The Native Iowan

It is Cmas eve, morning here. The weather has broke. Gone is the 100f/ 35c temps with high humidity and a blistering sun. Over cast and gentle is this morning. The fauna is out and appreciative. The heat these past few days has been intense.

An old compadre from Michigan, The Dancing Bear, sent some discussion materials this morn. Namely an editorial from the local rag in Storm lake, Iowa. DB and I do not agree much per anything (except motorcycles – he likes and has owned Urals too) and so, for some 30 years we communicate and discuss the world from divergent points of view.

I copy my discussion with Db here in… Merry Cmas to all…

Cmas eve day here. I have two little granddaughters living with me, so the magic of Cmas is alive. Or should I say the selfishness of Cmas is alive?

Being the middle child in a large family, there was never a whole lot of “booty” for me during Cmas. I was the youngest child for a very short time and Cmas, thought fun and cool, was never “loot” oriented in my mind.

Of course the modern commercial world makes it all about “stuff”.
My teenaged grandsons are worse. Fuck me gently, they want, want, want so much.

But our Cmas tree (a potted fig) is up and I’ve been slowly stacking presents under it.

I like to buy educational type gifts. This year it is wooden puzzles… a pendulum clock, a solar calendar, a scale locomotive, a perpetual motion machine that moves a small ball bearing up and around and about.

I bought Gracie a new machete.

It’s a really nice, ol Skool type machete. She will like it.

I can completely agree with a few (a few) things the esteemed editor of the Storm Lake Rag has to say… mainly people are stupid. And Iowa has no monopoly…

It’s been quite some time since the recent vote counting and now that the system has proven itself to “work”, now that the President Elect is in the wings, waiting to be inaugurated, the rhetoric is that of doom and gloom. Lock down and control. Dire prophesy of “more to come”, “piles of bodies”, unparalleled death and destruction…

And this comes from the folks that had the answers a few short weeks ago.

I say it again, fuck me gently, how stupid is the consumer?

Here in Aus we just got locked down again. Just as we were planning a long Cmas to NYrs outdoor party, preparing for an “Islander in Exile” party, a cluster of Kung flu in and around Sydney locks the borders down, seals the season into a jar, prohibits families from getting together. Keep folks isolated.

In QLD we are pretty good. The restrictions were not terrible in their own right. Not like places like Melbourne or South Australia where households were locked-in, not allowed to venture out but for necessities. One designated from each household allowed to go buy necessities. In some places for over 100 days or more.

Though schools and offices, and bars and eateries, and transport and entertainment forbidden… Grog shops have remained open and busy everywhere.

I joke with my local grog shop employees that they are Front Line Essential Service Workers.

And the beat goes on.

More later

big smiles