Mendocino County Today: Sunday 9/1/2024

By AVA News Service on September 1, 2024

COOLER TEMPERATURES will build today along with increased marine influence lifting just a bit further inland. Much hotter conditions for interior and clearer conditions at the coast will return by mid week. (NWS)

STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): .20" of rain fell in August bringing our season YTD to 51.57". This rainfall season will end September 30.

The fog seems to have broken up some this Sunday morning on the coast, I have a foggy 56F at 5am. We will likely see the sun today but as usual I have no idea when? The word "sunny" is in the forecast a bit more for next week currently, we'll see?

MATHIS’ CRAZY THREATS

On Wednesday, August 28, 2024 at approximately 11:02 P.M., deputies from the Mendocino County Sheriff's Office were dispatched to contact the victim of possible criminal threats made in the Covelo area.

Deputies responded to the area and contacted the 33-year-old female victim. Deputies learned the female was involved in a domestic argument with her boyfriend, who was identified as 41-year-old James Lamonte Mathis. Mathis had left the residence prior to deputies arriving at the scene.

During the course of the investigation, deputies developed probable cause that criminal threats were made by Mathis towards the female. Deputies issued a BOLO (Be-On-The-Look-Out) for Mathis' arrest to all law enforcement agencies in Mendocino County. Deputies searched the area, but were unable to locate Mathis.

On Thursday, August 29, 2024, deputies continued to try to locate Mathis to no avail. Due to the nature of the threats made by Mathis, deputies contacted the Mendocino County Behavioral Health Response Team (BHRT) to assist with contacting Mathis. The BHRT attempted to contact Mathis to determine if he would peacefully surrender to deputies.

At about 8:00 P.M., The BHRT was able to make contact with Mathis on the telephone. After speaking with Mathis, the BHRT convinced him to peacefully surrender to the Mendocino County Sheriff's Office.

Mathis was ultimately placed under arrest for Criminal Threats and was subsequently booked into the Mendocino County Jail where he was to be held in lieu of $30,000 bail.

The Mendocino County Sheriff's Office would like to thank the Behavior Health Response Team for their assistance with this peaceful resolution.

AV ATHLETICS

Games this coming week:

Tue: Volleyball @ Calistoga 5pm

Wed: Soccer @ Point Arena 4:30pm

Thu: Volleyball @ McKinleyville 5:30pm

Fri: Volleyball @ Fortuna 5:30pm

Sat: Soccer in Upperlake vs. TBD

NURSE LOUISE STILL LOOKING

I thank you all for your responses and well wishes. I've looked at several places, but no go. Either way out my price range or just too shabby. And I give thanks to this outlet for helping me get the word out. So contact me if something else comes up. 937-4837. Many thanks. Louise Mariana

ANDERSON VALLEY CASUAL GRAD GATHERING

The fair is celebrating 100 years and the fair flags are up. We had 30 people RSVP. It you missed the RSVP date and still want to attend now is your last chance.

If you just want to stop in to say hi we will be in the back of Mosswood Cafe (14111 CA-128, Boonville.)

Thank you Mosswood Cafe for providing a venue for this event.

Ivy Covered Gazebo, Rt 1, Little River (Jeff Goll)

HELP SAVE THE HISTORIC & BEAUTIFUL ALBION RIVER BRIDGE

Dear Friend or neighbor,

Our life on the coast will be seriously affected by 3 to 5 years of local highway construction if Caltrans proceeds with their plan to replace the historic Albion River Bridge.

Imagine a scene much, much, worse than what you are seeing right now at the Jack Peters Creek Bridge project on Hwy 1 just north of Mendocino.

We want to send Caltrans back to the drawing board to analyze, document, and publicly address the alternative which is to restore, seismically upgrade, add a cantilevered pedestrian and bike path, and, as required by law, maintain the bridge so it can continue being safe for years to come.

Please go to this page: savehighway1.org/2024/08/27/comment-templates/ and click some of the links in the “I want to comment on” section. Clicking a link will switch you to your email program, with a complete email ready to customize and send.

Comments are due by Sept. 9th.

We encourage you to pass all or any part of this email along to local and out of the area friends. We need Caltrans to receive as many comments as possible. As Michelle Obama might say, “Instead of complaining, do something.” Help save the last wood & trestle highway bridge in California, the historic and beautiful Albion River Bridge.

Thanks,

Tom Wodetzki

Albion Bridge Stewards, Albion

UKIAH SHELTER PET OF THE WEEK

Boxer mix, Rocky, is a happy-go-lucky boy! He walks well on leash and already knows sit. During his meet and greet and evaluation, Rocky tested well with a female dog guest. We think Rocky would make a wonderful pet for any family. And seriously, who could possibly pass on such a bundle of cuteness?

Rocky is 3 years old and a very svelte 60 pounds. Thinking you might like to jog up the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art? Don’t do it alone, adopt Rocky and do it together! To see all of our canine and feline guests, and for information about our services, programs, and events, visit: mendoanimalshelter.com

Join us every first Saturday of the month for our Meet The Dogs Adoption Event at the shelter.

We're on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/mendoanimalshelter

For information about adoptions please call 707-467-6453.

FORT BRAGG FOREVER, a dialog

Howard Pollack (Coast Chatline): I noticed a large "Fort Bragg Forever" sign outside of the Company Store. Does anyone know who put that up? And, what is it trying to say?

Anon: It's a non-subtle way to say "we're happy to remain racist with the name of our town.” Though they will all deny it, that is in fact the impact of those signs. Besides - if it were in fact "forever,” it would be using the original Pomo words for this place. Now, let the games begin!

Al Nunez: So anyone that doesn't care to have the town name changed is racist? Do you think that anyone or any place that flies the American flag are racists also? WOW!

Frank Hartzell: I personally oppose name change on three fronts. 1. The Fort Bragg city council spent a year studying it and found Indigenous folks have a wide variety of opinion. The general idea was that more Pomo and other Native history should be celebrated more. There is a big celebration coming up on the Noyo Headlands. The Democratic process addressed this and found name change not to be the solution. 2. There are at least 10,000 better things for Progressives to do and yet this has absorbed a community once dedicated to far more important issues like local farming, homelessness, keeping medical services on the Coast, relocalizing the economy, working with the city council to enact things like inclusiveness, dealing with global warming, buying local, making stuff locally, on and on and on. Not this. 3. I most strongly oppose this because to me it’s a disease as great as any in 2024: the present is always better. We are above that kind of thing that went on back there. NO WE ARE NOT. Look at where we are morally. We hate immigrants and the poor as a nation. We worship a proud liar who has been found responsible of sexual assualt in a court of law. Drugs and alcohol abuse and obestiy (got me on that one) are destroying us. It takes zero courage to oppose the idiot Braxton Bragg. The man was a fool, cuckold and the worst general in US history, so bad the other Confederate generals mutinied after he lost yet another battle due to incompetence and fellow idiot Jefferson Davis had to come save him, making old Braxtiel his personal secretary for the rest of the war. If you want something that would make a differnce and save the world, start a stop shopping on Amazon campaign. Or go out and picket fast food. I remember the story of a Quaker man who put his affairs in order, took his Bible and one extra suit of clothes and went to the South and preached on the street corner about the evils of slavery. He was lynched as he knew he would be. It takes no courage to do that now. Try opposing the greed economy, support tarifs on China (even if from our man above) and oppose more gas stations. 4. I believe we should celebrate Braxton with a fools festival in Fort Bragg. Braxxie is the head fool, scared of his wife, full of foolish bluster and marching about with oversized clown shoes and a big top hat. He is crowned head fool at the end, only to plummet into the water tank or something such Everyone could come as their favorite fool and it could all raise money for education and Native American efforts.

Ruby Gold:

I saw the sign Thursday for the first time.

When I try to understand why someone did something, my first way in is to ask how it made me feel.

For this I’m pretty sure the sign is a big fat f+$%k you to anyone who wants to reject the racism/misogyny of the confederacy and to Our Indigenous Community specifically.

I had the same experience about a week ago when I was about to go into the small coffee chop near the Botanical Gardens (name?). As I was about to go in I saw the same sign. It felt like a slap in the face and again f%^&&K you.

Seemed oddly unnecessary to be so hostile to to a potential customer.

I turned around and left.

Names and Naming Matters

David Alden: Oh, I vote for naming ourselves after the Bragg line of seasoning seasoning salts. That way when people ask what my town is named for I can proudly look like an absolute fool instead of a racist fool.

RON PARKER, Local photo historian:

Old Boonville in the 1920s

ED NOTES

NO MATTER how many warnings that the ocean can be dangerous, every year someone is carried off. Maurizio Biasini is certainly among the most memorable victims. Biasini's remains were found by a hiker at Jughandle on Christmas day on the beach at Jughandle State Park, about six miles north of the Mendocino Headlands where Biasini was washed out to sea on Thanksgiving weekend, 2008. An Italian national working in the United States as a visiting scholar in physics, Biasini, with his horrified family looking on, was overcome by a huge wave when he climbed over the bluffs at Mendocino for a closer look at a rock formation. Waving frantically for help as the powerful surf carried him farther and farther offshore, his frantic wife and sons looking on, Biasini was visible for some hundred yards until he disappeared forever. His twin sons, 18, were so distraught at what they perceived as the tardy response of rescue teams, they had to be subdued by Sheriff's deputies who feared that the boys, and the people attempting to calm them at the edge of the bluffs, might also fall into the sea.

Sons Arrested In Scuffle With Police

(The Ukiah Daily Journal)

A San Francisco man was swept off the Mendocino Headlands Saturday afternoon during a family outing with his wife and 18-year-old twin sons. A scuffle with police during the rescue efforts resulted in a California Highway Patrol officer using a taser on one of the sons and Sheriff's deputies putting both under arrest.

