Hurricane Hall and Tornado’s Townhouse

Last summer, a buddy of mine built a shed at the back of his yard. Now, whether it is too close to the city property, too close to the neighbours or might cause a danger for low flying aircraft is not the point. The point is that he had some scrap pieces left over and foisted them on me because I mentioned that I was thinking about building and painting bird houses with the grand kids. Don’t you just hate it when friends actually pay attention to what you are saying?

Anyway, I had this scrap lumber and decided that I would design and make three bird houses, one for Hurricane, one for Tornado and one for Poppa. The initial idea was that they would help build them, but I had visions of tiny fingers flying and a very, very angry Arwen that I would have to explain those missing fingers to. I decided that perhaps I would just let them paint a birdhouse each. I talked to Arwen to clear the idea with her and to tell the truth, she wasn’t too enthused about the idea. I suspect it has something to do with her feelings to birds in general. None of my kids are very keen on our winged friends, unless they have been stuffed and roasted.

I didn’t particularly care what she thought, but as it turned out, the timing never worked out to have the kids help me, so I went ahead and finished two of them and hung them out in the yard a couple of days ago. The third one may or may not ever get outside; a lot depends on how I am feeling in the next few days.

Now, I am waiting to see who takes up living in these houses. To tell you the truth, I am a little disappointed that so far there has been no interest at all. I don’t know how a bird couple go about finding and selecting a new home, but I assume it is kind of hit or miss. They would have to be flying past and just happen to notice something a little different than the last time they had passed by. Maybe they talk to other birds who may have noticed something a little different. “Hey, by any chance have you seen a place me and the little woman might set up housekeeping?”

Perhaps there is an avian MLS where you fly to a centrally located tree where an older male bird with slicked back feathers and a gold watch or a large breasted, platinum tipped, over perfumed female bird can advise you where there are some available nesting places. They might take you there or just give you the GPS co-ordinates. I suspect that it is hit or miss, because these houses should have been snapped up right away.

It might be a little late in the season to start a nest, but if there are no eggs yet, why not move? A well painted, sturdy home with a good location and air flow has to be better than some sad crook in an Ash tree with retarded, gay squirrels running back and forth playing with their nuts at all hours of the day and night. Okay, those squirrels actually live in the same tree as the nest hangs in, but for the most part they are quiet neighbours. Besides, sexual orientation should have no impact in this day and age. Species discrimination is a totally different thing, and there is something right about that.

I hope that the houses get someone to live in them pretty soon. I am going to call the house out front “Hurricane Hall” and the one in the backyard “Tornado’s Townhouse”.

Bean Counters

I’m more than a little sick and tired of listening to people babble about what a terrible state our countries finances are in. You can put the name of whatever country you happen to be in right now and it will probably apply. Do our countries owe money? Yes! Are the services that the countries provide expensive? Yes! Can we balance the budget? Not in any meaningful way! EVER!

Someone I know was venting about how much the teachers make and how their union is holding the children to ransom for more money and better conditions. Yes, in this day and age the teachers earn a fair wage. Gone are the days when you would get a sixteen year old girl, supply her with a place to live and pay her in grain, chickens and firewood. Teachers want to earn a living wage. Teachers should earn a living wage! Our kids deserve well educated, well fed, happy people teaching them who have all of the books and apparatus necessary to do their job.

The same goes for nurses, doctors, and all of the civil servants that work behind the scenes to keep the country running more or less smoothly despite government “measures” to balance the budget and rein in the “free ride” these people are getting.

When did the fucking bean counters take over the country?

I can remember when these people (bean counters) would come into a business and cause nothing but grief with their time and motion studies. They would recommend using cheaper materials that were almost as good and would raise the profit margin for the investors. Jobs were dissected and broken down into simple tasks that relatively untrained employees could do, getting rid of skilled craftsmen that understood the job and were innovative. That was when people took pride in their jobs and themselves.

I am sick of hearing how we have to suffer now so that we aren’t saddling our children and grandchildren with a horrendous debt that they will be unable to pay off. Bullshit! The Second World War cost about 22,000,000,000 (trillion) dollars which would be the equivalent of 219,000,000,000 (trillion) dollars in present day value. I am the son of the people who ran up that bill, and my children are the grandchildren of those people. The era that I was raised and my kids have been raised in is arguably the best and most affluent era in history.

Why? I’ll tell you why, it’s because those people spent money to tool up the factories, educated the population, give them jobs and made a better world where ever they could. We invented things, created a world that embraced innovation and intelligence. We created opportunities for people to better themselves. In short we reached for the stars and damn the cost. It can be argued that by spending those trillions of dollars we created the opportunity for success.

Today’s penny pinching bean counters should be tossed back to the accounting department they came from and let the running of the country and businesses be handled by forward thinking innovators. When you spend all of your time worrying where the next dollar is coming from, you don’t have the time to earn that dollar.

To my friends on facebook and elsewhere, the kids will be fine, the country will be fine and running a country is not the same as running a household. You have to spend money to make money.