Tuesday, April 24, 2018

Michelle Obama can't wait to have 'pajama party' with Prince William and Kate Middleton's new baby boy

That's the headline at the Washington Examiner.

Royalty makes me puke.

And it's not just being a grouchy old man. I was a grouchy young man about this.

Story time.

I told this before, here it is again. Why? Because there they are again.

My friends drink so much they don't even remember this. And that makes me sad. But this was the ultimate historic Colorado camping trip. I tried to refresh their memories but failed. Such a huge thing for me, but such a small thing to them, just one of a hundred such things for them.

I had just met a Colorado businessman and he invited me to join his friends to a gold mine that one of them owned. They do such things. Actually, I must say, because of them I ended up doing a whole lot of fun things, like fly small planes to Lake Mead then rent a houseboat, trips to Mexico and such, but this was a true first for me. This second acquaintance was a real go-getter, very serious about investing, very serious about wrenching the last drop out of life, dead serious about owning a whole lot of things. He traveled excessively, and he invested wildly. We wouldn't be staying in a tent. We'd be staying in the barracks where the gold miners slept. He bought the whole place. A played out gold mine. It was a small operation. But still. A real gold mine.

That turned out to be a tiny house. Not anything like the military barracks with which I was familiar, that I had been visualizing.

W-a-a-a-a-a-a-y up there just below tree line. So I understood in the morning. We arrived at night and the thing I recall the second acquaintance saying upon opening the back door and walking into the place, "it's totally cold." The cold went right through the stones of the fireplace. Everything in the house, the house itself, the same temperature as the outside. The chairs inside the same temperature as the roof and the rocks outside. It's going to take awhile to warm up.

That was night. The day was almost comfortaby warm.

the second thing noticed are the thousands of dead flies piled at each window. A real horror scene when you're not expecting any such thing. If there was electricity then you could go around with a vacuum and fill the vacuum bag with dead flies in one minute of cleaning. We swept them out by the pound. (Possible 12% exaggeration for dramatic effect.)

The morning the owner examined the kitchen for signs of animal intrusion. Bears break in and scrounge around for anything to eat and they just flat don't care about property.

It is a shack-like house. With an outhouse to poop in. Of course, you pee anywhere you like.

The entrance to the goldmine was boarded up with big fat 4X4 beams. A pile of gold ore detritus is piled at the entrance, a very large pile that spilled down the hill. It's all low-grade gold ore but there is still gold visible in it. This ore utterly fascinated me. Each chunk has discernible dull gold flecks in it.

"Why don't we smelt it?"

"It's value is insufficient to bother. Transportation and processing would eat up the profit."

"Oh."

I kept a chunk as souvenir. And I fascinated over this chunk of gold ore for decades. I still have it.

Below the entrance to the goldmine, further down the hill, beavers created a dam, long abandoned, but there it remained for our examination. We waked across the beaver dam, balanced and bounced on the branches, tested its strength, and imagined beavers building it.

The owner filled a hummingbird feeder with sugar water and we sat in the front in folding lawn chairs drinking beer and watching the hummingbirds feed then do aerial acrobatics for their own amusement. They were high as kites off the sugar and sped it off directly above us. They disappeared as dots into the sky then retuned swooping near the speed of sound.  I watched a lot of air shows at military air bases, but I never saw anything like this. Birds doing loop-de-loos and barrel rolls high in the air and we were already high as the Colorado mountains go.

[Incidentally. The owner showed me how he makes a salad. Slice cucumber and onion into a bowl of sugar water with vinegar. Boom. Salad. And it was good too.]

We were situated inside a geologic bowl. On the far side above tree line we could see iconic Colorado bighorn sheep working their way down to the trees, and nearby the tiny house weirdly situated up there in isolation marmots were crawling and jumping all around the rocks and around the trees like squirrels. They were interested in sudden human activity. I never heard of a marmot.

Bighorn sheep, marmots, beavers, hummingbirds. Does it get anymore interesting than this?

We hiked up the hill behind the little house, our side of the bowl, still in the pines, then worked our way down to a stream and panned for gold. The most bogus activity ever invented. Nobody ever finds any gold. Never. And even trying is just stupid. Even in gold country. It's a joke, like snipe hunting. It's the one thing about that trip that I somewhat resented. But the hike back and forth was fascinating. Like pretend American Indians.

These men were all rough necks. There were six of us altogether. Plaid wool shirts, laced boots, beards, heavyset, tough exteriors and rough outdoor sports-minded natures. I was the youngest, least ripened. This was the weekend that Charles married Lady Di and completely out of character the men were talking about that international news enthusiastically. I was apalled. There we were in the wilderness surrounded by real Colorado in its most elemental brutality and beauty and they werre all wrapped up in a British royal wedding. I could not have been more confused.

"Why are you guys talking about them? For Christ's sake, we're American! We're fundamentally antithetic to British royalty. That antipathy is in our blood."

"Oh, the pomp."

"What? Are you all out of your minds?"

"Yes. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. We like the pomp and the circumstance. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha."

"I don't understand you at all."

