Author Archives: bpriddy

Running government as a business, or—-

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It’s an easy suggestion to make: Government should be run like a business. We first heard this piece of oratory so long ago we have forgotten when and we’re sure it wasn’t original then.  So let’s test the validity of that idea. We’ll test it by reversing it. Suppose you ran your business the way Missouri government is run.

The first thing you would do because it would be popular with your customers is cut prices.  Customers like free stuff and if it can’t be free, it should be priced as lowly as possible.  People will like your store a lot because they will pay as little as possible for the merchandise. The best way to keep your prices low is to pay your employees as little as possible. Many won’t stay very long but that’s okay.  There are always more where they came from.

Of course, your merchandise won’t be of the quality of some of your competitors because you’re holding down the prices and you couldn’t afford better merchandise anyway. Your customers won’t complain about the inferiority of the product until it falls apart on them when they need it the most.  And their complaints will be easy to ignore because most of the others are satisfied with inferiority or mediocrity.

You won’t be able to pay for the new roof your store needs.  The parking lot will develop cracks and potholes you can’t afford to fix.  The place might not be as clean because there’s not enough money for a cleaning crew.  A lot of your business equipment is outdated because you can’t afford new stuff that will speed up payment processes or handle orders. You don’t have the money to train employees to use the new equipment anyway.  Your customers won’t mind the inefficiencies as long as you’re cheap enough.

You think about all of this for a while and you realize you’ll make the money you need to fix all of these problems if you just lower your prices some more, which will produce more customers who will in the long run spend more money.  You also can get by with fewer employees. That will help you become more prosperous and shoppers won’t mind if there are fewer people to wait on them or fewer people who can help them find something or order something.

Yep.  That’s the answer.  Keep prices low. Don’t worry about quality. Don’t bother with retaining employees. People will love you because they don’t have to pay much. Of course, they won’t get much.

Run your business the way government is run. Watch government be run the way you run your business.

Prosperity is just around the corner!

Racing— Truex locks in; Palou regains lead; A halo prevents a halo

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By Bob Priddy, Missourinet contributing editor

(NASCAR)—Martin Truex Jr., has become the second driver to lock in a position for the second round of NASCAR’s playoffs by Beating last week’s winner, Denny Hamlin, to the finish line at Richmond.  He let a 1-2-3 finish for Joe Gibbs racing.  Christopher Bell was third.

Truex had to come back from a penalty on the race start when he Hamlin, the pole-sitter, to the start line.  NASCAR ordered him to the back of the 37-car field for a restart.  He got to the lead on the 132nd of the race’s 400 laps and led the last fifty.  Hamlin led almost half of the laps but couldn’t catch Truex at the end. Larson, who started the race from the back because of pre-race inspection failures, raced past Truex for his first lead on the 133rd lap but finished sixth.  The finish gave him enough points to make him the third driver assured of a spot in the round of 12 that will go forward for the championship after next Sunday’s night race at Bristol.

(INDYCAR)—Alex Palou came from 16th place early in the Grand Prix of Portland to get his third win of the season and vault him back into the points lead with just two races left in the INDYCAR season.  He finished 1.3 seconds up on alexander Rossi with teammate and defending series champion Scott Dixon getting the last podium slot.

The win vaults Palou past Pato O’Ward, who led early but faded to 14th at the end.  A handful of drivers are still given a chance to win the championship—Palou, O’Ward, two-time champion Josef Newgarden, who is 34 points back. Dixon, in fourth, trails by 49 and Marcus Ericsson has a distant hope from 75 points behind.

A total of 108 points are available in the concluding two INDYCAR races: Laguna Seca next weekend and the finale on the streets of Long Beach on the 26th.

(FORMULA 1)—The world’s major open-wheel racing series have created cockpit safety systems designed to protect drivers from flying debris or in other cars landing on top of other cars.

INDYCAR’s system is enclosed except for the top for driver access.  Formula One has a similar system but it does not include a windshield.  It’s called a “halo” in F1.  And seven-time F1 champion  Lewis Hamilton is convinced he isn’t wearing a halo today because his car had one for the Italian Grand Prix at Monza.