Presumed lost at sea is 54-year-old Maurizio Biasini, of San Francisco. According to CHP Sgt. Jim Kerr, a 911 call went out after Maurizio Biasini was swept off the Mendocino Headlands by a rogue wave at around 1:45 p.m. Once rescuers from the Mendocino Fire Department, the Mendocino County Sheriff's Department, the Coast Guard and Cal Fire arrived, it was clear that the only possible search and rescue operation would have to be done from the air, not from shore, explained Kerr.

In the meantime the twin sons, Dario and Andriano Biasini were frantic about their father as some 50 or so onlookers began to gather at the scene. Kerr said the CHP went to the scene after a call for law enforcement assistance because, according to the request, the “lookee-loos are hampering the rescue effort.” At some point around 2:15 p.m., Dario and Andriano apparently began to argue with rescuers, because they believed there wasn't enough being done to find and rescue their father.

Law enforcement stepped in to try to calm the two men but, according to Kerr, the twins got into a pushing match with Sheriff's Deputy Jesse Van Wormer near the cliff's edge and CHP Officer Thad Williams stepped in to try to stop it. A video of the incident shows Dario wrestling with a Sheriff's deputy near the cliff edge and Andriano pushing and waving other rescuers away and appearing to get involved in the struggle. Williams tries to get Dario to stop the fighting and appears to taser Dario in the arm which momentarily immobilizes him after which he was told to stay put on the ground, but Dario began to get up and Officer Williams used his taser on him again. Meanwhile Dep. Van Wormer and one of the emergency medical technicians at the scene were able to get Andriano under control and handcuffed.

Both Dario and Andriano were arrested but cited and released. No prosecution is expected. Mendocino County Sheriff Tom Allman said that he can understand that the twins were upset having had their father just swept away to sea.

“Our hearts are very much with the family, we offer our condolences, this is a very unfortunate situation,” Allman said.

Ocean Claims Bay Area Visitor by Tony Reed, Mendocino Beacon -

Coast rescue agencies searched for hours but were unable to find Maurizio Biasini, 52, of San Francisco, who fell into the ocean from the Mendocino Headlands Saturday afternoon.

According to Sheriff's Office reports, a 9-1-1 caller reported that a man was climbing on the cliffs when he fell about 20 feet into the ocean. Although the surf was high and conditions severe, rumors that a rogue wave swept Biasini from the cliff could not be substantiated.

Mendocino Volunteer Fire Department, along with State Parks rangers and Highway Patrol officers, arrived on the headlands off the west end of Main Street minutes after the call.

The emergency response attracted dozens of people in Mendocino and along the bluffs. Mendocino Volunteer Fire Department blocked the west end of Main Street to traffic during the rescue operation. Within minutes, crowds of people clustered along the headlands and Main Street to watch, shielding their eyes from the afternoon sun.

According to Mendocino Fire Chief Danny Hervilla, Biasini was seen flailing in the water shortly after he fell, but was floating face down minutes later.

Hervilla said his department had two JetSki operators in the water to assist the Coast Guard's 47-foot lifeboat. During the early part of the search, a Sonoma County Sheriff's Department helicopter was in the area, and was summoned to help search. A Coast Guard helicopter from McKinleyville was called and searched the bay until late Saturday afternoon. Calls to Coast Guard sources were not returned as of press time.

All agencies searched the bay until nightfall.

“I'd been warning people not to go in the water," said Hervilla, adding that the department has conducted rescues Thanksgiving weekend in previous years, due to the holiday and the end of abalone season. He said seas are typically rougher this time of year. On Saturday, swells reached 14 feet at 18 seconds.

He said the conditions would have been too dangerous for a water or shore-based search effort.

"We did a thorough surface search," he said, "but the conditions were too treacherous for divers."

He said the response from involved agencies was good, but by the time emergency personnel arrived, the victim had been spotted floating face-down.

"And they had a good response time," he said, "but it happened so quickly."

A Tense Situation

In a video circulating the Internet, Biasini's 18-year-old distraught twin sons, Adriano and Dario, can be seen struggling with law enforcement only feet away from a cliff over the ocean shortly after the search began.

In the video, Deputy Jesse VanWormer can be seen wrestling with Dario before grabbing his feet and pulling him away from the bluff's edge.

Highway Patrol Officer Thad Williams used his Taser to incapacitate Dario, while Deputy VanWormer and a paramedic held Adriano. The video ends before the conflict reaches resolution.

Sheriff's Lt. Rusty Noe said both men calmed down and were cited for obstructing or delaying a peace officer and released. Both sons are San Francisco residents.

"We could have had a lot more victims really fast," said Sheriff's Lt. Dennis Bushnell, noting that the location of the struggle was directly over the edge of the rough surf.

Tuesday morning, Lt. Bushnell said he had spoken by phone with Biasini's wife and sons, who were back in the Bay Area.

Since Biasini is an Italian citizen, the Sheriff's Office has been contacted by the Italian Consulate General's Office.

News of the search for Biasini was printed in the Romagna Oggi newspaper, published in Forli, Italy. According to the Oggi, Biasini is the son of Oddo Biasini, Italy's former Minister of Cultural Assets. Biasini, a professor of physics at University of California Riverside, was still listed on the university's Website staff page Tuesday.

Search Continues

A Sheriff's Search and Rescue dive team searched the area Tuesday morning. By the afternoon, no results had been reported.

While walking on the headlands less than an hour after the search began, this reporter overheard rumors being circulated that a surfer had drowned in the rough surf and that rescue personnel had called off their search. Neither of which have any truth whatsoever.

Associated Press:

Mendocino, Calif. — Authorities believe they may have found the body of a San Francisco professor who fell from the Mendocino Headlands last month. A hiker found human remains on rocks at the water's edge Thursday afternoon. The spot at Jug Handle State Natural Reserve is only six miles north of the place where Maurizio Biasini fell from a cliff Nov. 29 during a family outing.

Mendocino County Sheriff's Lt. Rusty Noe says a scrap of clothing suggests the remains could belong to the 52-year-old Biasini, but further testing must be done to confirm the identity.

Biasini was a native of Italy who taught physics at the University of California, Riverside.

A SECOND SAD SEA STORY

AVA News Service

SUNDAY (January 11, 2008) about noon a boy’s basketball team from St. Theresa’s Catholic School in South Lake Tahoe made their way down the goat-like trails traversing the precipitous cliff face of Headlands Point Way, Caspar, to the sliver of sand at the foot of a 100 feet of sheer rock.

Three years ago a 72-year-old woman from Sacramento, walking alone on the public trail above this very same spot, had fallen into the crashing seas below and had drowned. Or died from hypothermia. If the one doesn’t get you, the other soon will because the Headlands Point waters are always roiling, are very cold, and they’re deceptively deep. The seductively tranquil bluffs above belie the oceanic turbulence at the foot of the sheer 100-foot cliff separating land and sea.

THE PUBLIC TRAIL the old lady had been walking on is literal inches from the bluff top’s straight drop to the beach, if a two by four of sand can be called a beach. After her death, nearby residents erected their own warning signs: “You only fall off the bluffs once.” There are no warnings anywhere on the Mendocino Coast to alert the landlocked that sleeper waves can carry them off at any time — low tide, high tide, ebb tide, neep tide, full tide.

THE STRIP of sand at the foot of Headlands Point Way, that narrow band of now you see it, now you don’t sand, that part-time beach, lies at the foot of as precipitous and as forbidding a hundred feet of rock as you’ll see anywhere between Big Sur and the Sinkyone. It disappears entirely at high tides and not so high tides, and it's always virtually inaccessible. Only the agile dare try the threads of trail leading down to the sand on the days there is sand at the foot of the cliff.. But even at medium tides like that terrible basketball team Sunday, only the foolish or the very young would climb down for a close-up look at the tide pools. High seas, high tides or sudden sleeper waves can, as they did Sunday, trap whomever happens to be caught between the water and the cliff face; there are no escape routes once the water hits. One either makes one’s frantic way to one of the huge rocks marking the last pieces of upthrust earth between Caspar and Hawaii, or one dies.

THE YOUNG BASKETBALL PLAYERS from South Lake Tahoe, their coaches and some of their parents, were staying only a few yards away from Sunday’s catastrophe in the plush comfort of a rented Caspar home. The boys were in the area to compete in a junior high school basketball tournament in the nearby village of Mendocino.

SUNDAY NOON, as the boys poked around the tide pools below the bluff that marks the end of Headlands Point Way, a very large wave suddenly crashed over them, dragging two boys into the surf and out towards the open sea. Two men accompanying the boys, one a chaperone, the other the father of one of the basketball players who was not harmed, immediately swam out to the boys, now struggling in the suddenly hostile waters. The two men helped the boys to what they’d hoped would be the temporary safety of one of those large, looming, last rocks, a slippery, steep hunk of sea stone, but absolutely the final chance at life anywhere between the ocean and dry land. But as big and as welcoming as it must have seemed to the four drowning visitors, that slick rock is no life boat.

AS THE TWO MEN and the two rescued boys climbed onto what they’d hoped would be their life raft until help arrived, perhaps glancing yearningly back at the scant trails leading to the final safety of the serene, suburban-like cul de sac maybe thirty yards east of them, a second sleeper wave washed the two boys and one of their adult rescuers from the slick of stone they thought had saved them. One of the boys and the man disappeared into the water. The second boy somehow made his way to shore, as did the second adult male.

WHEN EMERGENCY PERSONNEL found Michael Blank Jr., 14, and Phillip Joe Smith, 56, they were floating face down not far from shore. The Mendocino Fire Department and the Coast Guard deployed a helicopter and a rescue boat to retrieve the two victims and the surviving boy stranded at the foot of the cliff. All three were transported to Mendocino Coast District Hospital in Fort Bragg where attempts to revive Smith and young Blank failed. The surviving boy, Johnathan Camello, 13, was flown by medical helicopter to Santa Rosa where he was released in good condition Monday afternoon.

