After the Flood

by any1markNovember 13, 2017November 13, 2017

On July 15th, this valley had a severe flash flood & a dozen members of one family perished here. The first image is a memorial to a 2 year old child, the second youngest victim.

Image two is a metal picnic table that has been moved a half mile from where it started, and it’s over a hundred pounds.

Image three is a stack of logs and tree trunks almost six feet tall.

Last is the calm river today

Pet Meds

by any1markFebruary 23, 2017

There’s an interesting thing in the American health system. Mergers and outsourcing products have conspired with “universal” health care. In a truly American way, the only winners are the drug companies. I have found this by having an asthmatic cat.

My little girl is 15 years old. She has regiment of drugs that keep her from wheezing. They drugs are all human drugs. This means I can go to any pharmacy and supposedly they will be available as they are common. Well, interesting thing when insurance companies are involved. They can change the compensation they get from insurance companies. If you had thousands of drugs to sell it might be hard to pick a new price every month, but these are dedicated people!

It was just fine when her Flovent went from $125 to $190 by about ten dollars each refill. That was every other month. Now it took away my breath each time, I should have used some of it. But she has a prednisone prescription but that’s $15 every two months from the veterinarian. Now here’s the best part. At the human pharmacy, it’s double. The reason Obamacare. The increase in coverage had no provisions for price control. Meaning if you failed to enroll you were penalized by fees and drug costs. Because the powers that be, never think of the consequences of their laws.

But why am I here today? The pharmacy game is mergers among generic drugs. Large companies with brand names rake in billions in higher costs. They have based pricing on research money and time required to bring drugs to market. But generic drugs, well now these are cheap knock outs that are crazy profitable . There’s no fees to the developer as patient is expired. But that’s not good enough for giant profits. So they get bought out and the drugs are made overseas. The standards that the US government puts on formularies for drug manufactures is tops in the world. That means a common drug made for decades has been wait approval since November! The drug very common is not available because of this. One marker makes almost all of the drug. It took twenty calls, to every thing from chains to small stores. Finally, I found an online place. But it’s not all easy because I have a veterinarian in a different state who doesn’t like online places because some sell outdated drugs!

And the compounding online pharmacy is at least fresh stuff. Now that federal hiring freeze, nothing is getting done as far as approving anything being imported. It’s not looking good. I hope no one else is stuck in this place. But sooner or later, it’ll hit people hard. We have outsourced a bit to far.

Relocation -Thirteen Word Story

by any1markSeptember 10, 2016

Do I dare? Cross the country..start new. The only regret not going.

Trees Part One

by any1markJune 15, 2016

The world is being warmer. The easiest fix more trees to reduce Carbon Dioxide. It won’t solve everything but it’ll look good helping out. So here is the start of biodiversity suburban style.

The Blue Spruce is a very common tree in North America. It requires light and some drainage to keep roots from sitting in water. They grow fast about a foot per year once they are four feet tall. They may start slow if they are a hybrid. The one above is of the variety “So Cool” Blue Spruce. Every plant or tree may have varieties that offer better color, slower growth, faster growth, different shaping. Check the tag on the tree. It will tell you everything it needs and the size and shape.

Tree number two, the River Birch. They come in the three to five foot size normally. Little green leaves will shake in the wind creating a great relaxing sound. This guy is three years in the ground and about twelve feet tall. It’ll get to about twenty feet tall when full grown. Unlike the Blue Spruce, it likes wet soil. It can take standing water for a month or so. The bark will peel and expose a cinnamon color underneath a tan paper bark. Best part you can find these guys under $20!

Another water lover, the Bald Cyprus. It’s unique in another way. It is related to evergreens but it turns burnt orange in the fall, then looses is needles under early spring. Below is the color changing, as the other trees change it holds a nice color longer.

The above is a favorite of mine. It’s called a Franklin Tree. Named for Benjamin Franklin as he found it growing in a woods in Pennsylvania. It has these filament petals for its blooms. It’s graceful and birds love it. It’s doesn’t produce any fruit. The Franklin Tree is a slow grower, planted at three feet tall street ten years is about fifteen feet tall

The Variegated Wegielia is a nice shrub growing to about six feet tall and six feet wide. Difference between trees and shrubs, shrubs have multiple trunks that tend to spread. This guy will bloom all summer. It requires maintenance only if you want to keep it round or a certain height. Birds like the Cardinal, will use this for nesting because of its tight cluster of branches. Best part is if you want another one all that’s required is bury a lower branch in dirt. Six weeks or so later it will develop roots and can be cut from the parent.

Free Dirt

by any1markJune 14, 2016

If you ever had the desire to create a garden or maybe fix low spots in the yard. The price of dirt can kill you. Actually the delivery is often the price of an extra cubic yard (or cubic meter). So someone says free Dirt. I get excited knowing it’ll be dumped for nothing too.

For those people who are unfamiliar with dirt purchasing, it comes several ways. Really good stuff that crumbles by hand, loaded with sand and organic materials. Good stuff that kinda crumbles with less organic material and no sand. Fill dirt or clay which is slightly softer than concrete. The later is what I have here.

You may notice in the cart clumps of clay. Free means busting them up with shovel into golf ball sized pieces. Below is great dirt at $28/cubic yard. No working will bring this clay to that level.

