Category: Notes From The Cactus Patch

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Nothing To See Here..Next Question?


Where are Mayor Buttercup, President Biden, Speaker McCarthy, Jim Jordon, AOC, Crosby Stills and Nash and Young ( the song Ohio), Madonna, and all the other mouthpieces for environmental warfare? Ohio has a major environmental disaster ongoing, and the mainstream media and the administration are silent. Where are the dozens of environmental groups that rag-ass every industry in our country to the point of extremism? This disaster in Ohio is akin to a nuke set off in a small town of 5000 residents. Animals are dying as far as ten miles from the town, and who knows what future effects it will have on humans. East Palestine, Ohio, is now a toxic wasteland that may or may not be habitable.

From ABC News; State health officials were initially concerned about the presence of vinyl chloride, a highly volatile colorless gas produced for commercial uses, which spilled after about 50 cars on a Norfolk Southern Railroad train derailed in East Palestine, Ohio, on Feb. 3 while traveling from Illinois to Pennsylvania. Other toxins, like phosgene and hydrogen chloride, were emitted in large plumes of smoke during a controlled release and burn, prompting officials to issue mandatory evacuation orders in a one-mile radius of the crash site.

Butterboy sits in Washington doing and saying nothing. Where are the Republicans on this? Everyone is quiet. They would rather concentrate on Chinese spy balloons and UFOs, which our government has denied existed for years. Now ET will be pissed, and who knows what will happen. He definitely will be phoning home for reinforcements.

Maya Sharona, head reporter for NPR News, says that Mayor Pete and a small contingent plan to ride their new mountain bikes to Ohio to review the disaster. Now that should make everyone feel better.

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It’s A Philly Thing


“The thing is, win or lose… philly still gonna be philly bc ITS A PHILLY THING,” Twitter user @Annie_Wu_22 wrote, sharing footage of a crowd yelling, “F— the Chiefs.” Words of wisdom from the city of brotherly love and high-cholesterol steak and cheese sandwiches. Ben Franklin is begging God to send him back down to earth, like Clarence the Angel, so old Ben can kick some ass, ring a bell and get his wings. While here, he should spray a large can of kick-ass on that devil dog-worshiping Illuminati princes Rihanna and her little demon children. Up there on stage, strutting around in her rubber red devil attire, surrounded by dancers in hazmat suits. It’s a wonder she didn’t go into labor on live television; it would have increased the ratings.

What’s so special about the Super Bowl? Why is the winner called world champions when the United States is the only country in the league, and they compete against themselves? The rest of the civilized and uncivilized parts of the globe play “football,” also known as soccer. I am unimpressed with the “big game” and have been for decades. But that’s only my opinion, which doesn’t count for Jack Shit, who I met back in the 70s. Come to think of it, no opinions from senior citizens count for anything. All we are good for is keeping big pharma in business. I take so many pills I forget what they are for.

I used to be a Dallas Cowboys fan, but I overcame that communicable disease a few years back. My son had it bad, but he’s slowly recovering, like a Catholic that escaped from the church but can’t stop eating fish sticks on Friday. It’s a slow process. Now, it’s 28 years since a super bowl appearance, and if Jerry Jones doesn’t check out soon, it will be 30-plus years. Please, Elon Musk, make Jones an offer he can’t refuse; we saw you on the television, sitting there in your expensive seat drinking a can of beer, so we know you like American football. Sir Paul McCartney was also in attendance and could afford to buy the team, but he would have to play every half-time show, and he’s about done with music because he sounds like Carol Channing when he sings. Lennon and Harrison are up in the clouds looking down and saying, ” hey mate, give it up and come for a visit?” Of course, the downside of a celebrity buying a team like the Cowboys would be if Adele purchased the franchise. She is caught in a continuous state of mental breakdowns, and her auto-tune machine is unrepairable. Besides, she cries too much.

I likely said too much because my filters are gone, and my opinions don’t count.

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Buying Ammunition at The Walmart


I detest shopping at Walmart. It’s not that I feel I’m better than the folks that go there; it’s more of a sadness that washes over me when I enter the door and am greeted by an elderly person who is drawing social security and can’t make ends meet and has to stand and speak to strangers the entire day. Most of the strangers don’t reply when the greeter says,” hi there, welcome to Walmart.” It makes me want to cry at times-being old. I sympathize with the elderly, and even though I don’t consider myself in their league, people say I am elderly. At times, it’s tough to accept, but I knew it would eventually happen, and most of it would not be pretty and wrapped with a red ribbon and constant travel like the pharmaceutical commercials promise.