MENDOCINO CELEBRATES 100TH ANNIVERSARY

by Carol Dominy

In August 1952, Mendocino celebrated the 100th anniversary of the founding of the town. The festivities drew an estimated 5,000 attendees and showcased the rich history and community spirit of Mendocino.

The Centennial weekend kicked off on Saturday at Kellieowen Hall, on the southwest corner of Lansing and Ukiah Streets, where local residents proudly displayed a remarkable collection of antiques and heirlooms. The exhibit offered a glimpse of treasures that had been preserved for generations. The collection was so vast and valuable that a San Francisco collector estimated its worth at over $2,000,000.

Centennial Barbecue, 1952. Cletus Byrnes and Dusty Fraser serving food at the barbecue at the Mendocino High School athletic field in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the town of Mendocino. George Silva, in hat, is serving at the table behind. Sam Costa, Morris Mendosa and Mrs. Carl Enochs are also in this photograph. (Photographer: Ed Freitas, Gift of Ed O’Brien)

Saturday evening brought the community together for an “Old-Fashioned Revue” held at the high school gymnasium. Young townsfolk took to the stage, modeling the clothing and jewelry of their ancestors while the stories of Mendocino’s founders were retold. The gym was filled to capacity, with bleachers lining the walls to accommodate the overflow. The evening continued with a dance sponsored by the local Fire Department. Ben Watkins and his orchestra provided the music, and the dance floor was packed with jubilant residents.

Sunday’s events began with a parade that wound its way through the town’s streets, starting from the grammar school. Leading the procession was Ralph Sutherland in a Firepower Chrysler, proudly carrying Mendocino’s oldest resident, Mrs. W. H. Flood, 95, alongside Mrs. William Boyle, 91, and Mrs. James Barton. Another highlight was Charles Tyrrell driving Eddie Matthews’ station wagon, which carried Mendocino’s oldest married couple, Mr. and Mrs. Jens Hansen, who had celebrated over 60 years of marriage.

The parade ended at the high school where the festivities continued with a community barbecue. The aroma of barbecued meat, beans, and salad filled the air as 2,000 people lined up for a meal. After the barbecue, folk and square dancing began in the high school gym.

Kellieowen Hall reopened in the afternoon, drawing even more visitors eager to take one last look at the antique exhibit before it closed for the weekend. Historic buildings like the Temple of Kwan Tai and the Old Lisbon House also welcomed thousands of visitors, offering rare insights into the architectural and cultural heritage of Mendocino. As the Beacon noted, “All in all, the Centennial Celebration was a decided success, and one of the best celebrations ever put on in Mendocino.”

(kelleyhousemuseum.org)

CATCH OF THE DAY, Saturday, August 31, 2024

STEFFEN CANTUA, Willits. Leaving scene of accident with property damage, perjury.

JACKLYN CARMONA, Antioch//Mendocino. Disorderly conduct-alcohol&drugs, resisting.

ANGELINA DELOSSANTOS, Willits. Failure to appear.

EVAN FEEN, Fort Bragg. Disorderly conduct-alcohol&drugs, failure to appear.

KATRINA HAMILTON, Willits. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, resisting.

ANTHONY HOAGLIN, Ukiah. Domestic abuse, domestic battery, domestic violence court order violence, criminal threats.

RICHARD HODGE JR., Ukiah. Concealed dirk-dagger, paraphernalia.

VIKTORIA LADD, Ukiah. Under influence, unspecified offense.

KRISTOPHER MATSCH, Ukiah. Assault with deadly weapon not a gun, controlled substance, paraphernalia.

CHAD MCCALLUM, Ukiah. Under influence, contempt of court.

LEO PADY, Redwood Valley. DI causing bodily injury, hit&run resulting in death or injury, false ID.

IRA REYES, Covelo. DUI-alcohol&drugs.

TROY THORNTON, Willits. Under influence, controlled substance, probation revocation.

IT’S ASTOUNDING!

by Paul Modic

I am being dragged into the world of Smart TVs and forced to buy one because my cable company has decided to upgrade and go super-modern, and my perfectly working TV will be abandoned, given away, or trashed. Of course I don’t have to go to Eureka today and buy a Smart TV, there are other options: I could “cut the cord” and get my entertainment only through the Internet and my laptop, as many millions throughout the world have done.

(When I was down in Mexico for three months I didn’t have TV, for entertainment I found standup comedians on YouTube and watched/listened whenever I was doing something else. While prepping and eating food and cleaning up in the kitchen the laptop was right there on the high island above the black granite counter.)

Since my cable company wants to start streaming all the programming over the internet I could instead switch to satellite TV to get even more channels I never watch. I called them yesterday, postponing my Eureka trip for a day, to try to get the prices so I could compare them, but when they wouldn’t tell me how much the equipment would be without my Social Security number for a “soft credit check,” I rudely hung up on them.

Astound send me a component to use for changing over to the new system a couple days ago and I freaked: I really do not like to complicate my life, especially for wider access to more shopping networks I’ll never watch, and I spent the next morning wondering, then checking to see if my TV was actually smart. I was in denial, it was fifteen years old, of course it was dumb.

The Astound rep gave me all the prices, told me a tech would come by to hook up the TV, as long as it was smart, and I could make an appointment for the following day, or next week, or next month, the deadline being September 4th when the system will change whether I’m ready or not.

The question is why do I insist on keeping cable TV when the Internet has so much entertainment, most of it free, or at least cheaper than cable? Well, I want the networks for pro football, the cable news channels just in case, and HBO to watch Bill Maher and other shows and specials from time to time. All of that, plus Internet and a few hundred other channels would cost me about $80 a month. ($60 more for access to Comedy Central, TNT, and some minor movie channels.)

Could I get football online? Maybe. HBO? Definitely. CNN? I dunno. Face it, I’m a cable monkey horrendously stuck in my ways and about to buy a Smart TV for $300 as well as start renting a component for $5 a month. (A lot of channels I don’t watch much, TNT only seasonally for the NBA basketball playoffs, TCM for old movies, but it’s nice to have the mental pabulum available for this hopeless cable addict.)

Okay, I can afford it, the luxury of having all these channels to eat breakfast by, though actually I can go through all of them and often find nothing which holds my attention: I start with sports talk, switch to movies, even check board of supe reruns, and finding nothing check the Western Channel, then TCM, though rarely try the marginal ones like AMC, FX, and other bastions of low-budget crap.

It sounds like I’m trying to convince myself to cut the cord, a 20th Century dinosaur living in a 21st Century world, feeding at the tasteless buffet of American culture, and unwilling to become a cool hepcat with Netflix. It all adds up to one more item in the table of contents for my Grand Intervention, however no one loves me enough to stage one. (I might soon be mourning the loss of The Office and Seinfeld reruns on Comedy Central, still have a little more time nibbling off the mediocre plate of popular culture, waiting for the Fed-Ex man to smell something rotting as he drives by the house, as another self-loathing ex-hippie goes down, on another beautiful day in Paradise.)

MEMO OF THE AIR: Get some shut-eye, men, you've got a big day of violent love tomorrow.

Here's the recording of last night's (Friday 2024-08-30) 8-hour Memo of the Air: Good Night Radio show on 107.7fm KNYO-LP Fort Bragg (CA) and KNYO.org (and, for the first hour, also 89.3fm KAKX Mendocino): https://tinyurl.com/KNYO-MOTA-0607

Coming shows can feature your story or dream or poem or essay or kvetch or announcement or whatever. Just email it to me. Or include it in a reply to this post. Or send me a link to your writing project and I'll take it from there and read it on the air. That's what I'm here for.

Besides all that, at https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com you'll find a fresh batch of dozens of links to worthwhile items I set aside for you while gathering the show together, such as:

How science fiction movies have changed. I don't 100-percent agree with this, but it's a fair survey. https://nagonthelake.blogspot.com/2024/08/how-sci-fi-has-changed-over-last-70.html

Further space babes. The one top-left looks very like Servalan. Not quite supercilious enough in the eyes; but I see it about the mouth, nose, chin, confidence, weapon, and close-cropped-hair-shaped helmet. I read that Servalan was only supposed to be in the first year (of Blake's 7), but viewers demanded her, so they kept her on and made her a big part the whole rest of the four-year run of the series. She's coldly calculating evil itself in heels and a slit-sided sock dress. https://tackyraccoons.com/2024/08/28/space-bimbos-iii/

Heat. When replacement eyes are common and affordable, you'll be able to voice-command or maybe even squint-command your eyes to do this and many other tricks, like cartoonize the world, put motion and smell lines around moving and smelly objects, show exclamation marks and sweat droplets shooting out of a funny angry person's head, highlight fire exits or the path to the restroom or to the nearest receptive person whose registered personality dovetails nicely with yours, etc. Before that, though, this feature will be part of regular glasses, then contact lenses. Soon. https://misscellania.blogspot.com/2024/08/tweet-of-day_01209985264.html

Also it will do things like this, while you're eating dinner, or waiting on hold, or taking a bathroom break from work, if you want it to. Not while you're driving, of course, or Juanita is talking. https://misscellania.blogspot.com/2024/08/tweet-of-day_01148676348.html

/When you are born to do something and you know it./ I know what this feels like. When I was a little boy I tried to plunge the toilet to make it flush right. I kept trying and it kept not working, and I didn't give up, because if at first you don't succeed, try, try again. I was wasting a lot of metered water. My grandmother, whose mother's maiden name was Paulsinski, but was changed to Paulsy when she (her mother) came to America in the late 1800s, came in, said, "Gimme that," took the plunger from me, said, "I'm gonna show you something you can use for the rest of your life. This is called the Paulsy plunge." She crouched over, pressed the flush lever, held the plunger shaft with both hands, set the rubber part firmly on the drain hole, and /jammed it down and up, down and up, down and up/, really putting her whole skinny little body into it, grunting with effort. She let the water level get up near the rim, pulled the plunger out, stood back up, and waved voila as the toilet swallowed. Now, several times in my life I have seen someone trying and failing to get results from a plunger. They are doing it wrong. It's like they're politely asking it to work for them, not laying down the law. I say, "Let me show you something. Gimme that." https://misscellania.blogspot.com/2024/08/plunger.html

Marco McClean, memo@mcn.org, https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com

HUMBOLDT HISTORY: The Holmes-Eureka Massacre, When Eureka Police and Vigilantes Shot Striking Lumber Workers Dead

On the morning of June 21, 1935, at the Holmes-Eureka lumber mill in Eureka, a six-week-old strike by Humboldt County lumber workers came to a violent end. A riot broke out when a crowd of more than 200 pickets clashed with police and vigilantes attempting to clear the front gate. Tear gas, then firearms were used against stone-throwing strikers, killing three and wounding at least seven. More than 100 people were arrested for rioting, resisting an officer, and battery. …

https://lostcoastoutpost.com/2024/aug/31/humboldt-history-labor-day

WHEN I WAS A KID growing up in New York in the 60s and first heard that there was college basketball player named Julius Irving who was scoring more than 25 points a game, I thought, “Finally! A great Jewish basketball player!”

