I believe Jean asked for a picture of my co-author and Black Sabbath fan a day or so ago. I had to dig up a picture but here he is. This is a rare picture - he's not on my keyboard.
Grey - mis-named from his color at birth - is one of five current residents: mamacat, 3 of her 4 kittens, and a friend - blackcat - who showed up one winter day when the kittens were about 9 months old. The kittens will be 7 this April, mamacat is probably 9 or 10 - she just showed up one day in winter, pregnant and hungry, and blackcat is about 3 or 4 months younger than the kittens so he'll probably be 7 later this summer.
Grey weighs about 15 lbs - he has a brother about 2 lbs heavier. There is no doubt they are an integral part of the family. And I have no doubt they have souls ...
So, just because ... I like both bands and this video - and so does Grey (he's watching me write this post - "Take your paw off the screen!") ... a collaboration between Black Sabbath and the Temptations: Get Ready For The Grave. Someone did a good job putting this video together.
Lester began as a logging camp on the west side of Stampede Pass alongside the Green River east of Seattle. The Northern Pacific Railway established the company town of Lester in 1892 about 7 miles west of the Stampede Tunnel which was opened in 1888. The town was named for a railroad telegrapher.
At one time, Lester held extensive steam engine support facilities including this depot, a roundhouse, coaling docks, and a population of about 1,000 by the 1920s. As steam engines gave way to diesels, steam support facilities were no longer necessary; the region began to shift focus to logging.
In the meantime, the city of Tacoma began purchasing property in the area in order to maintain a water supply for the city. As a result, the city of Tacoma placed a locked gate across the only access road; several court battles were fought over the restricted access (to residents and guests); the land is in King County, Tacoma in Pierce County. The court cases mostly favored Tacoma. The last resident died in 2002 and the area is now jointly held by the Forest Service and the Tacoma Utilities with no public access allowed.
The railroad mothballed the line through Lester and Stampede Tunnel in 1984; the line was upgraded and re-opened in 1996.
I took this picture in 1990; I drove to the site so the gate must have been open. The depot was later burned by arson; the Burlington Northern Railroad - successor to the Northern Pacific - tore it down the remnants in 1992. Remaining buildings in Lester were razed in 2017.
This may be the last major stamp mill built in Nevada.
Out in the middle of once-was-somewhere Nevada, sits this relatively intact silver stamp mill. Not as unknown as it used to be, this mill was so far off the beaten path that much of it and the surrounding buildings still exist even though it is not part of a historical site or park. Hoping to maintain what little can be hidden, I'll not reveal its name or location though it wouldn't be hard to find information. Most of the machinery was removed when the mill shut down.
Although the Comstock Lode/Virginia City is well known as a major silver-producing area, the richest silver veins were found in the center of the state. The greatest "rushes" to the area occurred in the late 1860s/early 1870s but extraction methods were relatively inefficient.
Although this area had been "settled" in 1865, the majority of mines had played out quickly and the original mills in the region shut down by 1892 and the equipment moved elsewhere. However, after the Tonopah discoveries in 1901, mining companies using more modern techniques started to develop the older areas intending to seek deposits over-looked or deemed too difficult by the earlier efforts.
At this site, the mines were re-opened in the 1920s but the area was not suitable for building a mill. Transportation issues being what they were, it was more effective to mill the ore on-site and transport the semi-processed ore. A more suitable mill location was selected - about 2 miles distant from the mine - and this mill with associated structures was built. The ore was transported from the mine by an aerial tramway. It turned out the remaining ore in the reopened mines was not as rich as hoped, processing the ore proved more difficult than expected, and silver prices were falling; the re-opened mines and mill operated less than one year.
The tramlines are still in place as is the last tram bucket of ore, hanging in the wind, waiting for time (or vandals) to bring it back to earth.
It's on my list as a possible destination for this year's road trip.
So here I sit working on the magic box trying to put some plans together; have a few videos playing on one of my monitors for background - cat napping on the desk next to me ... when a Black Sabbath concert clip starts playing. The "Gathered In Their Masses" concert if I took my notes correctly. Playing their 40 yo cuts ... (pretty similar to the 1971 concert I went to).
Said cat gets up, sits on my keyboard, staring with rapt attention at Ozzy doing his thing on some of the bands earliest pieces - "Black Sabbath" off their first album in this case.
Hey! I'm trying to get work done here ... Cat doesn't move.
OK - sit back and watch the clip with my cat.
The cut ended, the cat got up and resumed his nap on the desk next to me.
And now I'm distracted saving this incident for posterity making y'all read about it.
This is something I won't often do, but JD thought it was an article worth passing along ... and I agreed.
The Thinking Housewife - "Museum Warfare" https://thinkinghousewife dot com/museum-warfare-2/
It was requested that I not publish any excerpts and I will not post the entirety of someone else's post without the author's OK, so if interested - and it's an interesting article, please visit The Thinking Housewife.
The fog was beginning to lift as I passed by the temple
"On April 25, 1877, the pioneer colonizers of Manti - the fourth community established in Utah - began taking from the south side of this hill the oolite stone from which to build their temple"
Completed in 1888 by volunteer labor, it cost $1M to construct.
Manti is the county seat for Sanpete County. Founded in 1849, it straddles US89, north of Salina, east of I-15, with a population of about 3500. Manti was the first settlement in Utah outside the Wasatch region.