Another thing that bothers me about Walmart is the trickery pulled on the shoppers. I can go to the H.E.B. and get more food for my money than at Walmart. It’s all a marketing ploy pulled on the folks that can least afford it. I don’t blame Sam Walton for any of the shenanigans in his formally buy American store. His family and their families and cousins and uncles and such have turned the place into a shrine for Chinese marketing. I tried once to find anything made in America. I walked the isles for hours, picking up random objects; made in China, Taiwan, Mexico, Philipines, and on and on, but most of it was from China. The only items found to be made in the US are the produce. If the Chinese grow celery, tomatoes, and lettuce, they must keep them for themselves.

Walmart used to sell guns. They still have a few shotguns locked in cases, and you can buy a nice Daisy Red Ryder BB gun or a pellet rifle, but no rifles or pistola’s, only limited ammo for such armaments. That’s where I ran into my old buddy Mooch.

It was yesterday, and MoMo and I were at Walmart picking up our medicinal prescriptions since our Medicare plan says we must use Walmart Pharmacy and no other. I saw him turning the corner from the garden section, which was now full of Valentine’s and Easter crap. I caught up with him in the sporting goods, standing at the ammo counter in deep conversation with a young man with wooden blocks in his ear lobes and piercings in his nose. Besides those additions, he looked like a normal Walmart employee; his nametag read Edwin B. He and Mooch were discussing ammunition.

I sided up to Mooch and cleared my throat. He acknowledged my presence but kept his rapport with the pierced boy.

” You’re sure these 50 caliber bullets will go at least 40 thousand feet and will bring down what I’m going to shoot at ?” The pierced boy said, “yep.”

The box of shells was as big as a loaf of Mrs. Bairds bread, and the price tag said they cost $300 dollars. I think Mooch will kill a Dinosaur or Bigfoot with ammo like that. He paid the boy with his debit card, and we walked away.

I’ve known Mooch for twenty-plus years, and it’s sometimes better not to know his plans. The suspense was killing me, so I broke my own rule and inquired, “Mooch, what are you going to shoot that would take a 50-caliber armor-piercing bullet?”

Without missing a step or turning his head, he said, “Me and the wife are leaving for Montana in the morning, going to shoot down some of them Chinese balloons and take the solar panels and all that spy stuff back home.” I wished him a safe trip and good hunting; wasn’t much more I could add to that.

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My Big Day At The Fort Worth Fat Stock Show


The legendary Fort Worth Fat Stock Show and Rodeo ended today. Once again, we didn’t make it to the grand celebration of Texas. Dallas, that eastern wannabe city, has the State Fair, but we have the stock show and the best damn rodeo in the nation. I’ve been going there since I was a small child, and my sister did the same. Since it’s always been in February, we never knew what the weather would be; sunny and warm or an ice storm like last week here in Texas.

Back in the 1950s, the western swing band, my father played fiddle with opened the Stock Show every year with a breakfast concert in one of the exposition barns. The famous Light Crust Doughboys were about to be on the air. They were and are a legend in Texas and country music. I was just a kid along for the ride and didn’t realize how good that ride was.

My father had bought me a fringed leather jacket, a pearl Roy Rogers cowboy hat, and a new pair of Justin boots from the outlet store next door to the Dickies factory. These new duds were just for the show that year. I think it was 1955 or 56, and I was as puffed up as a poisoned pup, and everything on me shined like a new dime. I wore my grandfather’s Bollo string tie with the silver state of Texas clasp and saw my smiling reflection in my polished boots. I was a kid to be reckoned with.

The band was set up on a low stage with a small split rail fence separating them from the onlookers. The local television station, WBAP, was there for a live broadcast that morning. They always put on a big deal for the first day. The news lady thought I looked like a little buckaroo and asked my father if I could sit on the fence next to her while she did her opening broadcast, which would be shown all over Fort Worth, Dallas, and points west and east. In those days, it was a big deal to be on television, and here I was, a kid getting ready to be famous. I knew some of my classmates would recognize me. My head growing too fat for my hat by the minute.