— Billy Crystal

49ERS’ RICKY PEARSALL SHOT IN CHEST DURING ROBBERY IN S.F.’S UNION SQUARE

by Christian Leonard

San Francisco 49ers wide receiver Ricky Pearsall was shot in the chest late Saturday afternoon during a robbery in Union Square.

Pearsall, the 49ers’ first round pick in the most recent NFL draft, was rushed to San Francisco General Hospital, where he was being treated for his injuries and in “serious but stable condition,” according to a statement from the 49ers.

The robbery suspect, a 17-year-old from Tracy, was immediately apprehended and arrested by police. The suspect was shot during a struggle with Pearsall and was also being treated at SF General, police said.

Board of Supervisors President Aaron Peskin said he received a briefing from a police captain, who told him that Pearsall was shot in the chest and fought back. “He wasn’t having any of it,” the captain told Peskin.

The robber was wounded with his own gun in the scuffle, police said. Police Chief Bill Scott said at a press conference outside S.F. General Saturday evening that only one gun was involved and as far as is known, the suspect acted alone. He emphasized, however, that there was an active investigation.

There was no indication that Pearsall was targeted because he was a football player, according to Scott, who declined to say what the suspect was trying to steal from Pearsall. “We have a good idea (but) we’re not ready to release that at this time,” Scott said.

San Francisco police said the robber was shot in the hand or arm. He is in stable condition, Scott said.

Pearsall “sustained a bullet wound to his chest and is in serious but stable condition,” the 49ers said in a statement. "”We ask that you please respect his privacy at this time. Our thoughts and prayers are with Ricky and the entire Pearsall family.”

Speaking at the press conference outside the hospital, Mayor London Breed called the shooting a “terrible and rare incident in Union Square,” calling the situation a “setback” for the area. Breed stressed that San Francisco has one of the lowest violent crime rates in the U.S., but said, “the data goes out the window sometimes when something happens like this.”

The San Francisco Fire Department said that the first 911 call for a report of shots fired came in at 3:28 pm on Saturday.

A Union Square security guard said she saw a man, possibly the robber, running into the Diptyque store carrying bags. The guard then heard three shots and saw people running and screaming before police quickly arrived.

Hours after the shooting, five shell casings lay on the ground at Geary and Grant streets. About a dozen police officers were surveying the scene, dusting two Teslas — black and gray — for fingerprints.

Scott said the police would further increase their presence in the Union Square area.

A witness said he was at a Kearny Street stoplight with about three seconds left when he heard about five shots and saw six women running. The witness said he saw Pearsall with blood streaming down his left arm. Police ran toward the victim, not the suspect, which the witness thought was odd.

“It was a scary situation,” said the witness, who asked not to be identified.

San Francisco's reported crime rate in the first four months of this year was the lowest since at least 2018, the Chronicle reported in May. That rate had increased from 2021 to 2023, but was on the decline in the years leading up to the pandemic. The falling crime rate was largely due to a sharp decrease in property crimes in larceny theft — including in the Financial District/South Beach neighborhood, which includes Union Square.

This year, the number of reported crimes through Aug. 25 fell by 33% from the same period last year. The number of robbery reports also dropped by 22%.

“Sadly gun violence happens all over America, but when we have one instance of gun violence in Union Square, it gets all the attention,” Peskin said. “It is horrible, it is tragic, it is frightening, but it is rare.”

San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins said at a press conference Sunday that a charging decision from her office was likely Tuesday or Wednesday.

In a statement, she thanked the police department and said: “We cannot and will not tolerate senseless crime in San Francisco, and my office will ensure that there is accountability.”

49ers players expressed relief that Pearsall was in stable condition. 49ers wide receiver Deebo Samuel posted on X Saturday that “He’s good. Thank God.”

Update (Sunday afternoon)

Ricky Had His Eyes On The Prize’: What Molded Pearsall Into A Future 49ers Wideout?

by Eric Branch

The “Oklahoma Drill.”

Ricky Pearsall, the San Francisco 49ers wide receiver who was their first-round pick in last month’s draft, winced last week when he said those words. It was as if he had been transported back to a youth-football practice and was now bracing for yet another spine-rattling hit.

Every member of his team, the Wildcats, participated in the full-contact, one-on-one drill in which he and his junior high teammates ages 13-14 would mimic a car crash, colliding with each other after getting a running start. But Pearsall’s experience was unique: He was always the Hyundai smashing into a Humvee during those painful practices in Phoenix.

The lopsided battles were orchestrated by his dad, Ricky Sr., an assistant coach who had been a scrappy, size-challenged standout wide receiver at Northern Arizona University.

“He would always throw me in against some of my buddies that were at that puberty point and I wasn’t,” Pearsall said. “They might have had a few more armpit hairs than I did. And it was killing me. But I learned to have that controlled aggression.”

Pearsall learned lessons from both his parents that explain his rare makeup. It’s a cliche for NFL players to be tough, hard-working and dedicated. But how many weigh 190 pounds and play like a linebacker? And are so driven that coaches need to order them to stop practicing? And are so single-minded that they stayed home on weekend nights as a teenager because good times might interfere with having good games?

“In high school he never went out,” said his mom, Erin. “And, honestly, as a mom I was a little bit worried at first: ‘Don’t you want to go out and hang out with your friends? ’ But Ricky had his eyes on the prize. He wasn’t easily influenced by parties and the stuff that a lot of teenagers are influenced by. He’s always marched to the beat of his own drum.”

His parents’ example established their son’s cadence. Ricky Sr.’s influence is more obvious and was often chronicled during Ricky Jr.’s college career at Arizona State and Florida. But Pearsall’s determination isn’t just a product of those one-sided Oklahoma drills and other on-field instruction.

Last month, the day after he was drafted, Pearsall referred to his mom as a strong and inspiring woman whose resilience allowed her to “fight each and every day and persevere” when he was growing up.

It was a reference to the challenges Erin faced after she and her husband, a captain in the Phoenix Fire Department who routinely worked 24-hour shifts, divorced when Ricky was 8. Erin, who had been a stay-at-home mom, began working three bartending jobs while living in a three-bedroom, 1,000-square-foot house with Ricky and his three sisters, Victoria, now 29, Isabella, 22, and Paige, 19.

Ricky shared a bedroom for two years with Erin, who is now a real-estate agent after carving out time to earn her license.

“You don’t really realize at that age, the toughness she had and the sacrifices she made,” Pearsall said. “I was just sitting in the room playing video games, not really appreciating what she’s doing over there at the table studying her butt off. And, obviously, seeing my dad working so hard. Seeing that growing up, and then being able to mature and see that those things happened in my life for a reason. How could I take those traits I saw in my parents and put them in my life?”

Ricky Sr. was an All-Big Sky wide receiver and an All-America punt returner at NAU, excelling despite his 5-foot-9, 180-pound frame. The elder Pearsall was a technician known for toughness. An NFL scout invoked Ricky Sr. when discussing his son with draft analyst Dane Brugler of the Athletic.

“The kid has heart,” the scout said. “His daddy was a tough-as-s—, sticky-handed receiver, and the apple didn’t fall far.”

About those sticky hands: They were created by sugar. When Ricky was 3, his dad gave him a Skittle each time he caught a ball with his hands, and he removed one from his pile of the candy for every drop or ball caught against his chest. At 5, Ricky was running cone drills. At 6, he began playing pee-wee football.

And from his first youth game to his final college game — Florida’s 24-15 loss to Florida State in November — Ricky has received counsel from his dad, often in the form of text messages that require scrolling, and scrolling …

“Oh, 1,000%,” Pearsall said. “He’s on me to this day about stuff that I do. It’s not going to stop, I promise you. Year 10 (in the NFL), he’s probably going to be texting me similar stuff. Hopefully I fix a few things by then.”

His exhaustive training explains why Pearsall, an exceptional route runner, has fewer things to fix than many NFL rookies. Florida head coach Billy Napier said Pearsall “always had a purpose” and lauded his attention to detail.

Pearsall would catch 100 consecutive balls from a JUGS machine, before and after practice, and he would restart when he had a drop. The result: He had six drops on 233 career targets and had the fourth-lowest drop rate in college football last season, when he had career highs in catches (65) and yards (965).

At Arizona State, where Pearsall spent three years before transferring to Florida for his final two seasons, Sun Devils head coach Herm Edwards occasionally had to order Pearsall to not practice.

Edwards, a former NFL cornerback and head coach, raved about Pearsall to 49ers general manager John Lynch while noting his quest for greatness could run him ragged.

“I told John this: You’ve got to protect him from himself,” Edwards said. “Because he’s a full-speed guy. He can wear himself down just because of the way he practices and goes about his business. He’s so competitive. Every once in a while, you’ve got to say, ‘OK, this is like a half-speed drill. Just slow down.’ And there were other times, ‘No, man, you’re not practicing today. You get a day. You’re not doing it.’ And it would be, ‘Aw, Coach.’ ”

If he wasn’t playing football, Pearsall was talking about it.