In my view, they're unworthy celebrities. A drain on a modern nation well past its use-by date. And there I was surrounded by rough men voluntarily enthralled by it. I can never forget that bizarre turn.

Now here's the Obamas attaining the same form of celebrity. So they think, so we give it to them. Reaching out to acknowledge their own. So they think. So we allow. I find it pathetic, the doing and the giving and allowing.  I find it embarrassing. All this vapid unworthy celebrity to unearned celebrity that drains and seriously so, instead of screw you and your little prince too.

What happened to returning the bust of Winston Churchill?

Oh, one is serious politician instrumental in saving the Western world, and the other is simply insipid.

How does royalty fit with both or their ideas about socialism?

It doesn't. Inflated celebrity doesn't need to make sense.
Barack and I are thrilled to congratulate The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge on their newest arrival!  
We hope to meet him soon for a Kensington Palace pajama party. I’ll wear my robe! 
Bless your heart.

I like it when British make fun of themselves. It shows they know this whole thing is nonsense.

12 comments:

edutcher said...

Mike wants to play and go beddy-byes with a couple of white British boys?

Is it me or does that sound really creepy?

PS Their royalty is better than ours.

Often a lot of people who had an ancestor who actually did something great.

Here, just some politician who's been in office too long. Or who went to the right university. Or who made a ton of money and thinks it makes him better than everybody else. Or, like the Bushes, who got here earlier than most everybody - and then made a ton of money.

ken in tx said...

Marmots, woodchucks, and ground hogs are all the same animal. I'll bet you've heard of them by their alternate name(s).

ricpic said...

There was a story in the NY Post about the birth of this latest Royal brat. Anyway, there was an accompanying picture of Kate Middleton, the mother, holding the bundle of joy and she was wearing a red dress with a fancy white color and to finally get to the point a letter by some Brit Royal worshipper was quoted to the effect that "Our Kate is wearing the same dress that was worn by our beloved Diana." What's with Royal worship?! The slave mentality makes me cringe.

deborah said...

Appreciating royalty is a guilty pleasure. I don't follow them religiously, but ever since I was a teen I've appreciated them. O how have the mighty fallen.

I was totally miffed when Michelle DARED to touch the queen, now I say good on her. Pretty damn cool in light of the history of slavery and Britain's part in it.

Of course I was also very hot under the collar when Michelle DARED flout convention and go SLEEVELESS at the first State of the Union address, in FEBRUARY, no less.

For all that, I take pride in not having to curtsy to anyone.

deborah said...

Ken, ground hog and woodchuck are interchangeable in Ohio. Did not know about marmot.

deborah said...

Ed, yes, that weirded me out.

ampersand said...

If it weren't for the royalty I wonder how many tourists would travel to England? On tv it always looks cold, damp and shoddy. I've been there three times about 10 years apart. Each time it looked and felt less and less English.
I'll give props to Queen Elizabeth. She did her duties quietly and dignified in a job she probably never wanted. The rest of them should be locked up in the Tower of London scheduled for beheading. Except for Prince Harry, he needs to be on the Maury Povich show getting his DNA tested.

Amartel said...

Michelle is a hungryhungryhippo for attention, preferably attention to parallels with royalty. GROSS! You are not royalty. Also, she's inviting herself over. So tacky.
I don't mind the English royalty. Whatever. It's their thing, their celebrities, their brand. Whatever. Enjoy, be happy, rock on. I love visiting London and the UK in general and the royals are a part of that history, and take up a lot of space in London what with their palace and all the stuff that they underwrite/have their names on. Sometimes they're annoying and weird, kind of a barometer of the British spirit, like the Princess Di hysteria, sometimes they're not. Just like our celebrities.

I'm Full of Soup said...

I like Chip's question re how does one reconcile the Obama's socialist tendencies to their worship of money, wealth and fame and the celebrity culture? It can't be done except the Obama's, of course, believe they will be among the ranks of the chosen few when America is finally a socialist shithole.

edutcher said...

deborah said...

I was totally miffed when Michelle DARED to touch the queen, now I say good on her. Pretty damn cool in light of the history of slavery and Britain's part in it.

Blacks enslaved more blacks than the Brits ever did.

I might also add, once Britain went anti-slave, they went whole hog, unlike the other "civilized" nations of western Europe who just kept it up on the QT.

See the Congo Free State.

The Royal Navy spent most of the 19th century interdicting the slave trade and the British army fought several unpleasant campaigns at the behest of the anti-slavers.

See Charles Gordon.

PS Mike did what (s)he did just to be disrespectful.

ampersand said...
I'll give props to Queen Elizabeth. She did her duties quietly and dignified in a job she probably never wanted.

WWII vet and I'll bet she can still drive and fix a deuce-and-a-half and hit the mark with an SMLE.

Amartel said...

Q: How do any of the socialist dictators reconcile their love of money and power and royalty with their ostensible "socialist tendencies?"
A: They don't.
Gratuitous Commentary: duh. Get with the pogrom. You're supposed to believe the ostensible and reject the obvious. For the Greater Good of the People. Or else.

deborah said...

"PS Mike did what (s)he did just to be disrespectful."

Correct, and you're right, probably just to stick it to Liz.