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A variety of maps, writings, and photos on a various topics that can’t easily be categorized into a county or place.

Had to get milk this morning 🐮

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Got to have the moo juice to start the morning off right with coffee and carrot pancakes loaded with cinnamon and topped with blueberries and syrup. What will happen with empty container, see below. Not that I’m in any rush to go out and get any kind of dairy animal soon.

Clouds and cool this morning, woke up around 5 AM or so. ☁️ Didn’t sleep as well last night, 🛏 not totally sure why as it was a good day for sleeping. Went out to Five Rivers last night after riding home from work. 🐸 Not a bad evening but it sure gets dark early now that we are rapidly plunging toward September and ultimately autumn. Before you know it will too dark to ride after the evening ride home. 🚲 Stiff wind again last night pushing up against me riding home. Last night was those delicious kidney beans 😋 fried up some some scrambled eggs, peppers, onions, and cornmeal. 🍳 Good eats for sure.

Black tie dinner tonight 🕴️so I got to wear a suit and tie to work. It’s so baggy on me since I loss so much weight. Some day I should get at least one suit that actually doesn’t look like it was tailored for Trump. I know I shouldn’t complain, it’s a $100 a plate dinner that I’m not paying for at 677 Prime Steak House. 🥩 I get a laugh 😂 at how people think I’m a vegetarian because I don’t eat meat daily and often prefer beans and tofu as a protein source over meat. I’m not against meat, it’s a good treat but it’s often loaded with saturated fats. 🥓 You know how I love my Mariaville Farm Bacon. 🐽 Maybe some day when I have land I’ll get some feeder pigs too. 🐖 I could change and drive back into the city after work, but I don’t want to drive home especially if there is alcohol involved. 💥 Truth is I drink less and less these days, and really after a drink or two I’m not ready to get anywhere near an automobile. 🚙 If anything I’d much rather have a smoke. 🚬 I tend to think smoking pot is actually healthier then drinking – – alcohol is a particularly problematic substance on many levels but it’s very legal and widely accepted outside of motoring. 🍻 Calories in alcohol are the worse kind, even worse than added sugars. On the other hand, cannabis is still controversial for reasons I do not understand. But then again, there are many things government does that I do not understand besides the activists, corporations, and government workers wanting it that way. 👥

I think I will be able to get away this weekend, 🏕 I was thinking about Thursday after work but I might be stuck in the office until late on Thursdays, as often is the case. I need to get propane most likely after the ten days camping during summer vacation, and it’s probably better to get up to camp when there is daylight, so I’m thinking of leaving before 7 AM on Friday, stopping and getting what I need and setting up camp by 10 AM. 🛻 Early start 🌅 but maybe it’s what will work best, plus I hate driving half awake to camp with deer 🦌 especially this time of year. Haven’t yet gotten my State Farm tracking device for the discount program, but hopefully that will come in the next few days. It will be interesting to see if it actually works and I get the discount. 💵 And better yet, if it actually teaches me to be a safer driver. I think of my self as a safe driver but I’m sure I have some bad habits – though I’m not foolish to think my driving is above average like supposedly most motorists do.

Other then had, just moving forward. ➡ Need to get new e-library books 📚 out on Hoopla and maybe Libby before I leave on Friday for my mini-vacation. 🏖 Not sure totally what I want to read 📖 but I would like to get a book about restoring old houses and maybe something again homesteading. Plus maybe an e-book but Midwest life or another part of the country. 🚜 While I grew up in the country for the first 24 years of my life, there i much still to learn. And maybe some good tunes to listen to while I’m floating away on the East Canada Creek. 🔉 I’ll get them from YouTube. Maybe some Phish records, I got the Allman Brothers the other day saved to my phone. 📱Plus lots of Grateful Dead 🎸, I’ve become such a Deadhead lately, lol 😂. I wonder why. Good memories from summer vacation 🏖 that is the part I remember.

