Gram Parsons EmmyLou Harris In my Hour of Darkness

One of my favorite songs, ever. I can listen tthis one over and over, and have.

Confederate Dick

Well this week has seemed to be very long. Glad it is the weekend. It has not been a bad week, just way too long.

Not sure what I am going to do this weekend. I have an idea of a place to go and shoot tomorrow and I suppose I may to do that. Otherwise I am not really sure what to do. Maybe I will look for art events of some type and see what is going on close to here. As long as it is free, it is for me.

Maybe I can finish my book for the contest this weekend and get that entered. That seems to be the best thing to do.

Watch "Whale Wars" tonight on Animal Planet. Cool show.

Went and shot an AR-15 yesterday. Kinda cool. However we were shooting at 100 yards and you can not see if you hit the target without some type of large scope. I would rather shoot cans or something so you know right away. 100 yards is a long darn way.

Photo at Whitsett Men's Hunting Club.

Thin Lizzy Still in Love with You

If you do not know this song, you should. Give it a listen.

Things to Ponder

Maybe one of the reasons so many Mexicans are coming to the United States is because of our failed policy on drugs and the stupid war on drugs. The combination of a barely functioning gov't in Mexico and the high demand for drugs in the United States has allowed the drug cartels to become a very strong component of Mexican society. Many Mexicans are leaving because the violence the face every day at home is much less than anything they will face here on an every day basis.

When a free country like the United States has the largest population of people in prison in the world and we put people in prison longer for drug possession than we do for murder there is something wrong with our priorities.

We need to change our drug laws. They clearly are not working and will continue to fail and we will continue to increase our prison population with the wrong type of criminals.

We also need to actively work with Mexico to stabilize the country. We clearly have a vested interest in having them become a legitimate nation. If we do not fix this then I predict the country will fail and the floodgate of immigrants will be blown wide open.

As the oil leak continues to grow and more evidence comes to light everyday we are being shown how a corporation operates. They continue to hide facts, lie, spin and hide behind the legal system.

Remember this is how most corporations do business everyday. We can only hope that as a nation we wake up and start to hold corporations to the fire. They do not care about us. They only want your money. With the way banks, mortgage companies, and now oil companies have been shown to operate over the last couple of years you would think that as a nation we would be outraged. We should start to demand they start to act morally and if they do not then we should put pressure on them financially. The only way they feel anything is to hurt their pocketbook. The revolution starts now.

Closed gallery in downtown Greensboro.

I can't breathe

Man, my sinus problems have been bad the last few days. Trying not to use over the counter remedies. But damm if they don't work well. You would think that there would be some type of spray that would work and not be addictive. I have Never got anything real relief from anything from the doctor. It might be time to look for an ENT whose can get this problem fixed once and for all. I know half the time my crappy sleep has too do with sinus problems. One thing I will not do is wear some shit on my head like was suggested to me in the past. I want the god damm congestion to go away.

Other than that all is good. Weather is perfect this morning. Wish I was camping in the mountains. It would be a good morning to be having coffee around a small fire.

Who wants to go camping?

Sparta, NC.

Hot Hot Hot

Yesterday I meet my brother and his boss, Phil, who run Whelen motorsport program for the Nascar Modified series. I went up to Martinsville Speedway and we roamed around the pits, went to the drivers meeting before the race, we were on the track for the driver intros and in victory lane after the race. It was a good time, except it brutally hot. Since we were in the pits, except for the race, I had to wear long pants and it was not fun. In the 90's sitting in the sun was so darn hot it zapped you of energy. But it was fun.

My brother looked good. He has lost 130 plus pounds in a year. He did this by changing his diet and going to the gym twice a day. He now weighs less than I do. Amazing, he has not weighed less than me in many, many years. Congrats to him. Hard work and dedication to a goal has paid off for him.

Picture is from the Moses Cone mansion on the Blue Ridge Parkway.

Feather in my cap.

The Grand Re-opening was very successful. The store had its best day in well over a year and they had never had that many customers in the store before, ever. The bosses, vendors and customers all were impressed with the whole event. Score on for Mark.

I am off to Martinsville today to meet my brother and catch some of Nascar's modified racing tour that they sponsor. It should be a blast. Pit passes and a pass to the owners suite. Also should be a good day for pictures.

Here is my first picture for the Megashot contest. I think this is pretty darn good.

Happy Sunday kids.

Grand Re-Opening Day

Well today is the Grand Re-Opening of the new store. We have vendors from a bunch of different company's scheduled to show some different products, free bbq, giveaways of two guns and other products. We advertised in the local paper and sent blast emails to many many agencies. We hope to get people from 50 different agencies at the store today. Who knows how it will turn out. I hope it goes well. These things are always hard to predict. I put a lot of effort into getting the store ready and arranging the vendors so I hope it goes well. I think we are going to have a great turnout.

Will be heading Martinsville to see some racing this weekend. Going Sunday for sure, not sure I am going to be able to make it for qualifying tomorrow. Hopefully I can. It is only about an hour from here so I hope to head out of work early tomorrow and catch some of that.

Trailer photo is from Apalachicola, Florida. Florida's oyster capital. I bet these folks are working there ass off to get as many oysters as possible.

Book

I still have not decided what pictures to us for the book contest. I have a couple of ideas. It is so hard to decide since there will be many people who are very very good entering and need to figure out a theme of some sort. Any idea of a theme will be appreciated.I still have not found an area here that consistently yields me the shots I want. I guess I need to get to Asheville soon. Asheville always seems to work for me. Its a bummer when go out to shoot and really do not find whatever it is you are looking for.

If you go to this link you can see what has been submitted to the contest so far.
http://www.blurb.com/bookstore/pbn



Peppers are coming along fine. A couple banana peppers ready to be picked, waiting on the cayenne to turn red.

That's about it for this morning I suppose.

This is a song I want played at my funeral.

Enough

Between BP and the gov't there has been quite a lot of poor and inept reaction for this whole mess. How can this really have been going on for so long, stunningly poor reactions from all party's involved.

The thing I wonder about is, where is all the oil? How much of this is still below the surface just floating and drifting along with the currents. I suspect that there is quite a bit that we have not seen. There needs to be some group that goes out and reports the full scope of the oil that we can see. If you watch the news they are basically reporting the same story each night and never really give any information about the full scope of the slick. They show images from satellites, but nothing from anybody out any distance from shore. Why?

The gov'ts reaction is pathetic, no leadership. Wake up you bums.