Chazd's (Charles Dowdell's) News Burps

I was up in NY for two days... I guess it was two days. It is hard to keep track. Honestly. Spent the night in Michigan. Back in ATL for the next ice storm (maybe). The politicians are sure to be proactive on the rhetoric this time in Atlanta. I am off to Russia for a few days. The opening ceremony was pretty cool wasn't it? The farm is good. And I expect it to get better. Folks have been having a tough winter. Every year is a tough winter there. This year, talking to folks who are not subject to the fashionable trends-- say it is indeed a tough winter. Cold and snow. Winter life is harsh. Not just on the humans, but also the animals. I saw a nice sundog in downtown Duluth the other day. I always wonder if others saw it.

I have received questions about the catastrophe in Atlanta over that last few days from all over the world. First of all, I think that the world has a lot bigger issues. There have been no deaths (that I heard about in ATL) regarding the weather and traffic. This is much better than a normal day in ATL when everything is going good! Lots of folks die on the roads here and all across the US on a so-called "good day". I was largely unaffected by the recent events. My commute was studied before I bought my house here in Duluth. It is about 4 miles (about 2 miles as the bird flies) from my work and I cross no rivers or other extreme constraints except for the railroad tracks. I left work on Tuesday at 5:00 PM and I made it home in about 10 minutes. I am a bit sensitive about getting stranded on highways and generally any sort of delays on the road. I was stranded (and subsequently lost) on the NY state Thruway as part of my commute in the 90s for about 16 hours. There were many h...

Let it snow! We have snow in Atlanta. There was an inch on my car after work. I am cool with it although running all the defroster items in my all electric car "the fishcar" reduced my overall charge by about 10% compared to otherwise no snow conditions. It was a bit weird scraping my car without an engine running and of course, no snow brush or scrapers. I guess that is why these situations breed Yankee ingenuity. For my ancestors it meant family survival. I think that is a strong motivator to do things differently.

We have been having a cold winter in Atlanta. Some days it has been as cold or colder than Moscow or Finland. They laugh at me when I show up at work with my parka and fur hat. Cold is cold. Dress for it. It has been so cold my lake has frozen. First time I have seen this, nothing close last year. It didn't totally freeze or anything, but it set up more like a Frozen Daiquiri or something. My truck has finally made it into the shop. I am getting the body work done, fixing the rust from up north. That has to be the single most thing I like about things down here in GA compared to NY. It's not the weather, really. I can dress for the weather and there is beauty in the cold and snow. The cars don't rust. My Brother calls it the "Tin Worms". The government isn't splashing corrosive material on my assets.

It's the weekend again. I have been living alone in this house since I moved in 18 months ago. The property has appreciated (a quick look on the HP 12c shows 44% in this time) nicely. People have a tendency to forget that they are spending their money twice when they are investing in the place they live. This is a true bubble. A basic need is to have a place to live, where is your baseline? I don't need a extravagant place to live and I have options. I can comfortably rent a place again if I need to. I received my new computer. It is replacing my Dell that I bought in 2003. 10 years is good for a computer. It was time. I expect to have the place up in NY rented again. I like that place so much. The more I learn the more I realize that your inner vision is precisely what you get on the outside or physical world. The appearance of "O dragão verde" in his retreat clinches it. I have been studying about the green dragon.

In St. Thomas USVI for a few days, Vacation. High winds have kept us on the beaches and out of the airplane so far. Still hopeful that we will be flying to some Puerto Rican islands from St. Thomas before we have to return to Atlanta this weekend. We finally made it in the air. We flew around the British Virgin Islands as well as Puerto Rican islands. It was fantastic! We were up on the control tower at KLZU the other day as well. The first three pics are of the same beach (Magen's Beach) from three very different angles.

Some more flying today.