Hamilton and Max Verstappen, who have an intense competition for this year’s championship going, tangled in the first chicane on the race’s 26th lap, with Verstappen trying to pass on the outside. His car rode over the track curb, pitching it onto the top of Hamilton’s car, the right rear wheel of Verstappen’s car rolling over the halo protecting Hamilton. The tire slightly penetrated the top of the halo.

Hamilton said in the paddock after the race that he was reminded of his own mortality and the risks he takes:  “It’s a big shock. It’s only when you experience something like that that you  look at life and realize how fragile we are.” He is convinced the halo saved his life.  There was no sign of concussion but he will see a specialist after complaining that his neck was sore.  “

“Honestly, I feel very fortunate today,” he continued. “Thank God for the halo, that ultimately, I think, saved me, and saved my neck… I don’t think I’ve ever been hit on the head by a car before and it’s quite a shock for me, because I don’t know if you’ve seen the image but my head really is quite far forward. And I’ve been racing a long, long time, so I’m so, so grateful that I’m still here.”

F1 officials consider Verstappen’s actions the main cause of the crash and have announced a three-grid place drop at the next race, and the loss of two standings points. The two drivers have had other incidents this year as they have fought for the top spot in the series.

Neither driver scored any points in the race, leaving Verstappen five points ahead of Hamilton, with eight races left on the schedule.

The winner of the race was McLaren’s Daniel Ricciardo, his first victory on the circuit in three years and McLaren’s first GP victory since Jenson Button won at Brazil in 2012. Making the event even sweeter for McLaren was Lando Norris’ second-place finish.  Third went to Valtteri Bottas, Hamilton’s Mercedes teammate.

(Photo credits: Truex: NASCAR/Sean Gardner/Getty Images; Palou and Pagenaud and Rossi at Gateway 2019: Bob Priddy; Verstappen-Hamilton crash: Formula 1)

What we’re made for 

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(Sometimes we have to be reminded of our proper roles and the proper place in our lives for our possessions and our institutions.  Today, Dr. Frank Crane tells us there is a difference between—)

USE AND BEAUTY

The Sabbath, said the teacher, was made for Man, and not Man for the Sabbath.

The bearin’s of which, as Dickens would say, is in its application.

Any Institution was made for Man, and not Man for the Institution.

The college, for instance. No, friend Procrustes, whilst we appreciate your zeal to make a record for yourself as President, yet we would remind you that we are sending our boy to your University for the good he can get out of it, and not for the benefit he can be to it. He is not there for you to find out how far he falls short of your standards, nor what glory he can add to his Alma Mater; He is there for you to find out what’s in him, and to develop that. We don’t care a hang about your grand old traditions and things, except as they help you in being the making of our particular pup.

The Church was made for Man, and not Man for the Church. And if your meeting-house is just occupied in keeping itself up, parson, why, close it up and start a hennery…We don’t care about how much money you raise, nor how beautiful are your vestments, nor how high your theology, nor how numerous your membership, nor how gay your stained glass. Are you helping friend Man? Are you making him sober, industrious, clean, and honest? Are you developing in him a civic conscience? Or are you simply being good—so good you’re good for nothing? Come, produce! Or quit!

The House was made for Man, Ma, and not Man for the House. Let the boys play marbles in the dining-room, and the girls have their beaux in the parlor, and grandpa smoke his pipe in the kitchen, and everybody raid the ice-box at 11 p. m. if they want to; what better use can carpets be put to than that children’s knees should wear them out a-gleemaking, and what are sofas for if not for spooning, and kitchen-warmth and cheer if not for old folk homing? Use the old home up, and get a better product—of love and laughter and undying memories.

Books were made for Man, and not Man for Books. Use ’em. Thumb ’em. Mark ’em. Go to bed with ’em. Carry ’em on trains. And don’t own books that cannot be carried down through the Valley of Every-day as the soul’s lunch-basket.

