Around these parts you'll find some of the best fall colors on the road to the town dump. Yup, Previously known as Dump Road - Orchard View Lane - sports some of the finest fall foliage this side of the 45th parallel.
And, by the way, it a new road. Completely resurfaced this year for an extra smooth ride...
Last Thursday brought the fourth visit to the Door Community Auditorium and second performance for us.
If you’re a fan of old school country, Mole Lake Blue Grass Fest, a
Stones tune composed at Muscle Shoals Sound Studios or Fender
Telecaster surf music; Marty delivers!
Intimacy of Gibraltar High School Auditorium is bonus.
Fast Fact: Yes, the bassist for Marty Stuart's band is Chris Scruggs,
who joined in 2015. He is the grandson of legendary banjo player Earl
Scruggs and also plays guitar, steel guitar and drums.
Strict copyright enforcement restricted photos and video of last week's performance; nevertheless YouTube delivers with a four song set list......
A sunrise
And a sunset
When you live in flyover country the views over the horizon are generally pretty nice....
Anyone know if and when the Ghost Ship will make her appearance?
Hard to know with the shut down and all…
Thirty-one years I've been here on the Peninsula and I've never had a personal encounter with a tick. Almost anywhere else in the state of Wisconsin is an altogether different story - mostly involving wood ticks. But here? Nada.
Until last weekend.
This is a deer tick.
A first.
It's a blood-feeding arachnid; and we picked a half-dozen or so off the dogs following our hike on the Ledge last weekend.
This is the first time we've personally been witness to ticks on the peninsula. Heretofore, I always assumed my personal experience was evidence that Door County was low on the margins of tick sightings and tick-borne illness. A little bit of internet sleuthing suggests tick-borne illnesses have been on the uptick (pardon the pun) of late.
The trend for the tick population on the peninsula is increasing, as evidenced by a significant rise in both tick-borne illnesses and related hospitalizations in recent years. Contributing factors likely include an expanding tick population (mild winters), improved reporting and increasing numbers of outdoor enthusiasts recreating in tick habitats.
These buggers are exceedingly small and difficult to spot. You're likely to feel it before you see it.
Mention Boston to a British subject nowadays; the response will likely be - Aye, that's where they dumped the bloody tea. Neither the Stamp Act rioting,nor the Boston Massacre nor Paul Revere's ride have quite the notoriety of Samuel Adams' Indian Caper - or Boston Tea Party.
This event was singularly a turning point in colonial resistance to the crown's trade restrictions and taxes. Governor Hutchinson himself acknowledged that war and separation from Britain was inevitable.
The first tax on tea was imposed by the Townshend Acts of 1767; but this tax was ineffective. Boycotts by the colonists prevented taxed tea from being sold; then smuggled tea from Holland undercut the price of legal, taxed tea. By 1773 the East India Company was nearly bankrupt with millions of pound of tea moldering in London warehouses.
The Tea Act was principally a bailout of the East India Company. Reducing the price of tea it retained the three-penny tax on tea as before and gave the company a one-shilling-per-pound subsidy on all tea sold in North America. Consequently, the company could undercut the smuggler and get rid of its surplus inventory profitably.
Bostonians weren't having it however. The Tea Act gave a monopoly to certain consignees who were all relatives and cronies of Governor Hutchinson. Boston merchants were outraged. If royal officials could do this with tea they could do it with anything else. No shop owner or merchant would be safe.
Moreover, the Tea Act was perceived to be a ruse to get the colonists to pay the three-penny tax they had long opposed. From Faneuil Hall the cry of No tax on Tea! was heard loud and clear. Ironically, the Tea Act managed to offend just about everyone including many loyalists.
The consignees were labeled as enemies of the country and hardly anyone, save the consignees and the Governor, wished the tea to be offloaded. Abigail Adams said it well; The flame is kindled and like lightning it catches from the soul to soul.
Between six and seven o'clock this evening came down to the wharf a body of about a thousand people. Among them were a number dressed and whooping like Indians. They came on board the ship and after warning myself and the Customs House officer to get out the way the unlaid the hatches and went down to the hold where was 80 whole and 34 half chests of tea which they hoisted on the deck, cut the chests to pieces and hove the tea overboard where it was damaged and lost.