I have had the pleasure of moving around four to five cubic yards of dirt each year. We have almost 4 acres (3 hectares). The dirt isn’t getting any lighter.

That’s the first eight cart full. That’s a yard and a half of clay. It’ll be coveted in peat moss and someday will have green grass on it. More important the mower will not keep hitting the ground bending blades. I have another 5 yards waiting for me. So back to work

School’s Out for Summer

by any1markJune 9, 2016

The lemonade stand! These girls. Entrepreneurs in training. Hawking their lemonade to passers-by’s. Fifty cents a cup for an American Traditional summer scene. It may be Kool-aid. It might be part of a garage sale. But nothing is more a sure sign of the world having its priorities straight, then this.

As a kid, I did this. They will never move on to delivering newspapers. That’s an adult thing, if your town has a daily paper still. But an slice of tradition peers past an Xbox, video game, the TV.

Day Fifteen- Because John Said So

by any1markMay 26, 2016May 26, 2016

John Donald this is for you (if you speak Auto correct- rid is fit tijuana). please visit him at https://johndonald.wordpress.com. doing my toes in reality…no, not quite reality but non fiction! Well, reasonable explanation of history surrounding a ghost story! The Non Fiction thing is like sacred ground, I don’t think my heels will catch fire if I step there with both feet…why take unnecessary chances?

Chapter Thirteen: What Really Happened at Gore Orphanage (Presented at Paper Session: Legend I: Local Legend, October 27, 1983, American Folklore Society Annual Meeting.)
By Bill Ellis
There is this place. . . it’s kind of close to my town and it’s called “Gore Orphanage” and it was back in the 1800s I believe. It was an old building, all that’s left is the foundation now, but, uh, it was an old guy who ran it, Old Man Gore, they called him. He was a mean guy and all the kids in there they were really deprived I know that. . . the place caught on fire. The old man Gore he got away and he left all the kids in there to burn to death….

This is all that remains of Swift Mansion. A driveway marker. This is the only solid past of the story left. Legend of the Gore Orphanage runs deep. The road is a long country road that is jagged starting and stopping at different places. It possess few traditional crossroads. The lack of a physical building just makes its existence have more mysterious. There is tought the Swift Mansion story is to keep teenagers from needing attention from the Lorain County Sheriff’s Department. Young thrill seekers end up in driveways of farms, farmers wish to make them ghosts!

So the legend is Ma and Pa Gore, losing all of their children start an Orphanage. They were always described as hard luck people. This is 1903. The horseless carriage is not around this area much. The area is the middle of nowhere. It’s an island of misfit toys long before a Rudolph story. In these days, children who didn’t go to school worked.

There are branches in the time line about 1905. At a time near this (maybe even 1902, or 1908..), the Orphanage was changed owners. A Lutheran Reverend used the name Light of Hope Orphanage. The road was so known as Gore Rd. The name of Gore Orphanage never dies

In 1908, a school nearby creates a legend. Lakeview School has a real piece of history. A fire cost 108 children there lives. There are stories of children crying unable to flee the building. The cause was probably one exit and poor construction for the deaths. But one quick fire changes everything.

Following the fire, ghosts came to the area. The assigned Swift Mansion burnt down abdonded in 1923. But teens were scouting out the grave yard a generation earlier. Swings moved empty near Swift Mansion and other buildings called the Orphanage. Children screams cries out from beyond.

Time changed the area. Near Swift Mansion site runs an Interstate highway. Trucks vibrate a bridge near a ravine. The high pitched sounds like children screaming after they travel a mile and a half. Maybe.

But before that highway, the sounds were from? Can one Legend be splintered into different parts then explained away? If you go near Vermillion, Ohio, maybe you can stop by and see. The empty swings are waiting.

#everydayinspirations

Quite Challenge- Day Two

by any1markMay 26, 2016May 26, 2016

Far better is it to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure… than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much, because they live in a gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat.
President Theodore Roosevelt

Day two begins. Thanks to Angela for getting me here. 🙄 You can visit her at https://iammyownisland.wordpress.com/2016/05/25/quote-challenge/

Rules stolen from another blog.
Rules for the challenge:

Post one of your favourite quotes(different quote on each day) on three consecutive days. The quote can be from your favourite book, author, or your own.
Nominate three bloggers to challenge them.
Thank the blogger, who nominated you.

Do I need to add here?!

Nothing we do here today can add or detract from what they gave
President Abraham Lincoln

Live! Today is all you have. The house, the car, the new phone are possessions. To live is to try. You succeed. You fail. But in doing so, you create a masterpiece called you. Good Ole Teddy, he didn’t even lead the Rough Riders. Battle of San Juan Hill- winner. He lead Bull Moose Party, it failed, but you know he took on the establishment. The only time to stay down in the mud is when you are young and have the right company 😉

Be fearless today! Hold that grey twilight for someone else. Trying is an option. Failure will happen. Forget it. Success is celebrated tonight!

All together now!

“I am FEARLESS! “😎

My list of my three fearless nominees
Lucy, https://lucycamp2706.wordpress.com
John, https://johndonald.wordpress.com
Gayatri,
https://gayatrinatrajan.wordpress.com/