1/25/5 - Longview to St Helens

Before getting’ started, here's a big shout-out for the Mt. St Helens Cam on this here sthelensupdate site. I sure like takin’ a gander at it once or twice a day when I’m online. Old-man McMillin down the street says the mountain is gonna blow within the next two weeks. Thing is, he’s usually dead-right. We’ll see.
So, when I got to work in Longview on Tuesday mornin’, I found out from the yard-boys that the loadin’-dock foreman had been real busy the past coupla days. He was lobbyin’ and doing his level-best to get my good-buddy Darrell thrown off a nice little run between Longview Fibre, the Newark Converting Plant and ShinHo in Tukwila. Without going into a bunch of details, Darrell knows (and lives) the ins-and-outs of this particular run, and helps connect a lot of the incidental info between these companies. The loadin’-dock forman just wanted to give the (lucrative) run to his nephew—who we all also can’t stand—in return for some kind of big debt or favor he owed. One yard-guy says he owed his nephew from a drunken night of Texas-Hold’em-poker this past weekend. Man, I just hate that guy sometimes.
And wouldn’t ya know it, when I stopped into the St Helens Café for some coffee and eggs an hour later, I heard about Margaret Magruder getting the shaft as well. (Ya might remember my post about her a while back.)
Boy, that pissed me off; this news on top of Darrell & the loadin'-dock foreman's nephew.
As I understand it: Joe Corsiglia and the Clatsop County Commissioners voted for Margaret, while Rita Bernhard & the Multnomah County Commissioners voted for Brad Witt. This left it up to Tony Hyde to cast the deciding vote, (for Witt) saying something to the effect of "promising Witt his support before Margaret entered the race". I guess Mr. Hyde has a lot of “integrity and loyalty”, sorta like the loadin’dock forman’s integrity and loyalty to his damn nephew. But, in sportsmanship, I’ll give congratulations to Brad Witt, who apparently went on the record about the problematic “Japanese Knot Wood”. Witt might want to bone up a bit on the very environmental concerns that Magruder intuitively knows and understands. He probably meant to say Japanese knot-weed and not, “knot-wood”. (sigh)
Like my friend Darrell compared to a nephew, I still believe Margaret would have been more intuitively informed and responsive to local issues, people and problems than Witt, but what do I know?
Anyhow, it sure was nice to be back in St Helens and catchin’ up with things. I’ll be sure to keep my eye out in this nice little town y’all got here.
-Tom

1/18/5 - Longview to Brainerd, MN

I'm off on another run east, to Potlatch in Brainerd, Minnesota.
Since we officially found out this past week that our WMD-reasons for waging war in Iraq were unfounded, I decided to post this interesting excerpt from Mark Twain's "The Mysterious Stranger", which Lorraine has been reading.
-Tom

"Monarchies, aristocracies, and religions are all based upon that large defect in your race -- the individual's distrust of his neighbor, and his desire, for safety's or comfort's sake, to stand well in his neighbor's eye. These institutions will always remain, and always flourish, and always oppress you, affront you, and degrade you, because you will always be and remain slaves of minorities. There was never a country where the majority of the people were in their secret hearts loyal to any of these institutions."
I did not like to hear our race called sheep, and said, I did not think they were.
"Still, it is true, lamb," said Satan. "Look at you in war -- what mutton you are, and how ridiculous!"
"In war? How?"
"There has never been a just one, never an honorable one -- on the part of the instigator of the war. I can see a million years ahead, and this rule will never change in so many as half a dozen instances. The loud little handful -- as usual -- will shout for the war. The pulpit will -- warily and cautiously -- object -- at first; the great, big, dull bulk of the nation will rub its sleepy eyes and try to make out why there should be a war, and will say, earnestly and indignantly, "It is unjust and dishonorable, and there is no necessity for it." Then the handful will shout louder. A few fair men on the other side will argue and reason against the war with speech and pen, and at first will have a hearing and be applauded; but it will not last long; those others will outshout them, and presently the anti-war audiences will thin out and lose popularity. Before long you will see this curious thing: the speakers stoned from the platform, and free speech strangled by hordes of furious men who in their secret hearts are still at one with those stoned speakers -- as earlier -- but do not dare to say so. And now the whole nation -- pulpit and all -- will take up the war-cry, and shout itself hoarse, and mob any honest man who ventures to open his mouth; and presently such mouths will cease to open. Next the statesmen will invent cheap lies, putting the blame upon the nation that is attacked, and every man will be glad of those conscience-soothing falsities, and will diligently study them, and refuse to examine any refutations of them; and thus he will by and by convince himself that the war is just, and will thank God for the better sleep he enjoys after this process of grotesque self-deception."

1/13/5 - Home

Can't tell y'all how great it is to be back home in the NW and relaxing. Lorraine fixed us up her pot-roast last night, I don't know what more a man can ask for.

Not much to say this week. I've been outta-the-loop, though it looks like I'll be headin' into town over the weekend on a Boise run, so I'll check in and see what's going on then.
Meantime, enjoy some pics from the road.
-Tom

Couldn't buy gas here, but it's a beautiful shot anyway


I'm still tryin' to figure this one out!


Obviously, an amateur

The Gorge in winter


A sure sign of being back home in the NW

1/4/05 - Elk City, OK to Home

There's no place like home.
I'm in a depressing (but warm) motel in Elk City, Oklahoma which is located nearby my constant companion of this past week: I-40.
Happy damn New Year.
Actually, there is total depression all around me. This is because of a certain, widely-watched TV program, which is almost over now, better known as the National Championship of college football. This television-broadcast is showing the much beloved local-team getting the total beJesus kicked out of it.
There's not much to do here, that's for sure. I can't wait to get home. I miss Lorraine and have already called her three or four times today. I've also gone over the TravelLodge-edition tourist-pamphlet a couple of times, which informs me of my fantastic opportunity to visit The Washita Battlefield Site where Custer massacred a bunch of Cheyenne Indians 130+ years ago. Great...Elk City rules. I figured I'd kill some time and get some bounty out of their fabulous snack-machine instead.
And, the mood was not good by the Snack/Ice-Machines either: A couple of Okie-truckers (now there's a "team" for ya) were going on and on about the game while their wives (or a couple prostitutes, I couldn't tell which) filled their ice-buckets proudly displaying the Elk City TravelLodge logo. These guys were clearly not happy about their Sooners losing to "a bunch of L.A. pretty boys."
"It's not like a tsunami or anything fellas," I politely offered.
The tall one spit. "Yeah it is pardner, it's like one big soo-nam-ee, (nam spoken like Sam) and I'll tell ya what: them soo-nam-ee people over there... (I loved that) ...once again is dependin' on the long-generous-arm of America." They all snickered like a bunch of idiots.
"Wait a minute," I said, "they're only gettin' 35-million-bucks from us, and that's a whole lotta nothin' if you ask me."
"Try three-hunert-fiddy million buddy," the shorter one sneered as my bag of Funyuns dropped with a thud into the vending-payoff-bin. "Yeah, ya betta add a zee-ro to that fig-yur a yours," the tall guy cracked. The wives/prostitutes laughed as they all left. It all kinda reminded me of sick high-school stuff.
I went back in and did a little internet-research and calculating: turns out our "generous" $350 million offering to help save the rest of the unfortunate world equals what it costs us to to wage war in Iraq for 42.27 hours. Ok...I'll round it up - the same amount of money we pay for two-days worth of war in Iraq. Welcome world saviors.
I'll sleep and then drive.
Besides, what good are red-states if they can't even play football?
See y'all soon.
-Tom