The most perfect ornament is that which is of the most perfect service to Man. No cane is so beautiful as the one grandfather wore smooth on a thousand walks; no chair so lovely as that one mother consecrated by many a night of rocking the baby; no table so priceless as that one where father used to write; no pipe so pretty as the one he smoked; no dress so charming as that one that still has the wrinkles in it worn there by the little girl gone—gone forever into heaven, or womanhood.

It’s the human touch that beautifies. Nothing can be warmly beautiful that is not, or was not, useful.

And Democracy is beautiful because it exists for the welfare of the People that compose it, and not for the glory of the Dynasty that rules it.

The State was made for Man, and not Man for the State.

The Encounter

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It had the elements of a nightmare.

Blackness

growing larger

in the eyepiece of my camera

rushing toward me

engulfing the sky

darkening it

obliterating it

consuming me

with its noise

its speed

its wind

its blast of heat

roaring past.

Bob Priddy met Big Boy

that day

And lived to tell the tale.

The railroad crossing in Osage City was crowded with onlookers a few days ago, all waiting for the largest steam locomotive ever built anywhere in the world to pass through on its way to a stop in Jefferson City.

Union Pacific locomotive 4014, the only Big Boy still running, rounded the curve in the distance, its mighty steam whistle bellowing in full-throated bass, warning those near the crossing to stand away.  Inconceivable power was coming and coming fast.

And then it blew past, faster than I could turn with it, slightly staggering me with its power, force, and the wind it was pushing outward. And briefly, a ripple of heat reaching out from its boiler to brush my face.

https://youtu.be/QweVLPAyDyY

Later, in Jefferson City, as the locomotive rested briefly at the station, too close to the Capitol bluff to be seen from above, I thought it might be visible from the House of Representatives garage, west of the capitol.  And there it was, lurking and breathing. And when it began to move, slowly, there was a feeling of menace, of a great beast stalking creatures protected by the barred garage windows as it slowly passed by, seconds later to ease onto a siding with the muscular attitude that it was going to go where it damn well pleased to go and it would be best not to challenge it.

https://youtu.be/8zmkZ1Ky2hc

We can be grateful such machines are restricted to tracks and that Transformers are not real.

Walt Whitman, the great American poet, long before Big Boy was even lines drawn on a planning page, felt what I felt when he confronted a locomotive, one of the mechanical marvels of his time:

Thee in thy panoply, thy measur’d dual throbbing and thy beat convulsive,                                                                                           Thy black cylindric body, golden brass, and silvery steel,                   Thy ponderous side-bars, parallel and connecting rods, gyrating, shuttling at thy sides,/ Thy metrical, now swelling pant and roar, now tapering in the distance,/ Thy great protruding head-light fix’d in front,     Thy long, pale, floating vapor-pennants, tinged with delicate purple,/              The dense and murky clouds out-belching from thy smoke-stack,/Thy knitted frame, thy springs and valves, the tremulous twinkle of thy wheels,/ Thy train of cars behind, obedient, merrily following,/        Through gale or calm, now swift, now slack,/ yet steadily careering;/ Type of the modern—/emblem of motion and power/—pulse of the continent…/Fierce-throated beauty!/ Roll through my chant with all thy lawless music,/ thy swinging lamps at night,/ Thy madly-whistled laughter,/ echoing, rumbling like an earthquake,/rousing all,/ Law of thyself complete,/ thine own track firmly holding,/(No sweetness debonair of tearful harp or glib piano thine,)/Thy trills of shrieks by rocks and hills return’d,/ Launch’d o’er the prairies wide,/ across the lakes,/      To the free skies unpent/ and glad and strong. 

The older generation can dwell for a short time in nostalgia at the appearance of restored steam locomotives. Children often gaze open-mouthed at this great machine, oozing steam and occasional spurts of hot water, as it dozes in front of them. For some, the graceful dance of the slow-moving side rods as the locomotive heads toward its overnight parking place is endlessly fascinating—-as is the pounding rhythm of the same side roads at speed.