Nothing, save the tea, was damaged. One padlock had to be forced open and was replaced the very next day.
Depend upon it, wrote John Adams, they were no ordinary Mohawks; as the Tea Party was organized well in-advance. Most of the 120 or so young men and boys had gathered secretly in taverns, houses and warehouses while the crowds were at the Old South Meeting House.
Destroyed were 342 chests, half chests and quarter chests of tea weighing 92,616 pounds - more than 46 tons of tea leaves. Enough tea to brew 18,523,000 cups! The East India Company's loss amounted to £9,659, 6 shillings and 4 pence. About $1.5 million in current dollars.
Rumors spread around town of the taste of fish being altered and the behavior of fish not unlike a that of a nervous overly-caffeinated individual. And since not a soul was willing to talk, Parliament meted out communal punishment on the entire town. The Boston Port Bill closed the harbor to all vessels, even restricting the ferries, until the townspeople paid for the tea. The economy of Boston came to a standstill.
The Coercive Acts of 1774 abolished most all of the colony's popularly-elected government, assembly was restricted, trials were moved to England, General Thomas Gage was appointed Governor by King George III and troops could be quartered in colonist's homes against their will.
These Intolerable Acts did not break the colonist's spirit as Parliament had hoped. Rather, these measures inflamed hostilities ensuring that people would resist even more strongly; with their lives if it came to that.
And it wasn't long before it came to that.
In an alarming trend - MAGA supporters by the thousands - are demolishing the east side of their houses.....
Hiking last weekend with friends - Bay Shore Blufflands State Natural Area.
View from the escarpment (the ledge)
Fall foliage
Milkweed fuzz
Staghorn Sumac
Beef prices are up 15 percent over the past year according to federal inflation data released Friday. One contributing factor is low supply and high demand. The herd has shrunk as a consequence of recent droughts and high feed costs. The second contributor is trade taxes (tariffs) on imported beef. The high cost of beef has been a primary contributor to a price increase for groceries of 3.1 percent this year.
In another unsurprising example of his on-again, off-again trade policies - president Trump threw American ranchers under the bus with the announcement that he was unilaterally quadrupling beef imports from Argentina - tariff-free. And that domestic beef producers should lower their beef prices in response.
The Cattle Ranchers, who I love, don’t understand that the only reason they are doing so well, for the first time in decades, is because I put Tariffs on cattle coming into the United States, including a 50% Tariff on Brazil, Trump wrote on social media.
It would be nice if they would understand that, but they also have to get their prices down, because the consumer is a very big factor in my thinking, also!
Soybean farmers were among the first to find themselves in the crosshairs of Trump’s tit-for-tat tariffs with China. Since May, China has effectively boycotted American soybeans as a response. And now it's the cattlemen. This is absolutely exhausting.
The domestic agriculture sector is already struggling with the rising cost of fertilizer as a consequence of tariffs and labor shortages driven by the president's immigration agenda. The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) suggested; The result is not merely a short-term disruption, it could signal a sweeping reconfiguration of global agricultural trade stretching from Latin America to Europe and Australia.
I'm not a big fan of conspiracies although I'm not surprised if some ranchers believe this is driven by the president's desire to help out his buddy, Argentina President Javier Milei.
It likely is some of the foregoing along with an extra helping of old school centralized economic planning at the whim of one guy. You know; Soviet-Style.
From the trail camera circuit here's a tranche of red golden retriever selfies. Some of me too.
Rock and blues musician Rory Gallagher performs ‘Walking Blues’ accompanied by Mark Feltham on harmonica.
Introducing Rory Gallagher, Shay Healy takes great comfort in the knowledge that "No microchip will every replace the great blues journeyman Rory Gallagher." Rory Gallagher explains that his unusual looking guitar is an old 1932 National Resonator. Although it looks wooden it is steel bodied and is often used for street singing as it is very loud.
Although out of the country a lot, Rory Gallagher feels the urge to come home every now and again, You always miss it when you are away. Accompanied by his friend Mark Feltham on harmonica, Rory Gallagher performs one of the greatest blues songs ‘Walking Blues’.
