A pirate looks at fifty one.

The dry santa ana winds are blowing in from the east, as they do every October. Last year they brought fire, this year it's a little colder and we are thankfully spared.

I got a shock from my fence when I opened the gate this morning.  Sinus's are dried out and bloody throughout the county and signs of fall are finally appearing.

My ranch is in a river canyon and I see that some jackoffs have dumped several loads of debris and old couches off the road into the river basin as I drive out this morning. I don't understand the consciences of people like this - let someone else pick up after me, but I can see my wife now - I should talk. Dump fees are probably too high for some people right now so the temptation is just too strong.

My friend Bruce the locksmith got called in to open a house the day before yesterday by the sheriff.  A marine had battered his wife and then hung himself in the garage.  Bruce discovered him dead, left two autistic kids.  Little old Fallbrook.

This year will be an endurance test for everybody and some are already stretched to the limit. Snap. I thought about checking out once, but a writer can't do himself in until his first book is published. De Rigueur.  Anyway I have way too much intellectual curiosity to see what happens next.

I turn 51 next wednesday, I think.  I will be in San Francisco setting up for an antique show. After 50, it's an incline (decline?) anyway. Crisis to crisis and watch your family and friends drop.  Thank god I don't have kids.

The blog made it to some interesting lands this week, Istanbul, Kuala Lampur, Taipei, Cayman Islands.  I'm big in Kuala Lampur for christ sakes. Maybe I quit the stupid thing when I get to 500 posts which ain't far off.  As my friend Bill Cooper told me recently, who gives a shit what you think anyway. Exactly.

I might pull back on my muckraking as well.  Don't want to piss off any mean nasty corporation and have to spend money defending myself or worse.  Besides, I know that I can be a downer. Why not write about happy things?


People work, sleep, watch television, feed their families, and basically try to get through it all.  A friend called last night and invited me out for a drink.  I said make it tomorrow and let's have several drinks.  Plan to get drunk this afternoon.

I appreciate the readers domestically and internationally that tune into or even stumble upon this blog.  Blog - what an unattractive word. This fat ass bloviation.  Many of you are buffeted with lots of these things and it's a freaking chore, to be sure.  

I need to write a novel and blast off. Find a new planet where people still think. Let me know if you've got any ideas.

Rob

Fritz - Moose Lodge #1992