The Big Boy and its few smaller kin who still display railroading’s past are far more exciting and, dare we say, romantic than the sanitary and ungainly diesels of today.  But their constant need for care and cleaning, their relatively short runs before needing more water and more fuel, and their mechanical makeup are reasons they are now curiosities, not commonplace.

In 1976, when I rode the American Freedom Train from Boonville to Jefferson City, I asked engineer Doyle McCormack if he thought he missed anything by not living in the age of steam.  “Yeah,” he said, “a lot of work!”

Let us be glad there are still those willing to do that work.  And to bring these great pieces of fierce-throated beauty to us from time to time, glad and strong.                                                -0-

A Good Time for a First Win; And a Glimpse at INDYCAR’s Future

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By Bob Priddy, Missourinet Contribution Editor

(NASCAR)—Win when it really counts.

Denny Hamlin, winless this year, picks up his first victory in the first of NASCAR’s ten playoff races and becomes the first driver to lock in a place in the next round.  Hamlin held off a banzai charge off the last turn by pre-race favorite Kyle Larson to win the Southern 500 at Darlington.

For most of the event, it was a two-man race between the drivers who finished 1-2 in regular season points.  They combined to lead 302 of the race’s 367 laps.  Larson, who challenged Hamlin for most of the last stage of the race launched an all-out run for the lead on the last turn, scraping the wall as he tried to get outside of Hamlin, finished two-tenths of a second short of his sixth win of the year.  Ross Chastain was third, his best finish of the year. Martin Truex Jr., and Kevin Harvick rounded out the top five.

Hamlin, who finished in the top five in half of this year’s races—including four thirds and a second—automatically qualifies for the round of 12 that will go on for the championship after the next two races.  Larson still leads in points, however, thanks to bonus points he piled up for victories, stage wins, and being the top points driver after the regular season.

Harvick and Tyler Reddick remain the only playoff drivers without a checkered flag this year.

The next playoff race will be at Richmond next Saturday night.

(INDYCAR)—INDYCAR resumes racing next Sunday afternoon on the road circuit at Portland, the first of the three races that will close out its season.  The last three races promise to be a shootout between Pato O’Ward, Alex Palou, and Josef Newgarden.  O’Ward took over the points lead from Palou three weeks ago at Worldwide Technology Raceway across the river from St. Louis and Newgarden put himself in the championship picture by winning the race there.  The three are separated by 22 points.

Six-time champion Scott Dixon is lurking in fourth, only 43 back.

This has been a year of emergence for INDYCAR’s young drivers as the series looks at changes coming in the next couple of years.

We spent some time with INDYCAR President Jay Frye after the INDYCAR/NASCAR tripleheader at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway last month, talking about this year, next year, and the new engines coming in 2022—–and what might or might not be in the more distant future.

Frye is a Mizzou graduate (marketing/education), a former Tiger football player (tight end/offensive tackle)and Rock Island Illinois native who says he learned to drive by driving a truck for the family-owned garbage trucking company. Before joining INDYCAR, Frye was with NASCAR, where he was named by ESPN the 2008 NASCAR Executive of the Year.

We started by discussing the weekend tripleheader of two NASCAR races and an INDYCAR race on the IMS road course

AUDIO:frye edited 2021 indy

Donald Davidson was the Speedway historian for more than 50 years before his retirement last year.

(FORMULA 1)—Max Verstappen has become the first Dutch driver in the 71-year history of F1 to win the Dutch Grand Prix.

His seventeenth career victory breaks a record he had shared with British great Sterling Moss for the driver with the most victories, but no F1 championship. That, however, could change this year.

Verstappen picked up his seventh win of the year, finishing twenty seconds ahead of Lewis Hamilton and taking the points lead from the seven-time champion.  Verstappen is now up by three.  He barely beat Hamilton for the pole but Hamilton had nothing for him during the race.

Hamilton teammate Valterri Bottas was third and afterwards announced that he was going to be the number one driver for Alfa Romeo next year.  Taking his place on the Mercedes roster will be George Russell, who has driven this year for the Williams team, which uses Mercedes engines. His success in F1 feeder series championships has positioned him to take the place of Bottas, who has been second-banana to Hamilton, who has described him as the best teammate he’s ever had.