Pearsall became particularly animated last week when asked about running routes. He moved up in his chair and joked to a member of the 49ers’ public relations staff that the interview could take longer than expected.

He began talking about arm placement at the top of his breaks. And “foot and ankle details” that can make an average route elite. And other nuances not noticed by fans, such as when a wide receiver adjusts his route based on the defensive coverage.

Pearsall spent countless hours at Florida discussing the subject with his friend, Thai Chiaokhiao-Bowman, a fellow wide receiver.

“It’s an art,” Pearsall said. “Even just saying that excites me a little bit because I love talking about this. … There’s always room for improvement. That’s what excites me. You’ll never get to that point where it’s, ‘Oh, yeah, I’m perfect.’ You see guys like (All-Pro wide receivers) Davante Adams and Justin Jefferson get to that high level. That’s what it looks like. And that’s what it’s about. Getting to that level.”

Pearsall’s passion helped transform him from a little-used underclassman — he had 13 catches in his first two seasons at ASU — into the No. 31 pick in the NFL draft. Head coach Kyle Shanahan, a former college wide receiver, said it was obvious in studying Pearsall that his routes were a result of gym-rat hours.

“He’s an extremely advanced route runner,” said director of player personnel Tariq Ahmad. “There’s extremely advanced detail in his routes. Polish. Understanding how to beat man coverage. Understanding the areas in the zone to attack.”

Ahmad was also struck by Pearsall’s willingness to attack defenders with an aggression that belies his size. Edwards said Pearsall’s courage in catching passes over the middle, an area of the field where big hits often await, is a quality that often separates wide receivers in the NFL.

Ahmad smiled when told about the Oklahoma Drill, which was banned by the NFL in 2019 because of the injuries it risks and causes, and how it helped create Pearsall’s controlled aggression.

“That doesn’t surprise me,” Ahmad said. “Because that has to be trained throughout your life to have a mentality of, ‘I’m not going down. I will fight continuously to get a little bit more on every single snap.’ ”

Pearsall’s mentality was molded by more than one drill or any one person. It’s a product of a tough-as-nails ex-wide receiver and a just-as-rugged single mom whose influence was also priceless.

“I think, ‘OK, so now that I’m in the NFL, I can give back,’ ” Pearsall said. “But I don’t think I could ever give back as much as they’ve given me. I give them all the credit for me being in the NFL, with the 49ers, in this position.”

(SF Chronicle)

AFTER YEARS OF FEUDING, THE GIANTS HAVE MADE PEACE WITH SAN FRANCISCO’S SEAGULLS

by Elizabeth Wilson & Christian Leonard

As the ninth inning drew to a close at San Francisco’s Oracle Park on a recent afternoon, the mood in the stands was dour — the Giants were losing to the White Sox. But in the skies above the stadium, the real game was just getting started.

California and Western gulls glided overhead, scouting the bleachers for garlic fries and ketchup-smeared hot dog buns. The gulls soared steadily by the dozens as the bleachers emptied. Soon, the birds were left alone to engulf any leftover food they could find.

Some observers have pointed out over the years that the birds almost seem to know when the final pitch is about to be thrown, the signal for them to begin their approach. And despite prior attempts to deter them, the Giants have embraced their presence, according to Stan Sprinkles, who leads the facilities department for the Giants.

That’s a major change from previous years. Fans, vendors and even players have griped about the gulls, whose impatience for games to end sometimes leads them to start scavenging for snacks before fans have a chance to leave the stadium. And the poop the gulls leave behind requires extra cleaning. But with a drop in gulls observed this past year, and a lack of reported bird aggression or attacks, the Giants are not currently using mitigation tactics as they have previously.

Over the past decade, the Giants have considered a few different tactics to keep the gulls from breaching the outfield. Falconry was a promising solution, but was deemed too expensive — $8,000 a game, the Mercury News reported in 2016.

An enterprising red-tailed hawk named Bruce Lee kept other birds away while nesting at the stadium, but eventually abandoned his position. One of the more successful strategies was to blast “The Cha-Cha Slide,” with a chorus of mid-song claps usually enough to scare the gulls away. The Giants also played a falcon screech to scare off the gulls, which worked until the gulls became accustomed to the noise, Sprinkles said.

At Oakland Coliseum, the A’s previously used two falcons to mitigate gulls at the stadium during baseball games.

Cleaning crews sweep the stadium after games to clean and pick up lost items. Once the crews start cleaning, the gulls take off, Sprinkles said. If seagulls come down to the stadium during the game, the Giants display a message on the big screen that asks fans to clap their hands to shoo them away.

“We’re embracing the seagull, you know, seagulls are here,” Sprinkles said. “We know we’re going to live together. So we’ve kind of tongue-and-cheek accepted it as part of the team, in a way.”

Sprinkles remembers when the stadium first opened in 2000, when it wasn’t considered out of the ordinary to see the birds — after all, the stadium is right by the water. Over time, he said, more and more gulls showed up. Before the pandemic, he remembers a few games where the gulls got “out of hand.”

“It kind of gives me a flashback to the movie ‘The Birds,’ where I look up into the bleachers, and I’m like, ‘Oh my goodness, there was almost a bird for each seat,’” Sprinkles said.

How do the gulls know when it’s about time for an Oracle Park meal? They’re incredibly observant scavengers, said Andrew Farnsworth, a visiting scientist at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. The gulls tend to flock near areas with food scraps, including ballparks.

Gulls are omnivores and will eat almost anything, said Whitney Grover, deputy director of the Golden Gate Bird Alliance. Working together, birds are very social and collaborate to share information about food resources, Grover said.

Yet gulls can be problematic for other birds, since their indiscriminate palettes can include the eggs of environmentally threatened birds like Western snowy plovers. And like crows and ravens, their populations can grow oversized, crowding out other species, said Nathan Van Schmidt, water bird science director at the San Francisco Bay Bird Observatory.

Gulls are some of the most common birds in the Bay Area. When the Golden Gate Bird Alliance conducted its annual count of San Francisco birds around Christmas last year, they found that about 6,700 of the roughly 58,000 birds it tallied were California or Western gulls, the two most common types of gulls in the Bay Area. That amounted to nearly 12% of all birds the group counted, twice the share the gulls comprised in 1983.

Last year’s gull count dropped sharply from the 2022 count, when volunteers tallied 4,800 gulls, about 23% of the total number of birds spotted. Van Schmidt, who said that the SFBBO has also seen a decline in the number of gulls and other water birds nesting this year, added it’s unclear what’s behind the drop, though he suggested that powerful El Niño weather patterns could be one factor. The second highest count observed since 1983 was 2018, when gulls comprised 21% of the total number of birds spotted.

Over the long-term, the Bay Area’s gull population has grown significantly. When the SFBBO began monitoring nests of California gulls in the South Bay in 1980, researchers found 24 birds, Van Schmidt said. Five years later, they recorded 2,200 birds, a population that has since ballooned to the tens of thousands.

The gulls started nesting in the Bay Area after being displaced elsewhere, Van Schmidt explained. California gulls previously nested in large counts at Mono Lake, but when water levels — drained in large part by diversions to Los Angeles — dropped around 1980, coyotes started attacking nest sites, which they were now able to access by walking across the newly dry lakebed. With their habitat threatened, many of the gulls fled south, setting up new nests in the South Bay.

“This is their home, and we’re their neighbors,” Grover said.

Researchers don’t know for sure, but Van Schmidt said it wouldn’t surprise him if those gulls commute from as far as the South Bay to Oracle Park for some easy meals.

Typically, California gulls are most active — or hungry — at dawn, Van Schmidt said. Throughout the day, gulls “take it easy” before foraging again during the evenings.

“They wake up in the morning like everybody else, hungry, ready for breakfast,” he said.

(SF Chronicle)

ONCE THE OLIVE CAPITAL OF THE WORLD, A CALIFORNIA CITY IS NOW MOSTLY IGNORED

Corning, Calif., is mostly overlooked, but the highway town along I-5 holds a juicy past.

by Suzie Dundas

Corning is not a very well-known California city even though thousands of people pass it by every day. It sits on the side of Interstate 5 sandwiched between Sacramento and Redding. Drivers may not even recognize there’s a town there unless they pull over for gas on the way to Mount Shasta.

However, to bypass Corning’s highway exits without a stop is a mistake — at least for anyone who likes martinis, Spanish tapas or the liquid gold that’s foundational for all cooking.

Corning is the olive oil capital of North America — maybe even the world, depending on who you ask and when.

“I don’t think there’s an official source for that,” laughed Corning City Manager Brant Mesker when asked about the city’s superlative. “It was the olive capital of the world. But the industry has changed, so now, maybe it’s just the olive capital of North America.”

Being the olive capital of a continent still counts for something, and a long association with the crop is one of the primary reasons visitors stop in the sleepy town. But increasingly, visitors are also stopping for two other quirky crops: lavender, and shower-ready organic loofahs from Corning’s boutique MoonBeam Farm.

However, at the southern edge of town, the massive Rolling Hills Casino continues to expand, drawing a decidedly different type of traveler more apt to drop $20 in a slot machine than mosey through purple-hued lavender fields. While it’s an economic driver for the town, employing about 500 people among Corning’s approximately 8,000 residents, recent investments into amenities like new restaurants and a modern 18-pump “Travel Center” is tempting drivers to exit toward the casino, not Corning.

The Queen Crop

Corning’s history starts the way many small town histories in California do: It was home to Indigenous Americans — in this case, the Nomlaki people — who were mostly displaced when white settlers arrived.

Today, the Paskenta Band of Nomlaki Indians operate one of the town’s biggest draws: the Rolling Hills Casino. Anyone familiar with I-5 has seen its playful billboards scattered between long stretches of the drive.