Written in 1930 by Son House, the song has been adapted and recorded by numerous other musicians including Robert Johnson and Muddy Waters. This episode of ‘Evening Extra’ was broadcast on February 24,1988. The presenter is Shay Healy.
Hat-Tip to Gabe from Friday Group......
If my household was supporting a spouse and three teenage kids consuming a gallon of milk a day I would also tell you the bread, fresh fruit, produce, beef, dairy, deli meat for lunches and eggs are also up in price too. And for a working family trying to make ends meet on the grocery bill along with sports uniforms and extracurriculars and a mortgage - life might be a challenge under Trump inflation and taxes. But he doesn't care. And I digress.
Last week, after putting the big garden to bed, I finally canned the last batch of San Marzano tomatoes grown in the crappy clay soil of my peninsula garden. One bowl yielded two last pints of these garden gems. So, yeah, there is a means to cutting costs. Grow your own applies to veggies too. And these are pretty darn tasty. My two - yes, only two - San Marzano plants were tomato factories. The bunker shelves are well-stocked.
In closing I want to announce that the big garden is being retired. It's being seeded into native pollinator cover this fall and I'm going to install 2-3 raised garden beds in the front yard and fill them with decent topsoil and composted goodness. I'm done gardening on my hands and knees. Furthermore, if I want to make a giant batch of pickles there is always the Sturgeon Bay Saturday Farmers Market.
After thirty years of gardening I'm scaling-back....
Recently, when I let out the dog before bedtime I heard the call of the Great Horned Owl as dusk settled upon the forest. The horned owl is common around here and its call is quite distinctive. And just a couple of days ago my cousin snapped this daylight photo in his backyard in Wauwatosa.
Depending on your priorities a lot can be done with $30 to $40 billion.
President Donald Trump has prioritized his friendship with the president of Argentina.
Javier Milei, nicknamed El Loco for his eccentric manners, is one of the few world leaders who attended Trump’s inauguration. Now, with his country facing a dire economic crisis, Trump is sending El Loco $40 billion in a not-at-all subtle effort to help him win reelection later this month. Given the fact that Argentina's credit rating is basically junk you can kiss our money good bye.
And here’s the conundrum: during Trump’s first term in office he started a trade war with China. When China responded by buying soybeans from Brazil instead of American farmers the resulting bailout cost all of us more than $35 billion.
Now, Trump’s doing it again, and another ginormous bailout will follow.
America’s soybean crop is worth at least $30 billion. And once again, China pulled back and hasn’t bought any of our soybeans. Not a single, solitary, bean; much less the $12.6 billion they would have purchased from us at this same time a year ago.
So, where did China get their soybeans?
Argentina.
The country now getting $40 billion from us.
Trump might have used that $40 billion to reinstate health insurance premium tax credits he insists on letting expire. So the government is shut down, Americans are seeing skyrocketing health insurance bills and farmers are hoping for a bailout check because the president wants to help a friend in a country that’s taking our spot in the global marketplace.
If you're still convinced this puts America First or if Argentina is ever going to pay us back you might just be El Loco.
I don't see how any of this advances your and my prosperity and general lot in life. For you readers who are Trump devotees I'm waiting for the explanation. Meanwhile, all this winning is exhausting....
As March 5, 1770 dawned, tensions between colonists and British soldiers were running high as a consequence of troops occupying Boston to enforce civil law for two long years already. The presence of soldiers to enforce order inflamed resentment. The town was a powder keg ready to explode.
Trouble began in late February when a schoolboy named Christopher Snider was shot and killed by a British loyalist during a melee. The boy's funeral, organized by Samuel Adams, drew thousands of angry Bostonians.
On March 2, a British soldier, seeking a job, was told to clean my shithouse. This triggered rioting.
On Monday, March 5, rumor had it that there would again be trouble. The town was filled with people, mostly boys and young men milling about. Many from out of town. This was one of many brawls and arguments that broke out in Boston on that day.
This one began innocently enough with a dispute over a barber bill. A wig maker's apprentice was pestering an army officer, tailing him all over town, insulting him about the debt - which had, in truth, been paid. Eventually the officer entered a tavern on King Street opposite the State House. The apprentice continued his harassment outside. A solitary sentry on guard at the nearby Custom House joined the argument and struck the boy with the barrel of his musket. A crowd began to gather, someone rang a church bell - normally used as a fire alarm - and more people arrived. Many had sticks and clubs.