The nice TV lady helped me climb onto the fence, scootched me over a bit closer to her, and the broadcast started. It was my first brush with fame and live television, and I stared at the camera like a deer in headlights. She asked me a few questions, which I don’t remember, and I answered with a croak and a whimper, then fell backward from the fence onto the dirt floor. I got up, all covered in a mixture of fifty-year-old dirt and manure. The new cowboy hat was all bent in, and my fringed jacket was all whacky and filthy, so I dejectedly walked over behind the bandstand and started to cry. I had ruined my one chance at being a television personality. Mortified would be a good description, then maybe add humiliation to that, and you would have the gest of it.

After the Doughboys started playing, the nice TV lady came over with a coke and a hot dog, gave me a mother-type hug, and said I did just fine. That made it all better.

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Blueboy The Pigeon


My grandmother loved her critters. She shepherded about five-hundred chickens on her farm in Santa Anna, Texas. A scroungy stray cat or dog would show up, and she would feed it and give it a place in the smokehouse to stay. They usually were soon gone, thanks to Coyotes and Bobcats, but she wouldn’t let them go hungry.

She couldn’t place the day, month, or year the pigeon showed up. It flew down from a bright blue sky and commenced pecking at the chicken feed my granny had thrown on the ground for her hens. It was a beautiful bird, blue-grey with white markings; she called it Blueboy, not knowing if it was male or female, so to her, it was a boy pigeon.

Blueboy took a liking to granny and followed her around the farm while she did her daily chores. He would walk a few feet behind her, even when she was in the barn or the smokehouse. He would perch on the front porch railing if she was sitting outside. He became her pet. After a while, she could reach down and pick him up, which for a wild pigeon, was something to see. She carried him around like a pet chicken and would feed him in his own dish by the giant oak tree that shaded their farmhouse. Blueboy slept in that tree most nights, but in the cold winter, she would crack the smokehouse door, so he could roost inside out of the weather. She and that pigeon understood each other. Farm people know critters and how to communicate with them. It’s a natural talent you are born with. The bird thought he was a dog, and she treated him as such.

Blueboy started following the cousins and me around the farm. Always a ways behind us, curious about what we were up to. We could never touch him or get too close; only granny had that honor. He was always there for years when I visited the farm in the summer and at Christmas or Easter. I guess that pigeon was a big part of the family as the grandchildren.

Just as he had shown up one day, he was gone. Granny figured he or she had met another pigeon and started a family, or at least that is what she told us. Years later, she said she found some of his feathers by the barn. Probably a Bobcat got him while he was strutting around instead of sitting in his tree. She never got over losing Blueboy and talked about him often in her old age. I saw a pigeon a few days ago, and it took me back there.

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Up Up And Away In My Beautiful Balloon


So now we have Chinese Spy balloons floating over the US. What the hell? The Japanese Imperial Army tried this in World War 2, sending weather balloons with bombs attached. Is this the best these guys can do? And they warn us not to shoot them down with planes, drones or rockets. Get a Cub Scout Troop armed with Winchester 22 rifles. Problem solved.

This is not my usual Tall Tale, folks; you can’t make this crap up. My apologies to The Fifth Dimension.

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They Don’t Make Them Like They Used To


Pictured above for your drooling pleasure ( if you are a musician ) is my “go-too” guitar, a 1980 Epiphone Casino with original P90 pickups, which I combine with a Fender Blues 1×12 tweed 100-watt amp. Years ago, when our band was going through our British invasion phase, we all tried Vox amps, but we couldn’t master the accent required to use them correctly. This is the same guitar the Beatles used for so many years because of its versatility and sound. It’s the Epiphone cousin to the Gibson 335, but much lighter and with a smoother playing neck. I played this baby for over 20 years in a few hundred gigs, and it never once let me down. My grandson has the blonde model of the same guitar, only a newer edition. And yes, Yoko did break up the band.

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Before They Was Fab


This post is for my musical buds, Max and Dave.

I own two of these sacred gems, released in July of 1963. The one pictured leaning against my laptop is in the best condition, and it appears the album photo was taken at a London Sears portrait studio or by Brian Epstein with his Brownie Box camera. I believe it has only been spun a few times by a little hippie grandma on Saturday nights after consuming a few glasses of French Chardonnay since English wines are notoriously inferior. The other disc is missing the album cover and has minor scratches, but it still plays well. This captures the boys as they may have sounded at the Cavern club. Raw, gritty, and bursting with talent.

The American version was released 10 days later on Capitol Records titled “Meet The Beatles.” I also have that one.