Prior to the casino’s debut in 2002, the town’s identity was mostly synonymous with agriculture. Corning’s Mediterranean-like climate proved ideal for cultivating the Queen olive, a Spanish varietal that would eventually define the region’s culinary character.

Today, Mesker thinks the olive industry accounts for at least half the jobs in Corning. Signs of the town’s reliance on the industry are everywhere, from the top-rated shop on Tripadvisor (the Olive Pit) to the local elementary school (Olive View Elementary) to the city’s biggest annual event: the Corning Olive Festival and Car Show, now celebrating its 77th year.

But despite the town’s slogans and signs, it’s not the only crop thriving in Corning.

“Why would I grow olives? Everyone else is,” said Caz Hansen, owner of Corning’s MoonBeam Farm. The loofah-and-lavender farm is the top tourist “Thing to Do” in Corning on Tripadvisor. (It’s also the only one; the other is a permanently closed olive oil tasting room.)

Named for a French impressionist painting that inspired Hansen during a visit to the de Young Museum in the 1970s, MoonBeam Farm specializes in loofahs, also called landsponge, which differ from the cheaper variations found in most stores. Those versions, Hansen says, are treated with pesticides, dyed with lye and compressed into dense discs.

“They’re not good for anything,” she said dismissively, handing me a crusty hunk of one from Walmart. “Except maybe grinding dead skin off your feet.”

MoonBeam loofahs are organic, non-GMO and surprisingly large. Some are a foot long, and much softer and lighter than commercially available alternatives. Loofah cultivation requires hot and humid conditions to sprout, Hansen explained.

Corning isn’t a tourist town, and Hansen thinks most people who visit are probably drawn by the casino. To drum up year-round business, she offers art classes, hosts RV parking, rents out the farm for photoshoots and has online sales through Etsy.

Another way that Hansen pulls people into Corning is by offering free farm tours, during which visitors can observe loofah cultivation firsthand.

As we meandered through rows of loofah plants, she affectionately calls the loofah plants “her kids,” pointing out not just the lighter colored gourds — a variant she crossbred herself for longer vines and larger loofahs — but also the many bees that call the farm home.

The lavender she grows serves as the base for most of the handmade items in the small farm shop, from lavender cookie mix to car diffusers to lotions and eye masks. It’s not that lavender is necessarily more popular, she said, but more that “there’s not a hell of a lot else you can do with loofah.”

Next to the loofah vines are fields where she grows up to eight species of lavender, all of which should be aromatic for years.

“My dad once told me he heard that when they opened King Tut’s tomb, they could smell lavender that had lasted for more than 2,000 years,” she said matter-of-factly.

Casino Competition

Hansen acquired the 10-acre farm in 2015. (Formerly a marijuana farm, MoonBeam at its peak coincidentally had 420 loofah plants.) Over the past decade, she’s dealt with several natural challenges, including flooding and a tornado that destroyed her greenhouse.

However, this year, she’s also worried about the smoke from the nearby Park Fire that ignited in July to become one of the largest wildfires in state history. When I visited, it was barely 50% contained. Hansen pointed out discolorations on some leaves.

“Smoke could have an impact,” she shrugged. “I think it might. You never know about dust particulates on the leaves.”

This year’s record-breaking heat is also taking its toll, shortening her lavender season by more than a month. “We had what, 15, 16 days above 100 degrees in June?” she said, shaking her head and gesturing to the now dry and yellowing expanse outside the farm shop. “Two months ago, this all looked like a golf course.”

The city manager also raised concerns about the impact of California’s rising summer temperatures and wildfires on the olive industry, but Mesker said there’s another obstacle that’s pinning Corning down. He said domestic olive production is pricier than buying imports.

“But it’s the tradition that’s behind it,” he opined of the Corning-grown olives. “A lot of foreign olive farms are properties owned by large corporations just trying to make a buck. Here, it’s generations of families doing the work themselves.”

One of those multi-generational businesses is the town’s Olive Pit, a gourmet food shop and cafe. It was busy during my visit on a Friday, with guests browsing multi-tiered, olive-stuffed racks sorted by everything from “garlic style” to “cheese-stuffed” to “hot spiced.”

The Olive Pit started in 1967 year as a basic burger grill, but pivoted when then-owners Ann and Pete Craig realized locally grown olives were flying off the shelves. Today, it’s still owned by the Craig family and is the largest retailer of olive and olive oil products in Corning. I ordered a blood orange and olive oil shake (the most popular, per the cashier) and it was surprisingly tasty and creamy.

MoonBeam Farm and the Olive Pit are likely the town’s main draws — outside the casino that dominates the southern end of the city. Mesker says it’s never been much of a tourist town, but it’s become less so as Rolling Hills Casino and Resort expands. In 2022, the casino completed a $50 million expansion that added an amphitheater and several new restaurants.

The success of one business may come at the cost of others in town.

“They have a number of restaurants and hotels now, so if anything, they’re big enough that they are attracting folks to stop there, rather than stop off in Corning,” Mesker said. SFGATE reached out to Rolling Hills Casino repeatedly for comment but did not hear back before publication.

The city manager said there are hopes to develop its historic downtown area to bring travelers into town. But Corning is so deeply rooted in its olives that it may never grow beyond the past to become a bigger destination. After all, its only roadside attraction is “the world’s largest green olive.”

Hansen hopes to expand MoonBeam Farm’s offerings into flowers next year, but it depends on several factors, including whether the town’s tourism and economy rebound a bit.

“It’s a rough financial situation out here,” she said. “I try to get good, quality products in here. I’m not a Walmart. I never will be a Walmart.”

(SFgate.com)

A'aninin woman preparing sacred dog soup on the Fort Belknap Reservation in Montana - circa 1906

{Note: This young dog would have been quickly killed, then placed briefly on a fire to singe off all the hair, before being placed into the cooking pot to make soup. A number of Northern Plains Tribes had a special relationship with dogs, and every family had a few. Before the introduction of horses, dogs would help transport belongings when a camp moved. Dogs were used in hunting and they kept the camp clean by eating scraps and bones; they served as level of protection and early warning by barking when a predator like a Grizzly Bear or a group of enemy warriors were close to camp. However, the most important thing was that if things got desperate during a tough Winter and a camp ran out of food, they could always eat a dog to get protein enough to survive until Spring. For the reason that dogs made the difference for the Tribe's survival, a young dog is ceremonially used as sacrifice to make sacred dog soup used in a Kettle Dance before the Grass Dance, as a prelude to the Sundance and given to elders as a way of recognizing the dog's special place in the traditions of the people.}

ON-LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

Yes, all humans are flawed, and most cops are human. Consider, however, that there are qualitative differences between people. Some people have a sense of humanity, and there are others who do not. The flawed cops are out there to suppress those predators who have little humanity and would prey on others. The cops, as flawed as they are, are generally a better class then your neighborhood burglar, rapist, or marauding Canadian.

BILL KIMBERLIN

I have been reading a biography about Marjorie Merriweather Post, heir to the Post Cereal fortune and the creator of General Foods. She built Mar-a-Lago in 1925 as her Florida home at the cost of $2.5 million dollars. It spans 126 rooms and 62,500 sq ft built on 17 acres of land. Her will donated it to the United States as a summer White House. They turned it down. Trump bought it in 1985 at a fire sale price.

RALPH NADER: “Take the promises ‘for the people’ by Kamala Harris with a grain of salt. Even if sincere, she knows the realities of a corporate Congress and a corporate Supreme Court. Consider the emphatic promise by Joe Biden in 2020: ‘No more drilling on federal lands. Period. Period. Period. Period.’ Now, the Washington Post reports: ‘The Biden administration has now outpaced the Trump administration in approving permits for drilling on public lands.’ Period!”

WALTER KIRN: What’s amazing to me is that especially if you’re on the left or if you’re a Democrat, that you even are worried or concerned about who’s president. I mean, you don’t want the evil Donald Trump, of course, but the presidency itself seems to have just dissolved into a mist. I mean, it’s being administered right now by a guy who hasn’t been off the beach for two weeks and a vice president who hasn’t been in Washington. There are major conflicts going on in the world, so you can be sure decisions are being made by someone, but we don’t know who. It’s almost conventional wisdom now that the Obama machine or faction is kind of in control in some way. Had a big role in picking at least the vice president vaults and so on. So the presidency has never been more amorphous and more kind of committee-like. And yet they also have to get us into a state in which one person is all-important. That’s a strange psychological task, to convince you that the presidency is really a committee. It can just go on autopilot and maybe it should, but also it is absolutely of historic, absolute historic urgency that we nominate this one person.

THE ORIGIN OF ‘GENOCIDE’

Nazis! The Fraught Politics of a Word and a People Besieged

by Gary Fields

Like many highly-educated individuals in Palestine today, Mohammed Q. cannot find work in his field of computer engineering, despite a master’s degree in computer science from Birzeit University, and as a result, he relies on the tourist industry to earn a living, drawing on his fluent English and knowledge of the fraught politics of the region. In the aftermath of October 7th he was working in Ramallah at the same hotel where, by fate, I found myself as the only guest on a sabbatical that began October 6th. Over coffee, he recounted to me an experience leading a group of German tourists to Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem. As a West Bank Palestinian, Mohammed would normally be barred from entry to the Israeli capital, but because of his role on this occasion in shepherding a German tour group through the Holy Land, he was able to obtain the mandatory permit from Israeli authorities to enter the Holy City. While at Yad Vashem, the group had a tour from one of the Museum docents who explained in detail the suffering endured by Jews at the hands of the Nazis

As Mohammed recalls the episode, the guide described how the Nazi regime forced Jews to wear a yellow badge as a mark of identification that enabled Nazi authorities not only to stigmatize them, but to monitor and control their movements. Alongside this measure, Nazis eliminated the rights of Jews to German citizenship, insisting that only those with “pure” Aryan blood could be Germans. Bolstered by mobs of fascist-supporting vigilantes, Nazi authorities orchestrated modern-day pogroms against Jews including the ransacking of Jewish businesses and the theft of Jewish property designed to force Jews out of Germany. Those Jews who tried to remain, the guide explained, fell victim to the night raids of the Nazi SS in arresting Jews and sending them to concentration camps. In areas outside Germany under Nazi rule, Nazi policy ghettoized Jews as a prelude to a genocidal campaign of eliminating them as a people, and the guide spoke admiringly of the heroism of Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto who resisted these measures. “I did not know about all of this suffering,” Mohammed admitted to me, “and I felt sorry for these Jewish victims of Nazism.” At the same time, he could not help but reflect on the parallels with his own experience as a West Bank Palestinian living under Israeli military rule.