I continue to study the various houses and properties that are popping up on Zillow, 🏡 which really thinks I want to live in Rensselaer County, maybe because I checked out that one property in Hoosick Falls and decided it was too far away. There are options, and I should make up my mind, but I have yet to find the perfect 👌 property. After learning what I pain real estate agents can be once you first reach out to them, I try to do as much due dillegence including a property drive by 🔎 and GIS data study and pull the deed before I ever research out. Been writing and thinking a lot 💭, finishing up things I start on vacation a few weeks back, and really trying to figure out what’s next in my life, from housing to automobiles to smoking and homesteading. What can I say, I like the dirty life as deep down I’m redneck even if I wear a suit and tie. 💩

The internet marketers have discovered I have a concern about paranoia and smoking weed, 🤪 so now my social media feeds are once again filled with advertisements for Better Help and Talk Therapy and low cost mental health treatment options. 🧑‍⚕️ Of course you feed the advertisers the fact your concerned about paranoia, not understanding the context, the advertisements become very tailored for big angry black men. 👨🏿 I was shocked a bit at first about the ads with all the black people I was seeing. As apparently those are the only people who have such worries in the racist algorithms that sell shit on the internet. And of course advertisements for drug rehabs. Because I’m just looking for a good time up in the woods, and not worries about my housing situation or my big jacked up truck getting old. 🛻 I’m not paranoid about privacy or internet tracking but I do not like these targeted ads, they are so creepy, 👻 especially as they rarely understand the context in which you might be reading or researching a topic. 💭

Milk Jug 2

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The milk jug further blackens in this picture, as the flames start to melt it down further.

Taken on Sunday August 15, 2010 at Fire.

Trump or Harris!

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The people insist. When you tell them you’re thinking of voting third party, their initial reaction is you must be thinking of voting for Bobby Kennedy Jr — he’s nuts!

Honestly, I don’t have a strong opinion on either Trump or Biden and if I have to choose in November, I think Chase Oliver would be better. You know the libertarian. My vote doesn’t count for much living in a heavily blue state so might as well vote my conscious. I like guns and cows but also wilderness and smoking pot.

I’m a Democrat, that’s the party I work for and have been actively involved in for twenty years now. I think Harris would be good on ending the federal cannabis ban and advancing climate change initiatives and perusing electrification which would dramatically reduce local sources of pollution in the cities. Harris wouldn’t appoint people who are bonkers on the economy, her appointees are more likely to be the steady hand rather than the marginally competent bomb throwers Trump would likely appoint to the federal reserve and bank regulatory agencies.

On the other hand, I’m not convinced that Donald Trump would be a complete disaster. Maybe we need some people on government willing to break shit and get people all of the old routines in government as a lot is not working today for average people. I suspect Trump would be good on the second amendment, though I’m reminded of his unconstitutional bump stock ban and have to doubt his true champion nature. And maybe Harris would continue to lard down the economy that would keep prices going up. Clean air and water is expensive and it’s reasonable to have a debate about how fast we should moving in that direction. Often Democrats are too fast to lock up and close off public lands from public use.

I’m really okay with either candidate but I would lean towards Harris this cycle but would hope if she’s elected the Republicans really hold her accountable much like the Democrats should hold Trump accountable if elected.

N.Y. high court says voting early by mail is constitutional

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N.Y. high court says voting early by mail is constitutional

New York’s highest court affirmed that state lawmakers had the proper authority when they expanded who was eligible to vote by mail last year.

The Court of Appeals ruled 6-1 to uphold a state Supreme Court judge’s decision in favor of a 2023 law that allows any registered voter to request an early mail ballot. The law was challenged by U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik and backed by the state Republican Party.

Good, because I am lazy and I like getting my ballot mailed to me. And if you don't like that, too bad.

I want to be inspired 💭

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Hammock View

Probably the top reason for smoking pot in my mind is to find more inspiration about the world around me. To help me find clarity in ways that reading and thinking has yet to provide in my own life. I think or at least have been told that smoking cannabis can let you focus on the moment and while making you forgetful, can provide a sense of calm that is too often lacking in my life as too many things break down and wear out as I refuse to engauge in all the consumerism trends of the day. I don’t own a television, but I am damn aware of all the evil in society, and how all of us are one bad day from having our entire lives destroyed.