 

 

The Virtue of Waiting 

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(Patience seems in short supply sometimes.  We want this pandemic to be over, now. We want a new TV set, now.  Or a new video game. We want rain, now; peace, now; money, now.  We listen too seriously to those who promise to fix complicated problems with simple solutions, now.  But Dr. Frank Crane urges patience because—-)

Old Father Time knows more than anybody.

He solves more problems than all the brains in the world.

More hard knots are unloosed, more tangled questions are answered, more deadlocks are unfastened by Time than by any other agency.

In the theological disputes that once raged in Christendom neither side routed the other; Time routed them both by showing that the whole subject did not matter.

After the contemporaries had had their say, Time crowned Homer, Dante, Wagner, Shakespeare, Whitman, Emerson.

Almost any judgment can be appealed, but from the decision of Time there is no appeal.

Do not force issues with your children. Learn to wait. Be patient. Time will bring things to pass that no immediate power can accomplish.

Do not create a crisis with your husband, your wife. Wait. See what Time will do.

Time has a thousand resources, abounds in unexpected expedients.

Time brings a change in point of view, in temper, in state of mind which no contention can.

When you teach, make allowance for Time. What the child cannot possibly understand now, he can grasp easily a year from now.

When you have a difficult business affair to settle, give it Time, put it away and see how it will ferment, sleep on it, give it as many days as you can. It will often settle itself.

If you would produce a story, a play, a book, or an essay, write it out, then lay it aside and let it simmer, forget it a while, then take it out and write it over.

Time is the best critic, the shrewdest adviser, the frankest friend.

If you are positive you want to marry a certain person, let Time have his word. Nowhere is Time’s advice more needed. Today we may be sure, but listen to a few tomorrows.

You are born and you will die whenever fate decides; you have nothing to do with those fatal two things; but in marriage, the third fatality, you have Time. Take it.

Do not decide your beliefs and convictions suddenly. Hang up the reasons to cure. You come to permanent ideas not only by reasoning, but quite as much by growth.

Do not hobble your whole life by the immature certainties of youth. Give yourself room to change, for you must change, if you are to develop.

“Learn to labor and—to wait!”

Moderates-in-waiting

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President Trump heard something a few days ago that he hadn’t heard before. He was booed by an audience he had called to hear his latest, uh, whatever.

Boos at a Trump rally?

Who else was listening?

Who else in the Republican Party was listening?

Maybe we’re reading too much into the event. But there have been, all along, questions about how tight Donald Trump’s grip on the party will remain the longer he is out of office.

It’s doubtful many people left the rally and left Trump because he suggested it might be a good idea for people to get their COVID shots.  It was only a tepid endorsement but it was the first time he had encouraged his followers to do what he had secretly done before leaving the White House.

Boos.  At a Trump rally.

And on this quiet street, these thoughts quietly began to emerge.

The competition for Roy Blunt’s to-be vacated Senate seat has drawn several Republican early entrants, the biggest names of which seem determined to prove they are the most like Trump. They are betting Trump will be the dominant force in the 2022 elections that he claims he will be.

But there are some other Republicans who are holding their counsel.  And it might be wise for them to do so. August, 2022 is a long ways away, politically. The world can take a lot of turns in the next twelve months.

But beside that there’s the issue of mathematics.

Let’s go back to the 2016 presidential primaries. We wrote just before Missouri’s primary that year that earlier state primary voters “seem to favor ANYBODY BUT” Trump with the ABT vote through Super Tuesday that year looking like this:

Iowa   76% Anybody But Trump

New Hampshire  65

South Carolina  67

Nevada  54

Alabama  57

Alaska  66

Arkansas  67

Georgia  61

Massachusetts  50 (although in the total vote, he lost by about 20,000 out of 631,413 cast)

Minnesota  79

Oklahoma  72

Tennessee  61

Texas  73

Vermont  67

Virginia  65

Kansas  77

Kentucky  64

Louisiana  59

Maine  67

Hawaii  58

Idaho  72

Michigan  64

Mississippi  53

Trump had cracked the 40% support level only six times in 22 opportunities up to that time. By the time of the Missouri vote, only four GOP candidates remained in the running.  Eight candidates on the ballot had dropped out but their names could not be removed.  In 2016, Trump got 40.84% of the Missouri votes.  Ted Cruz got 40.63 (and he did not ask for a recount).  John Kasich and Marco Rubio combined for 16.2%.  The rest was scattered among the withdrawn candidates or for “uncommitted.”   The fact is that in Missouri, as in the other states, the majority opposed Trump.

