I very literally could not see the car in front of me. I was gauging my speed by the cars beside me and hoping my lane did not stop short. Most scared I have ever been while driving.
  17. Yes and no. I was sharing this with my sales guy who lives in Minnesota (he reports to a different division and did not get the bulletin), and we made the comparison of me getting this would be like him getting a safety bulletin on snow. I found that when we had the facility here, they never put out safety bulletins like this. The most they did was a simple e-mail from facilities saying that they would not have the parking lot plowed unless a certain amount of snow fell, and to be careful of ice in the parking lot. Also, they did allow for latitude in the working hours for folks, especially for folks who lived way out in the county who wanted to get home before dark, or delayed coming in to allow the county to clear the main arterials (some folks started work at 4-5am)
  18. Yes I did, yes I have, and it's part of the reason I moved out here. The conversation that started my relocation pretty much went like this....I was hanging out at one of my best friend's apartment up in Athens in the middle of summer, we were just sitting there sweating doing nothing more than sitting on the couch passing a bong around.... My friend: "Want to move to Oregon?" "What's in Oregon?" "Trees....and its not hot, its not humid, and no gnats!" "When we going?" We packed up our respective apartments after Christmas and started driving January 1st, 1994, there were 4 of us in total. Me and my girlfriend at the time, and my friend and her boyfriend at the time. I never really "acclimated" to the heat in Georgia, I just tolerated it. I spent a lot of time in local pools, rivers, and lakes. If none of those were available, I was running through or riding my bike through the sprinkler. When I worked in the summers in South Georgia, I was lucky that the house I lived at had a pool. I was in that sucker every day.
  19. 80 is now the hard limit for me. Anything above that can f*ck right on off. It used to be about 75, but now that I have A/C in the house, I find that I can tolerate a little more heat outside. I always hated the being hot outside then coming into a hot inside.
  20. Luckily, they don't seem to cause cancer anywhere else. I've never been able to figure that one out. Crazy thing is that before they closed the factory up here in Washington state, the California facilities used to ship a lot of product up here to be painted, because the cost of increasing the permit for emissions of volatiles related to paint outweighed the time and cost of shipping truckloads of parts up here to be painted.
  21. People seem to forget, or didn't pay attention and don't realize that Putin started his career in the KGB during the "glorious days" of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republic. That's not a job you get by being a pro democracy weenie. And Andie mentioned that the election is coming up for Putin. Putin did a really good job and was fairly strategic (in a very Soviet way) to set himself up as President for life. So this election is nothing more than a formality. My wife's cousin is extremely invested and active in politics and democracy. He went to Ukraine in the late 90's with the Peace Corps. He has a business/marketing background, so his primary "mission" was teaching Ukrainians at the local level about how a free market economy works. On the side, he formed a "democracy" club working with folks to teach them about democracy. He said one of the shocking an most frustrating things while he was there was that from day to day, he never knew when he got back to his apartment if he was going to have water, heat, or electricity. He talked about it with the club, and asked why they weren't complaining. Through extensive dialogue, he figured that they were all highly "conditioned" to never question the government, and to never rock the boat. Keep in mind this was within 10-12 years after the wall came down. He said that by the time his tour was done, he still could not get the group to a point where they were comfortable with challenging the government on the "status quo." Carry that over to Russia, where their experiment with Democracy was very short lived...sure Putin is up for election, but the other candidate will be hand picked by Putin and given marching orders to fail. No doubt this other candidate will be well compensated for his time. And no doubt, the people will go along with it, unless they by some miracle finally reach a tipping point. Maybe all of the body bags coming back from Ukraine will help them reach that tipping point....(doubt it)
  22. I work remotely for a company in SoCal, and HR sent out a safety bulletin that I think is very important to those of us in the PNW, and I think we all could learn valuable information from this safety bulletin. Everybody be safe out there!
  23. Down to 28 this morning. Got snow in the air for a few hours yesterday, grass kinda started to turn white, but then the temp popped up a couple of degrees and it melted off.
×
×
  • Create New...