Ed "Big Daddy" Roth - of Rat Fink hot rod fame in the '60s died here in 2001 after converting to the Latter Day Saints in 1974. A Hot Rod Rat Fink reunion is held here every summer.
It was really a dreary kind of November day in the mountains. Temperature in the mid-30s, rain on the verge of freezing - wet and sloppy most everywhere.
Stacy was 19, probably in love for the first time. 5 ft something, blond, slim - pretty and cute. I didn't know her more than that. But I got to know her in the most intimate way possible.
I wish I hadn't.
She had been in town with her boyfriend who was at work. I'll call him "SB" for Stacy's boyfriend - I never knew his name, never met him, never knew what job he was working; I suspect he was early 20s, it appeared he was in construction but not too many construction jobs allow girlfriends on site. Maybe his job was somewhere else and he just had construction tools in his vehicle.
Speculation on my part so who knows?
SB had forgotten something at home. Stacy offered to go get whatever it was so SB didn't need to take time off. Stacy knew how to operate a vehicle but she didn't have a license and didn't know how to >drive<.
Found all that out later from the police report.
The call came about 2:30 in the afternoon. Being a lightly populated mountain area, it was difficult getting a full EMS crew together on a weekday - but Mo and I had worked together for almost 7 years and we both happened to be on duty that day. Three would have been a better crew but two was better than none.
Mo was the EMT; I was fire & extrication with the fire dept but filled in as a driver for the ambulance. Up there it made sense for the two separate organizations to work together - manpower was short enough as it was. So the two of us allowed a "full" crew to be on duty - and there's lots of things to do on an emergency call that doesn't require licensed medical training.
This day, we were "lucky" - we worked the east side of a mountainous 2200 sq mi county and most of our calls were at least ½ hour away; too often, closer to or even more than an hour response time. Some of those back roads even in good weather ...
You wanted to live in the back country, didn't you?
This call however, was almost at our driveway.
Mo and the buggy
It's hard to work an accident scene with only two people. Help was coming but not soon ... and now was of essence.
Right now. 10 minutes ago now.
The scene in better conditions
The scene was right there where the road bends away. The station was about ½ mile up the (dirt) road to the left by the sign.
The road was wet, maybe a bit slick with not-quite-sleet. Steep embankment on one side, creek down below on the other - not much shoulder.
Tracks on the road told the story.
Stacy was in a hurry, heading into the picture. Probably doing 60 in a 45. She took that corner too fast, drifted into the wrong lane. Met one of these coming the other way ...
The accident being just to the right out of the photo
What are the odds?
Not much traffic on this road but enough - it's the only route through here; still needed to place traffic control. We used the ambulance to block one direction, the truck had swung partially around when hitting the brakes - it worked to block the other direction.
Oh, please hurry up guys. We need extra hands here.
People get pissed off when the road is blocked ...
Mo and I got Stacy out of what was left of her boyfriend's car. Got her to the side of the road. Did an initial eval. The truck driver was OK ... sort of. Not physically injured. Well enough shape we didn't need to attend to him right away. Stacy on the other hand ...
This isn't good ... call in Life Flight. Meanwhile ...
I was supporting Stacy's head and neck in my lap while Mo was doing what she could with the equipment on hand. Oh, lordy, lordy ... I don't pray often ... the answer was No.
Stacy hadn't been wearing a seatbelt and her head had smashed hard against the passenger side B post after impact. Her skull was cracked - broken into pieces - and leaking. She was still breathing ... Then she wasn't.
I don't need to have someone breathe their last in my arms again. She had been unconscious at least; it wasn't an easy death.
Help finally arrived and the scene was properly conditioned during clean-up. The truck driver was physically OK but went into shock; not hurt but this was ugly. He got a ride home. I don't know if SB came to the scene - it was cleared and we were gone if he did. Mo and I left the others to finish up - we were still on duty but no more calls that day. Probably for the best.
That was almost 20 years ago. Images still in my mind. Mo and I are still friends but left the service long ago; Mo now lives in the city, I'm on the west side of two ranges over from there.
Someone - SB maybe? - still leaves flowers on the marker where she died.
Giggle street view 2025
Lot of calls during my time; one develops a weird sense of humor. Not the only death call either, but this is that one of all.
Haven't been on that side of the mountains for quite a while. Maybe one of these days I'll head over and place a few flowers myself.
The Kiffness, the stage name of David Scott, born 1988, is a South African performer. He began studying medicine but switched to music and philosophy while working as a DJ. He had been a touring artist but when COVID halted live performances, he started recording some parodies about how the South African government was handling the pandemic.
He mostly writes political satirical songs aimed at South Africa issues, but he parodied Trump's claim of Haitians eating people's pets in 2024 (which I happen to believe was true but maybe not as widespread as media let on).
The Kiffness plays the instruments and backup vocals on this selection.
Alugalug is the lead singer on this cut, singing in her native language ...
There is an album available called "Cat Jams". It's actually not bad ...
I just deleted over 100 spam comments from the spam bucket but for some unknown reason, a couple of them were from regular readers. If one of them hadn't been flagged for my review, I'd have not noticed when I emptied the slop bucket 9and I probably wouldn't have emptied the bucket for a few more weeks). The installed spam filter is good but not perfect.
It could be I've accidentally deleted other not-spam comments in the past, so in the future, if you post a comment and it doesn't show, please let me know. I may need to form a white list but I'd prefer to not have to do that - I'd need your email or IP address to do so ... and that's your business to provide, not mine to require. DT