We now have five big-name candidates trying to convince voters they have the shortest political umbilical cords linking them to the former president.

Might there be a moderate Republican or two just quietly watching the internecine warfare among the COTs (Children of Trump)?  And might we see a moderate Republican candidate step forward about the first of the year who can win the Republican primary with 35% of the vote while the five (so far) COTs divide the 40%—assuming Trump still has a solid-enough 40% following in the party by then?

COTs go 25-20-10-5-5% and the moderate polls 35% and moves on to November.

Memo to the COTs in the aftermath of the Alabama boos:  Be nervous. Somebody not like you might be lurking.  And one person who looks good to the 60% can beat the five of the 40.

Or maybe we’re just reading too much into that rally the other day.

 

 

 

Blaney wins, Reddick’s in, and The most ridiculous race ever

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By Bob Priddy, Missourinet Contributing Editor

Before we recap NASCAR’s final race of the regular season and list the ten drivers who have made the playoffs we have to tell you about a Formula One race that lasted less than a lap.

The Belgian Grand Prix never saw a green flag.  No driver earned points for fastest lap because every lap was run behind the pace car, or as they call it in F1, the safety car.  A relentless downpour was the culprit, but so was the series’ policy of running a race on the day it was scheduled to be run.

Even if it never was a race.  Even if the finishing positions were the starting positions.

Here’s how it all came down:

First, torrential rain came down.  Then the scheduled start time came down.  No go. After a           three-hour wait, the safety car led the field out of the pits.  The competitors did the ceremonial formation lap but did not halt for the usual standing start. Instead, they kept circulating for two more laps and returned to the pits, never to turn go out again.

The official time of the race was three minutes, 27.01 seconds.

Formula 1 rules say a race is official after completion of just two laps.  The rules say the final finishing order is determined by positions on the lap before the suspension of the race.  Thus, the Grand Prix of Belgium, 2021, goes into the history books as lasting one lap, with pole-sitter Max Verstappen the winner with George Russell, who qualified second giving the Williams team its first podium finish since 2017, and giving defending F1 champion Lewis Hamilton third, his starting position.

Points are usually awarded to the driver who achieves the fastest lap.  There was no such lap in this, uh, event.

Racefans.net says the race actually lasted less than one lap because there is a 124-meter offset between the start line and the finish line. Therefore, says the site, the race did not lost 7.004 kilometers, the length of one lap, but only 6.88 kilometers.

All three of the podium drivers apologized to fans who waited throughout the rain but only got to see an almost-race that has been described with various derogatory words in the European media.

Because the race fell 32 laps short of reaching 76% of its distance, the points were reduced by half.  Verstappen, by “finishing first” received 12.5 points.  Hamilton’s third was worth 7.5 points.  He now leads Verstappen in the standings by three.

Hamilton called the event a “farce” said he hopes the fans get their money back.  There’s been no comment from F1.

However, Motorsport.com is reporting that Formula One CEO Stefano Domenicali “is eager for discussions with the sports stakeholders,” and F1 Race Director agrees. “We’ll look at a whole lot of things that we can all look at, to see what everyone wants,” he says.

-0-

Now, to a race that was a race.