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Life At 33 1/3 RPM


Since my teenage years in the sixties, I have been a vinyl album collector. It was out of necessity; we didn’t have CDs, flash drives, and such, but we did have 8 track tapes, which I despised. I was a rock musician in those years, so I bought all the most popular records. I’ve long lost many to thievery, unreturned loans, and negligence. At last count, I still have about 125 albums, most in good to perfect condition. I lost a box of my most treasured ones when a moving company absconded with them during a move. It was clearly marked ” favorite 60s albums.” The culprit also relieved me of my coveted ” Ray Ban” classic sunglasses. I curse the man daily, although I shouldn’t carry a grudge. I hope his turntable broke.

Last week I made the plunge, purchasing a new Sony receiver, an Audio Technica turntable, and two Klipsch speakers. Now my wife and I can listen to our eclectic collection of albums by the likes of Joni Mitchell, Cat Stevens, Crosby Stills and Nash, Chicago, Buffalo Springfield, Hank Williams Jr., Billy Joe Shaver, Jerry Jeff Walker, and of course, the Beatles and everything in between. I even have a greatest hits album by Sonny and Cher, if you can picture that. I own two coveted albums of “Meet The Beatles,” on VeeJay records, the one released in the UK, not the states in 1963.

I have a nice collection of CDs, but they don’t count since everything is digitized and sanitized, and I own a nice collection of music on my computer.

Thanks to Apple, I lost around 350 songs off of my iPod Nano while trying to download them to my laptop. Steve Jobs be damned.

There is something magical and soothing about that slight hiss and skips of a classic vinyl disk recorded on analog equipment with a 4 track machine. I can picture Sir George Martin sitting in the control booth pushing knobs while the Fabs struggle to produce the perfect tune on ancient equipment. I am deaf in my left ear, thanks to standing in front of large amplifiers playing at level 11 for many years, so my right ear is my musical one. Like the RCA dog, I can trick myself into hearing stereo high-fidelity if I turn my head just so.

No need for that flat-screen television anymore. We plan to live our life at 33-1/3.

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Ice Storms and The Alamo


Texas is in the midst of a nasty ice storm. It started with sleet, then freezing rain, a dusting of snow, and now more freezing rain mixed with thunder, sleet, and lightning snow. I envy the folks up north; they get plain old snow. it may be five feet deep, but it’s not ice.

Ice storms are part of our history. Our great authors, Larry McMurtry and J. Frank Dobie often wrote of them in their novels. Hondo Crouch, the lord of Luckenbach, Texas, commented, “there is nothing as lovely as a good ice storm to make you stay inside to ponder and piddle.”

In 1836, when General Santa Anna marched his troops from Mexico to San Antonio to dispose of those pesky Texians who were having a barbeque cookout at the Alamo, his men were pelted with ice and sleet storms. Most of his soldiers came from warmer parts of Mexico and died in the scrub brush of south Texas, frozen solid while standing upright or in mid-stride. Santa Anna lost his personal wagon full of Tequila; the bottles froze.

Here in Granbury, the most historical small Town in Texas, the day before “Icemegedon” hit, my wife and I went to our local H.E.B. for a few items. We know how to “hunker down,” so we don’t require much.

Good God, it was as if the world was ending. Masses of shoppers grabbed everything they could from the almost bare shelves. One lady had a basket full of Mrs. Baird’s bread and twenty-six packs of Dr. Pepper and Big Red. I ran into Mooch and Mrs. Mooch, and he had a basket full of Red Baron Pizzas and Pork Rinds, which is actually survival food here in Texas. I saw two older women in a tug-of-war over the last pack of pork ribs, and the bakery ladies were smacking shoppers with loaves of French bread as they came over the counter. It was pandemonium at its finest. The wine shelves were empty, as well as the beer coolers. If you have enough booze, food is not required to sustain life.

Back to the Alamo, if I may. It’s a good comparison to the state of our country today, and we are fighting a similar battle, destined to lose. The defenders, which would be the citizens of Texas, are sheltered in the mission and are attempting to hold off the invading hordes, which would be Mexico and the rest of South America. By letter, Travis, now Governor Abbot, begged for reinforcements, which never came. Thus, the mission was breached, and the defenders slaughtered. President Biden is now playing the part of General Santa Anna, and Senorita Kamala is his muse.

All of this happened because of an ice storm. I think Hondo was right. It’s a good day to ponder and piddle.