Free In Idaho!

Today was one of those days for stopping during the chores, putting a piece of long grass in your teeth, and just taking a look around at all that’s around you.  Blue sky, white fluffy clouds, grass growing so green and fast you can almost hear it, and it seems as if we have a new returning bird every day or so now.  One of the things I love so much about southwestern Idaho is the way the four seasons stretch out and take their time about it.  Yes, winter can be cold a long time, and in a few months I’ll be “mentioning” the unbroken string of 100+ deree days.  But spring and fall make it all worthwhile.  The pink trees last for weeks.  It seems the bulbs last for over a month. 

The swallows started showing up last week.  I haven’t seen any tanagers yet, or nighthawks.  But I saw my first hummer this afternoon, a nice rufous.  It had gotten into the greenhouse and I saw it when I went over to visit my sweetie.  I notice there’s still a lot of snow on Shaffer Butte (the mountain that Boise sits beneath)… in fact, there seems to be a lot of snow across the whole ridge, not just on the Butte.  The old-timers, like my wife’s grandpa and dad, used to say not to put out any tender plants until the snow was off.  But it just seems like we oughta be planting now.  The tomatoes and beans and pepper plants are get bigger every day.  I have to remember that here in the valley we can plant a week after Mother’s Day and still have plenty of summer for everything to grow.  But all the little plants in the greenhouse look ready to go.  We might gamble on a few this next weekend and set them out early.  Just a few though.  Those guys knew their stuff, and made their living growing here.  Best to listen to them.

It oughta be a good water year too.  Snow is still up there this late, and the days haven’t been terribly hot, so it isn’t melting off too fast.  The snowpack has 10% or more extra water in it than normal.  That’s good.  Last year they shut down the irrigation at least two weeks early… not a happy thing for a lot of farmers.   Should be a good year for gamebirds too.  I’m noticing a lot of doves this spring.  Squirrels too, but that’s a different story.  I can’t say that I wish I were a farmer, but I’m lucky to live in a place like this, and able to pay attention to these things and dabble a little bit.

Spring and fall, my favorite times of the year.  We are so very blessed.  Thank you Lord.

Noticed a little article over at Pajamas Media, speaking about the Democrat Mayor’s planned response to all the recent gang shootings in Chicago.  Personally, I think the Mayor is having a hysterical over-reaction to a little youthful spring “rite of passage”.  After all, every spring, when the weather gets good, the young men of the inner city go through an upsurge in, er, territorial disputes, and  you don’t hear Jesse Jackson, Rev Wright, or Barack Obama having this kind of a reaction, do you?

After a recent outbreak of gun-related violence, Mayor Richard Daley is now pushed into supporting a plan by new Police Superintendent Jody Weis to arm 13,000 Chicago police officers with assault rifles. Depending on how many weapons are eventually deployed, this may develop into the largest militarization of police patrol officers in United States history. If the department arms 10,000 of their officers with M4s, the police will have 9,900 more assault rifles in Chicago than the U.S. Marines presently have in Fallujah, Iraq.

And besides, “nobody needs an assault rifle”, right?  Oh wait, Mayor Nagin and his boys just got a bunch, didn’t they.  Alright then, they looked like they were enjoying it, so let’s not be too hard on the cops and the Mayor in Chicago, and just let them have their toys.  It won’t cost much, right?  $10 or $15 mil oughta cover it, don’t you think?  But hey, if we don’t arm the cops, then those pesky citizens will be demanding that they be allowed to have guns again, for ’self defense’ or some such reason, and God help us then!  Why, there might be shootings or something.

Perhaps instead of up-gunning the police, it is time for Chicago to admit its strict anti-gun laws have failed, and perhaps rescind mandates that only disarm Chicago’s law-abiding citizens in the face of increasing violent criminal activity. Mayor Daley is unlikely to see that logic, however. For him and those like him, guns in the hands of citizens are the problem, not the cure.

It is an irony lost on a man intent on turning his police force into a respectable third-world army, and his city into Chicagostan, Gaza on Lake Michigan.

What some politicians won’t do in order to keep the citizens unarmed (and may I add, defenseless?)…

What some “Reverends” won’t look the other way on, in order to keep bashing whitey…

Mr Completely’s ePostal shooting match goes international this month.  The host blog for May is “armes et tir passions“, somewhere in France.  After Mr C’s fly target, and JimmyB’s dastardly aliens targets, it might be good to shoot at circle targets and bowling pins for a change!  Head on over the ocean and check it out (the ePostal post is in English by the way, but try the Babel fish button to translate the rest of the blog).