(NASCAR)—The last race of NASCAR’s regular season was a must-win situation for most of te field, a contest between teammates for the last playoff spot, and a second straight win for Ryan Blaney.  The race went an extra five laps because a scramble for positions with thirteen laps to go saw eight cars get tangled up, leading to a stoppage of the race.  Eleven cars got together in the first overtime attempt for a finish and nine cars got wadded behind Blaney on the last lap.  The race finished under the yellow flag with Chris Buescher trailing Blaney to the finish.  However, Buescher’s car failed a post-race inspection and was disqualified, leaving him last in the final standings and Bubba Wallace second.

The last playoff spot had been in contention between Childress Racing teammates Tyler Reddick and Austin Dillon. Dillon was caught up in the crash on the last lap.  Reddick, whose car was damaged in the wreck 13 laps from the end, was able to keep going after some quick repairs in the pits, and finished fifth.

Reddick was 16th in the standings after the first 12 races with only one top-ten finish. He had climbed to 11th going into the Daytona races, posting nine top tens in the last fourteen races. His fifth on Saturday night is his best finish of the year.

Blaney heads into the playoffs with two straight wins, three for the year, and second-seeded behind regular-season points champion Kyle Larson.

The first of ten playoff races will be at Darlington next Sunday.  The drivers who will run for the championship are Larson, Blaney, Martin Truex, Jr., Kyle Busch, defending champion Chase Elliott, Alex Bowman, Denny Hamlin, William Byron, Joey Logano, Brad Keselowski, Kurt Busch, Christopher Bell, Michael McDowell, Aric Almirola, Reddick, and Kevin Harvick.  Only Hamlin, Reddick, and Harvick have yet to win this year.

(Photo Credits: Formula 1, Bob Priddy)

 

 

The Joy of Rest

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(I know of a top-rank executive who would close his office door each afternoon so nobody would see him taking a nap.  I took some ribbing from my news staff from time to time because along about 2 p.m., I would find a long sound file and play it back so my computer screen appeared as if I were listening to something while I slipped into a “personal screen saver mode” for a few minutes. I always thought those moments helped me cope with 70-hour work weeks.  Dr. Frank Crane, our former Presbyterian minister turned popular newspaper columnist a century ago knew the value of such things as part of his advice to—-)

KEEP FIT

Ford, the automobile man, stated in his testimony before the Industrial Commission that he gets more and better work out of men at eight hours a day than at ten.

It is a law that holds good everywhere. The first duty of a worker is to keep himself fit. And an hour’s labor when he is up to the mark, bright, keen, and enthusiastic, is worth three hours’ effort when he is fagged.

“Keeping everlastingly at it brings success” is a lying motto; it rather brings poor results, slipshod products, and paresis.

Rest and recreation are the best parts of labor. They are the height to which the hammer is lifted; and the force of the blow depends on that height. To go ahead without 107let-up is to deliver only a succession of feeble, ineffective blows.

Get all the sleep you can. Stay abed all day occasionally. Learn to be lazy, to dawdle, to enjoy an empty mind; then, when you are called to effort, you can hit with ten times the power.

The higher the quality of your work, the more necessary it is that you approach it only when you are at your best.

This is especially true of intellectual effort. You can tell, when you read a story or an article, whether it is tainted with exhaustion; it is dull, lifeless putty.

Those who court the quality of brightness, but do not keep their bodies in trim, often resort to artificial stimulants. Stephen Crane said that the best literature could be divided into two classes: whisky and opium.

Intelligent people ought not need to be told that this is suicide. The best form of enthusiasm is the natural reaction of one’s system after a period of relaxation.

The pestiferous “work-while-you-rest” apostles are ever after us to “improve our spare time,” study French during lunch, geometry while going to sleep, and history during recess. But spare time ought to be wasted, not improved.

An hour or so at the ball-game, a contest at tennis, a long and aimless walk, a party at cards, a chess match, or a time spent in jolly talk with friends are not waste; they mean restored strength, upbuilt mental acumen, the doubling of efficiency when work is to do.

Learn to let go. Learn to relax utterly when you sit down. Learn to let every faculty lie down when you lie down, and rest whether you sleep or not.

The more thoroughly you do nothing when there is nothing to do, the better you can do something when there is something to do.