Mohammed thanked the guide and admitted that he had not been fully aware of the suffering of Jews at the hands of the Nazis. He then commented to the docent that many details in his story of the Jews resonated for him as a Palestinian living in the West Bank. After Mohammed made this admission, however, the guide became angry and demanded to know how he was able to come to Jerusalem and gain entry to the Museum. Mohammed explained that he had received the necessary permit from Israeli authorities to chaperone the German tour group at which point the guide became extremely irate and called Museum security. “Security personnel from the Museum came,” he explains, “and took me to the exit of the Museum where they ousted me from the building.” In this way, Yad Vashem evicted a Palestinian from its premises for sympathizing with Nazism’s Jewish victims while explaining how, in his own experience, Israeli rule over Palestinians resembled some of the same practices attributed by the Museum to those used by the Third Reich on European Jews. Replete with irony, Mohammed’s eviction from Yad Vashem, in the context of the forced displacements and carnage unfolding in Gaza, recalls a traceable historical arc.

Nazis Among Us?

On December 4, 1948, the New York Times published an open letter penned by a group of Jewish luminaries including Hannah Arendt and Albert Einstein who were protesting a visit to the U.S. by Menachem Begin, founder of the Herut (Freedom) Party of Israel. Herut would later emerge as the foundation of the ultra-nationalist Likud Party of current Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu. Authors of the letter made note of “Fascist elements in Israel” and objected to Begin’s visit because, according to them, Herut was “a political party closely akin in its organization, methods, political philosophy, and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties.”

In support of its claim, the letter referenced the massacre in the Palestinian village of Deir Yassin committed earlier in 1948 by the paramilitary predecessor to Herut, the Zionist Irgun, labeled even by many Zionists of the time a terrorist militia. The Irgun had come into the village, which had harbored no animus toward its Jewish neighbors, and “killed most of its inhabitants—240 men, women, and children—and kept a few of them alive to parade as captives through the streets of Jerusalem,” revealing a practice of cruelty toward Palestinians eerily similar to what Nazis did to the Jews. Arendt was already on record as warily critical of exclusionary tendencies in the Zionist project, writing in “Zionism Reconsidered” (1943) how the Zionist movement stood for a kind of ethno-state in which Palestinians would have only “the choice of voluntary emigration or second-class citizenship.” In the end, Arendt, Einstein and co-signers of the 1948 open letter proffered a warning about Herut and its Fascist roots: “from its past actions we can judge what it may be expected to do in the future.”

Apart from the reference to Deir Yassin, the letter did not specify what this kinship might portend but Fascism’s past practices highlight three themes. First, Fascism is a mass movement animated by an extreme nationalist ethos whose adherents share a sense of collective victimhood caused by “outsiders” who are considered to have illegitimate claims of belonging to the nation and who emerge as the cause of collective national suffering. Second, Fascism channels this shared outlook of victimhood into collective hostility toward these outsiders whom Fascists consider as enemies seeking the nation’s demise. Finally, Fascism enlists its backers to support liquidation of these enemies which drives it to untold levels of brutality and toward territorial expansion to ensure the completeness of the liquidation process, while keeping outsiders safely distant from the bounded space of the nation and those who belong to it.

In the case of the Nazis, some of the signature behaviors that emerged from these contours and resonated so profoundly with Mohammed at Yad Vashem included Nazism’s exclusionary citizenship laws; its pogroms against Jewish businesses and property; night raids by the Nazi SS of Jewish homes along with arrests and deportations of Jews to concentration camps; and the ghettoization of Jews and their liquidation in these confined spaces. Although Mohammed recounts these practices as part of his own experience, it has become anathema, and in some places illegal even to raise the question suggested by his story: How could heirs of those claiming to be Nazism’s most hapless victims assume the role of those who brutalized them, or in the words of Edward Said, how did Palestinians become “the victims of the victims”?

It turns out that insight into this vexing puzzle beckons to two contemporaries from the nineteenth century with vastly different political persuasions. In his celebrated work, The Ancien Régime and the Revolution (1856), Alexis de Tocqueville asked how the luminaries of the French Revolution, with their “love of equality and the urge to freedom” ultimately crafted a system of authoritarian rule little different from the absolutism they so passionately set out to overturn. In seeking to explain this paradox, de Tocqueville signaled a beguiling truth about these revolutionaries who he insists, “were men shaped by the old order.” These individuals may have wanted to distance themselves from the ancien regime they so fervently wished to destroy, but years of conditioning under French absolutism had influenced their outlook and behavior. Try as they might, these revolutionaries, “remained essentially the same, and in fact…never changed out of recognition.” Four years before de Tocqueville’s Ancien Regime, Karl Marx famously wrote how human beings make their own history, but they don’t make it as they please. They make it “under circumstances directly encountered, given and transmitted from the past.” In this way, both de Tocqueville and Marx emphasize how human actors emerge from the circumstances around them, and this history conditions and weighs upon them as they seek to remake the world of the present. What kind of “dead weight” did the Nazi Holocaust cast on Zionism, Jews, and the State of Israel?

Lords of the Landscape

As early as 1904, Zionists in Palestine associated with the Second Wave of Jewish immigration were already signaling the future character of the State of Israel when they promoted the idea of “Hebrew Land, Hebrew Labor.” Central to this slogan was an effort to build an exclusionary Jewish society by evicting Palestinian tenants from lands they purchased, and preventing Palestinian labor on Jewish-owned land. In this way, early Zionism was seeking to create a landscape of Jewish spaces free of Palestinians. What Zionism ultimately created to fulfill these exclusionary impulses, however, took shape after 1945 in the crucible of the long shadow cast upon world Jewry by the experience of the Holocaust when the State of Israel came into being. Its signature practices with respect to the Palestinians reveal a striking, if unsettling set of parallels with what was done to Jews by the Nazis. Two seminal moments in the evolution of the State of Israel are paramount in marking the development of these exclusionary behaviors.

The initial moment encompasses Israel’s early years, 1947-50 and focuses on three defining practices designed to create Jewish ascendancy on the land and render Palestinians a subjugated people. First, during this period, the “Jewish State” — a moniker that is something of a mischaracterization since that State contains a 20% Palestinian population — evicted 750,000 Palestinians from homes within its boundaries, and in a Cabinet decision of July 1948 declared that it would never allow these evictees to return. Second, was what the Israeli Government did to Bedouins from the Naqab desert who managed to remain in their ancestral homeland following the end of hostilities in 1949. The Israeli military rounded up the 13,000 remaining Bedouin and confined them in a prison-like encampment near Beersheva known as the Siyaj (Enclosure Zone) where they were without basic services, forced to obtain permits to enter and exit the Siyaj, and prevented from building permanent housing for themselves. Finally, in the early 1950s, the Israeli State passed a series of laws on property rights, notably, the Absentee Property Law (1950) that dispossessed refugees of their lands on the grounds that they were “absentees,” no longer living in their domains. This law, however, also confiscated the property of roughly 50% of Palestinians in the new state through a macabre legal designation for Palestinians temporarily displaced from their homes who were classified as “present absentees.” In effect, what the State of Israel did in its infancy in seeking to make the Jewish State free of Palestinians by evicting, dispossessing, and confining them, had an uncomfortable resonance with the aim of the Third Reich in making Germany and the Reich Judenrein, free of Jews.

The second historical moment focuses on the aftermath of the June War in 1967 in which the State of Israel sought to extend its domination over Palestinians into territories conquered in the 1967 campaign by settling those areas with Jewish Israelis – a clear violation of Article 49 of the 1949 Geneva Convention. This practice expanded Jewish presence within the conquered space while shrinking Palestinian presence by confiscating an ever-expanding inventory of Palestinian property for settlement-building and limiting the territorial spaces accessible to Palestinians in the occupied areas. In this way, the Jewish State created a constantly growing Hebrew landscape in the areas under its military control.

Not surprisingly, the State of Israel has taken draconian measures to fortify its project of land confiscation and settlement, and to this end has created a carceral-like regime for control over a population that it perceives as hostile to Jewish supremacy on the land. In pursuit of this aim, the Jewish State has not only intensified a system of actual incarceration in which thousands of Palestinians fill Israeli jails as political detainees. The State of Israel has created a massive prison-like environment on the Palestinian landscape dubbed a “Matrix of Control,” for the subjugation of Palestinians. This “Matrix” consists of an elaborate system of checkpoints, including several large checkpoint terminals, diffused throughout the West Bank to control Palestinian circulation; guard towers situated at major transport junctions to monitor Palestinians and their movements; and a massive Wall built along a 450-kilometer route across the West Bank where Palestinian circulation is pre-empted and the territory partitioned in much the same way that Michel Foucault has described the attributes of modern prisons. These features on the land have imbued the Palestinian landscape with the unenviable moniker of “The Biggest Prison on Earth.” More critically, as Palestinians encounter these elements in queues of regimented bodies under the gaze of armed soldiers, the echoes of Nazi landscapes seem inescapable.