So far on that front I’ve been disappointed, mostly getting hungry and sleepy after getting stoned. Most of the various pre-rolls I got when I went to Northern Lights a little over a month ago have been more on the indica rather then sativia side of things, probably because the prior is less expensive and something too strong on sativia side of things runs a risk of paranoia, and just a bad experience if not enjoyed in moderation. I asked for more sativia, but at least some of the stuff on summer vacation made me more couchlocked in hammock then anything else. I am going to probably need to get more cannabis prior to camping in woods over Labor Day Weekend, so I’m continuing to research strains, methods of smoking and enjoying cannabis. It’s fun to ride a mountain bike through the wilderness after dark, stoned because of how it makes your eyes wide open.

I get smoking pot or doing any kind of drug, be it alcohol or caffine or some kind of “illegal” drug won’t get you all the answers. Mostly it will get you stoned or drunk or awake. But sometimes taking a look at things and being focused more on the now, in an altered state of mind, when your away from it all can be beneficial. Certainly many creative people over the years have smoked a little weed, for the better. The more sativia leaning hybrids I’ve smoked, in moderation are better but I still need to figure out what I want to ask for and have a better idea the next time I visit the the local budmaster. He after all can’t be much guidance if I can’t give him the direction I am looking for over my next high in the wilderness.

I do want to get a pipe and probably will want a grinder so I can buy flower, rather then get pre-roll which is unneccessarily wasteful. I especially dislike the pre-roll I have that is packaged in glass that has to be seperated out of the trash for recycling. It’s a good commitment, not that expensive, and will save money in the long run, once I figure out what I like to smoke. That White Wedding ain’t bad, but I’m not sure that’s my best option for the experience I seek. There are so many options out there, and I just want to see and think clearer but not get paranoid. Not that cannabis has made me any more paranoid — if anything my paranoia over my someday faltering pickup truck and housing situaton has gone down since I’ve started to smoke. I’ve never been afraid of monsters in closets, it’s more what happens if things spin wildly out of control in the long run or that ball joint or the roof joist in my rundown apartment that finally goes ko-put.

Truth is I don’t smoke all that much one way or another. Nor do I plan to make it habit outside of sitting around a campfire in the wilderness or laying back in the hammock staring at the clouds or floating in the tube during the summer months. There are real health consequences to smoking too much. Much like eating too much bacon or ice cream — both are a treat. Smoking cannabis should be something you do that’s special and not ordinary. Plus I like it because it’s kind dirty and smelly, not socially acceptable (your doing drugs!), somewhat illegal. Not unlike dairy or hog farming! Or having a burn barrel and bonfires for trash. But I get a kick out of people turning up their noses at me, and saying I’m just a dirty hick. And some what of an outlaw!

That old house smell 🏠️ 👃

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That old house on Meads Lane

I really should take a look at older, smaller houses out in the country once again. Not just that house next to my parents house, but other things that come onto the market with land. And just decide I am going to dedicate to fixing it up once I have the facts after a good home inspection. A lot of things I can do myself but there will inevitaby be things I have to pay to get done as I lack the skills and knowledge. But it can be done.

Often I discount old structures, seeing the flaws when I should see more of the potential. That property I toured next to my parents house, definately had it flaws, and I didn’t like how it was on the main highway and had another property inset on into it, but had the location been somewhat different, I probably could have made it work. It being old, certainly had a lot of charm, and musty smell of old buildngs. Maybe it’s the smell of rot and mildew, but it also is kind of charming to. For a farm house, that lands it lot of character. There is something quite charming about the smell of old house, wood smoke, cow manure. It’s a reminder of how close one is to the land.

Maybe that old house I looked at next to my parents, would have been an easier sell in my mind, had it had a woodstove, and neighbors a bit farther away for when I had fires or wanted to discharge a firearm for dispatching livestock and predators. Still I don’t know if that’s the right option for me. Depends a lot on the property, I keep looking. I still would much rather go fully-off grid with as little technology and plumbing to deal with as possible. Less modern stuff in a house, less to break. I can’t imagine wiring a house for internet or big screen televisions, and while I guess hot water is good for showers and washing dishes, I certainly wouldn’t want a dishwasher and probably not a laundry machine. Why do my wash at home, when I can take it to town, do it while buying groceries or surfing the web there? Just another appliance to break down.