The very cream of life comes from rest. The blush, the aroma, the shine of your best work lie in the hours of idleness massed behind it. The secret of brilliant work is in throwing every atom of your reserve force into it. Perpetual exertion begets mediocrity.

“Keep fit.”

That is a better rule than “Keep at it.”

Notes from a Quiet Street  (Hot Summer Days & Nights Edition)

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We have officials from Missouri and many other states who are threatening to punish school districts and local health departments, in particular, if they institute mask mandates.  Our Attorney General, Eric Schmitt, is the chief guardian against local mask mandates and he now has a class action lawsuit forbidding school districts from having the mandates. He says parents and families should decide if children wear masks, not those who act in loco parentis when hundreds of children are together.  Parents and families, he says, should make decisions based on science and facts—-as if officials in charge of hundreds of children in close contact with one another can’t make decisions based on science and facts.  Or should not be allowed to make decisions based on science and facts.

The lawsuit also cites a low COVID death rate among school children.

Isn’t one child dying from this plague too high a death rate?

We find all of this energy by governors and attorneys general—almost unanimously Republicans—on this issue peculiar.

Remind us again which party is it that does the most griping about government over-reach, especially the federal government telling states (who know what’s best for their citizens) what should be done.

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One thing we’ve noticed about the pandemic, and now “the pandemic of the un-vaccinated,” is that no preacher has tried to capitalize on it as God’s punishment for this or that nation condoning this or that whatever.  Perhaps it is because all nations, whatever their faults, are fighting this thing—and deciding what human trait is being punished is impossible to determine, even by those who in the past have claimed exclusive knowledge of God’s intent.

But maybe God can’t get in a word edgewise amidst all of the conspiracy cacophony that has helped give the pandemic new vigor.

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There’s been a slew of book released revealing more about the more chaotic last chaotic days of the Trump administration. It is unlikely—we certainly hope it is unlikely!!—that we will ever again see so many books from so many insiders so critical of a president. But there’s one insider book we are waiting for although it might not come until the author determines that he will be more benefitted than damaged by his words.  Potential bombshell-author Mike Pence seems to think the success of his future is still too closely tied to his recent past to discuss it.

But, boy oh boy, the tales he could tell…….

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We notice, by the way, that the former VP is becoming more visible on the public speaking circuit.  He’s hitting some of the big venues—a few weeks ago he repeated his lamentable attack on Critical Race Theory at the inaugural Feenstra Family Picnic in Sioux Center, Iowa.

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Watching the drought envelop the West, we are reminded of some jokes that we heard back in the very hot summer of 1953 while growing up on our little Illinois farm.  That was the summer when the thermometers reached the 90s in late May and the heat wave ran well into September with several days in the triple digits.  In fact, the last 90-plus day was not until October.  Few homes or cars were air conditioned and I can recall my mother closing the curtains in the morning to keep out the sun during the day.

It was so hot that I saw three dogs chasing a tree.

We got a little rain one day and we sent what was in our rain gauge to the University to be analyzed. It came back only 35% moisture.

That was the winter is snowed a little bit but the snow was so dry we just shoved it into the ditch and burned it.

Not sure but those might have been told by Sam Cowling on Don MacNeill’s Breakfast Club that broadcast from Chicago for 35 years on the NBC Blue Network (which became ABC Radio) and is known as the program that created morning talk and variety as a viable radio format.

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Several months ago we told the story of a Cole County man who got married into a family situation that sounded like the story told in the song, “I’m My Own Grandpa.”

Well, we’ve found another one.  From the Sedalia Capital, a newspaper founded when Sedalia was making an ill-fated run at taking the seat of government away from Jefferson City, February 21, 1925 issue.  Page 5 has a picture of a nice-looking lady captioned, “Miss Ruth Davis’ marriage to her stepbrother, Andrew Jean Stormfeltz at Kansas City, Mo., made her mother also her stepmother and her mother-in-law, and her stepfather her father-in-law. She’s her own stepsister-in-law.  Figure it out.”

We’re not genealogist enough to know, but would that make their children their own cousins, or their own aunts and uncles, step or otherwise?

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