Random Musings of a Ramblin' Fool XVI

Valentine's Day/President's Day/NBA All-Star Weekend Addition

This is going to be a veritable "kimapalooza" of a Random Musings installment and I hope you enjoy it. Actually, I better lower expections so my story now is this is merely an average Random Musings and if it sucks don't blame me, it's free and you volunteered to read it! ;-p

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For starters, this has been quite a weekend for me chalk full of little things.

My fat ass walked 6.8 miles yesterday and 2.3 miles today and add to that I was walking my friend Erin's dog Jax who is

I'm still not used to having a girlfriend on Valentine's Day and I must say it's nice even in spite of the bummer of said girlfriend being located 360 miles north of my current location. ;-p

Despite the current economic crisis there are a lot of people visiting Atascadero from out of the area based upon the motel occupancy I've seen here in Atascadero this weekend. That or they're Atascaderans who have gotten a room to celebrate Valentine's Day. ;-p

As I compose this I'm watching the NBA All-Star game and I must say it's been one of the best I've watched in quite some time: they're actually playing some defense for a change. Wootz!
Final score: Western Conference All-Stars: 146 Eastern Conference All-Stars: 119

California is getting nailed pretty hard by a powerful Pacific storm that continues to wind up although it feels like it's getting bogged down and taking longer getting here. I love winter storms (the windy and rainy type) and for a while it was looking as if we might not get any more heavy-hitting storms following those that buffeted us early in December of last year. Last month was one of the warmest January's on record for Southern California and for a time it appeared that climatic trend would continue unabated for the forseeable future.

As a rockhound I am hoping these storms scour all the local and regional creeks and other drainages and dump lots of cool new material in said drainages as well as on the beaches as collecting inland as well as at the coast has been not nearly so great in recent years during the current multi-year drought.

We can't talk about last month's warmth without mentioned the terrible drought that we are in danger of suffering later this year unless this current wet weather pattern dominates the rest of this month into next month. In all likelihood the current weather will not last but at least some of the edge will be taken off what would have been a much worse drought without the current spate of storms.

Speaking of storms, the California state government is on the brink of financial collapse as a result of the budget stalemate. There is no effective leadership in the legislature within either party. We must make across-the-board cuts (I certainly have had to on a personal level so why not everybody else?) as well as increase taxes although that runs the risk of doing more harm given we are already over-taxed. However, the special interests, particularly labor unions, are threatening Democratic lawmakers with retaliation if they support cutting measures that would effect their interest group. The net effect of every interest group selfishly playing that game is that nothing gets cut and since Republicans won't sing off on a budget without adequate spending cuts while opposing more taxes which the Democrats in typical fashion support is that both parties are playing chicken with our state government and we all stand to lose.

Inside the Beltway, things aren't looking much more inspiring than in Sacramento.
Our nation's current problems require decisive action; half measures certainly won't do.
What is coming from the Obama Administration appears to be half-measures intended to keep the political flow as bi-partisan as possible. Normally I would applaud this as constructive but not so now. Decisiveness is imperative now and some sort of average of what both parties want will accomplish nothing which reminds me of the old saying that a giraffe is a horse designed by a committee.
The Republicans are lost and have no leadership and seem to only stand for opposing the bail-out plan while not having any ideas of their own, particularly, what they would have us do instead of said bail-out plan.
It is now clear President Obama is not the naive in-over-his-head "babe in the woods" many (including myself) once thought back when he was merely a candidate. It is also disappointingly obvious he has yet to become notably effective but his Presidency is yet young so much has yet to play itself out so hopefully these discouraging trends will reverse themselves.
It is worth noting that Obama is the same sort of pragmatic political chameleon that President Clinton was both of whom sold themselves as Liberals while running for office but once in the White House then shifted to the political middle much like Bush the Younger did in falsely claiming to a be Reagan Conservative and a true Evangelical Christian and then proceeded to do little to make either group happy.

Business has been painfully slow on eBay of late due to this economy. We have great stuff and plenty of it and our customer service is second to no one's but folks just don't have the money to spend they did a few years ago. All our customers are happy but there just isn't enough of them to make ends meet. Fortunately, I'm in the GEMboree in Northridge at the end of the month and that should help.

While we're mentioning things taking a dive it is worth mentioning that it appears parts of those two satellites that collided last week are now making reentry into Earth's atmosphere as reports of fireballs falling from the sky are way up over the past several days including one in Texas and one in San Diego County and these appear to be slower-moving debris as opposed faster moving meteoritic objects.

Speaking of meteoritic objects, my large Sikhote-Alin didn't sell at the Tucson Show as I had hoped so I need to call Geoffrey Notkin tomorrow and see what our strategy is now. I believe his plan is to blog about it and take some professional photos of it and put it on his website and create some buzz for it as it is one of the largest ones from this locale he has seen on the market in a few years that is also in such great condition so maybe it will sell in the next month or so.

It appears my Cal Poly student roommate will be moving out and moving home to Torrance, CA, and back in with his parents upon graduation next month due to the scarcity of jobs resulting from the current economic distress. Consequently, I need to line up a new roommate so if any of you know of anybody who would fit in here living with me and another guy in his late 30's please let me know. The rent is $500 per month base rent plus we split the utilities three ways which usually comes out to about $150 per person for a total of about $650 per month. The room will become available around April 4th give or take a few days.

Kimmer