At the 29th Regiment's nearby HQ, Captain Thomas Preston 'walked up and down for near half an hour' wondering what to do. The lone sentry was surrounded by hostile citizens and clearly in danger. Finally, Preston led a detail to the Custom House to escort the sentry to safety. Upon arrival Preston and his eight men found themselves surrounded. For fifteen minutes the crowd grew uglier as the mob confronted the soldiers. Insults and profanities were hurled. Ice chunks were thrown at the soldiers. Snowballs mixed with horse dung from the street were thrown at the troopers. A club was thrown hitting one of the redcoats and knocking him to the ground. Under stress and confusion and presaging events at Kent State two hundred years later - the trooper stood and fired at point-blank range. More shots followed.
Preston frantically ordered his men to cease fire; but three already lay dead and two more were dying. Five colonists were killed including an African American - Crispus Attucks - remembered as the first violent casualty of the Revolution. Several other Bostonians were wounded.
Samuel Adams and Paul Revere played this for all it was worth for its value as propaganda. Their perennial villain, Lt. Gov. Hutchinson was forced to evacuate the troops to Castle Island in the harbor.
Revere's engraving of the Bloody Massacre was plagiarized from an illustration by Henry Pelham and was factually inaccurate but was terrific agitprop. Prints were sold throughout Boston, the other colonies and made their way to England.
But Boston was not ready for war and with the troops removed the situation quieted-down. Two ardent patriots, John Adams (future president) and Josiah Quincy defended the soldiers in court and won an acquittal for all but two of them. The two found guilty of manslaughter were branded on their thumbs and set free.
The incident deepened colonial hostility toward Britain and contributed to unifying the opposition further laying the groundwork for the Revolution.
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| click on image to read the grave marker |
The Orionid Meteor Shower will light up the night sky on October 21 and
22. This event happens every year when Earth passes through the debris
left behind by Halley’s Comet. As these tiny particles enter our
atmosphere, they burn up and create bright streaks of light known as
meteors.
The Orionids are named after the constellation Orion, because the
meteors seem to appear from that part of the sky. They are known for
being fast and bright, often leaving glowing trails that last for
several seconds. Under dark skies, you might see up to 20 meteors per
hour during the peak.
To watch this event, find a dark location away from city lights. The
best viewing time is after midnight and before dawn when the sky is
darkest. No special equipment is needed, but letting your eyes adjust to
the darkness for about 20 minutes will help you see more meteors.
This meteor shower is one of the most reliable and enjoyable for both
beginners and experienced sky watchers. Even if you only see a few, the
sight of these natural fireworks across the stars is worth staying up
for.
click on image to enlarge
Photo of Constellation Orion Monday morning - view southeast, October 20, at 5 AM. iPhone 14 Pro.
Ugh.....
The Orionid meteor shower featured in this post originates in the debris left behind by Halley's Comet. Halley completes a circumnavigation of our sun every 76 years or thereabouts. It last visited us in 1986 and will return in 2061. Nevertheless, the dust trail left behind in its path does not disappear and is intercepted every year in late October.
As particulate matter from the debris trail enters our atmosphere it burns-up producing the Orionid meteor shower. The orbit of the earth is opposite that of the debris (Retrograde is the Word Of The Day) resulting in fast-moving shooting stars. We also collide with the debris once-again in May which results in the Eta Aquariids meteor show. Halley is responsible for two meteor shows a year.
The overall duration of this shower is from September 26 to November 22 and is scheduled to peak on the evenings of October 21 with the best opportunities after midnight and before dawn.
This month's New Moon coincides with tomorrow evening. New moons have no moonlight to clutter your viewing conditions and if you have clear skies viewing conditions could be optimal. The radiant for the Orionids originates from the constellation Orion the Hunter so fix yourself a cuppa hot cocoa or a glass of Merlot and keep your fingers-crossed for good viewing conditions.
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| 09.15.23 Orion |
On the heels of two evenings of venison wieners yesterday's dinner was a terrific change of pace.
Those of you who are NYT subscribers will recognize this as Ali Slagle’s Salmon Teriyaki recipe from last week.
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