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I Hate April Fools Day
To be fair, I hated April Fool’s Day before the brain injury and accompanying face blindness. You see, I don’t have to wait for April Fools for that feeling of the ground falling away under my feet. That unpleasant realization that something you thought was true wasn’t. It happens a lot for me. Just recently, what I thought was two different and lovely people at church, turns out to be one single person. Face blind. This is splitting. Because we can’t recognize people, it’s easy to assume that one person in different contexts is two different people (or three, or…
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In Montana, the commission form puts a small group of elected people in charge, and each one runs a department. On paper, that sounds efficient. In reality, in a town like Eureka where only 8 to 24 people show up to meetings, it creates pockets of power. Each commissioner can end up “owning” their department.…
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It looks to me like electric cars would be good for a guy who made short trips at low speeds. It would be nice to have a little car that I could plug into a solar panel. Or even two solar panels. Get the battery charged and drive off. The problem is, a gallon of…
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I have a three year old and know a bit more about ladybugs. Cake design is probably an underutilization of our entomologist’s skills, but I’m pleased by the outcome. Ladybugs are class insectae, within phylum arthropoda. They have the distinct body plan: head, thorax and abdomen and three pairs of legs (total 6). There are…
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The Eureka government Study Commission held a public meeting tonight, giving residents an opportunity to learn more about a process that could shape the future structure of local government. The meeting was also live streamed, allowing community members to follow along from home. While attendance was modest, with eight people present in person and two…
local
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When I went to get some repair work done, the person I was consulting advised fixing the structural issues and then putting the same ancient dilapidated siding back on the building. The rational? Property taxes. Last summer, we joked about how much the nice flowers my mother had on their porch raised their taxes. They…
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I spent most of a year away from the school after I finished my term. I attended a couple of board meetings because I was asked – on one hand, there was, at the least, the appearance of an unlawful board meeting . . . unlawful because it appeared to violate Montana’s open meeting law.…
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Historically, independent voters, and voters for minor third parties, do not get a large percentage of votes. Often, they’re considered “spoiler” candidates, who lose the election for someone by dra4wing critical support away during a close race. Or their thought of as simply “protest candidates” with no chance of winning. In Montana, for the presidential…
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Not many years ago, if you were faced with a cluster of unacceptable clowns on your ballot, you could write a name in and cast a protest vote. Hell, I guess you still can – the thing is, your write-in protest vote won’t be counted or reported. With the elimination of subsection 7 last year,…
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I’m having trouble summarizing this one, not least because I lost my notes. In short: The meeting did discuss prayer, but did not discuss a four day week. About prayer: The discussion was specifically with regards to having prayer on the agenda as a part of each school board meeting. The result- no. Community presence…
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The proposed library district has me looking at taxation again. One of the great things about Lincoln County is that, with three high school districts, it’s easy to figure out which communities provide the funds that keep our county going. Market Value Taxable Value Percentage Libby $1,687,186,708 $21,911,499 36.42% Troy $831,354,553 $10,966,329 18.23% Eureka $1,974,407,031…
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Now it takes a single click to get the data. So what does it mean? I measured the record lows back in 1977 – this chart, from the Grave Creek site, shows how the critical snowfall that brings us up to normal or above occurs between the February measurements and April 1. I don’t know…
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The USDA has updated plant hardiness zones, and despite last winter’s impressive cold, we’ve jumped up a zone (to 5a from 4b in 2012; the average low went up by 6 degrees) Hardiness zones are a (partial) climate description that’s been in existence for a bit over a century, though the government didn’t get involved…