Added to this carceral environment is the effort of the Jewish State to weaken Palestinian presence on the land by destroying one of the primary anchors affixing Palestinians to place, the Palestinian home. At any one moment, a Palestinian home is routinely demolished, usually on the pretext of being built “illegally,” without permission, but the State of Israel also destroys Palestinian homes as retribution against entire families of alleged perpetrators of “terror” against the Jewish State. Complementing this destruction is the longstanding practice of Israeli military “raids” into Palestinian homes, casting a pall of terror over the Palestinian landscape. These raids not only witness the arrests of Palestinians who disappear into Israeli jails as political prisoners, but also the ransacking and vandalism of the Palestinian home. Such destruction of Palestinian homes and property, along with the arrests of Palestinians in these actions find resonance in the way Jews were subjected to raids by the Nazi SS and sent to prison camps while their homes were ransacked and looted in Nazi versions of the pogrom.

In February of last year, the world witnessed a particularly savage outbreak of this kind of violence in the Palestinian town of Huwara perpetrated by settlers from nearby Israeli settlements who set fire to cars, businesses, and homes of Huwara residents and killed one resident by gunfire as Israeli soldiers looked on and even assisted the perpetrators in this mayhem. So depraved was this rampage that the Israeli military commander in the West Bank, Yehuda Fuchs even used the word, “pogrom,” to label this carnage, a word choice by an Israeli official that was especially poignant. The implication was that the Jews who perpetrated this violence possessed the same kind of racist animus as perpetrators of Christian and Nazi pogroms against Jews, and enlisted similar types of brutality against Palestinian civilians. At the time of events in Huwara, however, the uprooting of Palestinian croplands and the destruction of rural homes, livestock pens, and farm equipment by Jewish settlers in an effort to evict and drive out Palestinians had already become commonplace on the Palestinian landscape — with nary a condemnation by Israeli officials, and virtually no effort by Israeli authorities to prevent and punish this criminality. As it turned out, Huwara was but a prelude to the much more sweeping campaign of carnage visited on Palestinians in the aftermath of October of the same year.…

jadaliyya.com/Details/45818/Nazis-The-Fraught-Politics-of-a-Word-and-a-People-Besieged

“ONCE THERE WERE BROOK TROUT in the streams in the mountains. You could see them standing in the amber current where the white edges of their fins wimpled softly in the flow. They smelled of moss in your hand. Polished and muscular and torsional. On their backs were vermiculate patterns that were maps of the world in its becoming. Maps and mazes. Of a thing which could not be put back. Not be made right again. In the deep glens where they lived all things were older than man and they hummed of mystery."

— Cormac McCarthy, “The Road”

24 Comments

MAGA Marmon September 1, 2024

I wonder if Craig left town yet, he has until noon today to vacate his motel room.

MAGA Marmon

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- Chuck Dunbar September 1, 2024
  
  Yes, I was also wondering how he’s doing. I hope he lands well and finds a place to live and help. Let us know, Craig.
  
  Reply
- Bob Abeles September 1, 2024
  
  I’m wondering where he’s landed as well. Thanks for asking, James.
  
  Reply
  - Lazarus September 1, 2024
    
    Like minds about Craig, at least…
    I’ve been thinking about Craig also.
    Laz
    
    Reply
- Eric Sunswheat September 1, 2024
  
  $2 bus ticket to Eureka. Then Humboldt County might pay to transport him to Washington DC.
  
  Reply
  - MAGA Marmon September 1, 2024
    
    Fort Bragg would work as well.
    
    MAGA Marmon
    
    Reply
- David Svehla September 1, 2024
  
  I wish Craig all the best.
  
  Reply
Harvey Reading September 1, 2024

https://consortiumnews.com/2024/08/28/hiding-an-ugly-truth-about-israel/

A bit of history that, seemingly, doesn’t make it to the corporate nooze media.

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Cracked Egg September 1, 2024

I called the Royal on State St. Craig left day-before-yesterday, two days ago.

E.T. phone home!

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- Professor Cosmos September 1, 2024
  
  This seems like an important leak of info re Craig’s doings but I’m not completely clear on it’s meanings: has he accepted a spiritualized mission that has taken him off planet?
  
  Reply
  - Un Happy September 1, 2024
    
    Earth to Cosmos
    
    Craig left the hotel on Friday as reported by the Front Desk. I did ask the Front Desk if he knew where Craig was going to which he replied in a friendly manner he did not know. Craig was probably trying to avail himself of public transportation limited on the weekends, with major holiday on Monday.
    
    He has a friend in the Bay Area, or may have taken a plane to DC. I do not know.
    
    He has not kept in touch.
    
    Reply
    - Professor Cosmos September 1, 2024
      
      Let’s hope no news is good news.
      Yes, that factor (limited weekend schedules) makes alot of sense.
      
      Reply
Mike J September 1, 2024

If Craig is going to be unsheltered here in 24 minutes (11am check out time), that presents an opportunity for his form of spiritualized activism.
He would truly be confronting a demonically criminalized community that with great ease accepts the fact that old people are living on the streets. Old people are even kicked out of the shelter here after a time limit they mandate has been riched.

His activist confrontation can be carried out with the help of other community members. I’m sure this will please, in a perverted way, the eager photographers of the Ukiah Vagrant Watch Contingent of demonic energy. He could pitch his tent along the GRT or the lawn at City Hall on Seminary and advertise for help to form a manned perimeter to assist Craig in dealing with UPD or railroad cops and McCowen. I’m sure Craig has powerful mantras aligned protesters can use.

(Can you tell that this situation of old people on the streets pisses me off?)

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Whyte Owen September 1, 2024

FYI: If you have internet, a dumb teevee can be made “smart” with an inexpensive accessory such as an Apple TV or ROKU, which stream any subscription provider (HBO, HULU, PBS, YouTube, ESPN, etc.) and have the advantage of a three-button remote you can use in the dark. Often available on the deep cheap at the Gualala Pay ‘n’ Take.

Reply
- MAGA Marmon September 1, 2024
  
  R0KU also rolls out FoxNews, One America News, NewsMax, and the Right Side Broadcasting Network.
  
  MAGA Marmon
  
  Reply
- Bob Abeles September 1, 2024
  
  Excellent point. I’ll add this: smart TV’s, especially the less expensive ones you’ll find at Walmart, are in-home advertising machines.As a rule I never give them the internet connection they crave. Privacy wise, it’s best to get an Apple TV and hook your lobotomized smart TV up with that. Roku is no longer a good choice, they’ve been taken over by MBA Ferengi who will spy on your viewing habits while shoving ads everywhere they can.
  
  Reply
- Paul Modic September 1, 2024
  
  I took that Smart TV back, turns out my dumb one wasn’t so dumb after all, and that inexpensive accessory you mentioned is supposed to indeed make it smart, and streamable, etc, thanks…(I’ll be paying my internet company $5 a month to rent the component…)
  
  Reply
  - Zanzibar to Andalusia September 1, 2024
    
    The only thing I watch on TV is the NFL, and I found the games can be streamed online from here: https://reddit1.nflbite.com/
    
    You have to click through a ton of ads, but then it just streams. Still has the commercials, so you aren’t stealing anything.
    
    Reply
MAGA Marmon September 1, 2024

49ers’ Ricky Pearsall released from hospital after being shot in chest in San Francisco

According to his mother, Ricky Pearsall was shot during robbery but the bullet missed his vital organs.

“Ricky Pearsall, the San Francisco 49ers’ first-round pick in the 2024 NFL Draft who was shot during an alleged attempted robbery at San Francisco’s Union Square on Saturday, was released from the hospital on Sunday afternoon.”

https://sports.yahoo.com/49ers-ricky-pearsall-released-from-hospital-after-being-shot-in-chest-in-san-francisco-235941345.html

He also has a 12.5 four year guaranteed contract.

MAGA Marmon

Reply
- Marshall Newman September 1, 2024
  
  Discharged within 24 hours means he was very lucky regarding the trajectory of the bullet. That said, healing will take time.
  
  Reply
- peter boudoures September 1, 2024
  
  Shot by a 17 year old from Tracy. Bay Area has a crime problem.
  
  Reply
Zanzibar to Andalusia September 1, 2024

Violent crime in SF is one-third of what it was in 1990.

SF ranks 38th among cities over 200k in population for overall violent crime. 66th for aggravated assault. 66th for murder. 68th for rape.

Wishing Ricky a speedy recovery. Glad Aiyuk signed!

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Sarah Kennedy Owen September 1, 2024

People from other countries, or even outside the area, have no idea how dangerous our headlands and beaches are. Climbing around on the rock cliffs is not for amateurs, and, even without the combination of rough terrain with rough seas, not really for anyone. The bluffs are wildly unreliable, as well, so standing or walking near them is rarely a good idea. Then there is the danger of the beach because of rogue waves and undertows. I guess we really should have warning signs, but, judging from the many accidents at Ocean Beach, San Francisco, which I believe does have warning signs, people rarely pay attention to warning signs. My children swam in the ocean at Virgin Creek Beach, and we were pretty careful, so nothing bad ever happened, except one of their dolls had to be rescued when she (he?) was swept off the rocks! However, one of their friends did manage to get caught in a riptide on a raft, and had to be coached from the shore on how to maneuver to safety. Most beaches, even the calmest, have problems of some kind. A friend of my sister’s broke her collarbone body surfing because of a radical shore break, forcing her head down onto the bottom of the shoreline.

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Donald Cruser September 3, 2024

The write-up on the situation in Palestine has revived an old, unanswered question in my mind. Back in the early seventies I took a job up in the mountains above Tucson, Arizona as a dormitory supervisor at the Southwest Indian Youth Center. It was a rehabilitation program for delinquent Indian youth from tribes all over the Southwest. If they couldn’t handle them on the res, they sent them to us. The age range was 14 to 19. Many of them were strong, handsome, athletic young men.
For three nights a week I came on duty at 4 in the afternoon and monitored their whereabouts and behavior until I put them to bed at 10. Then I would sleep in the dorm with them and get them up and moving in the morning. I worked the “restriction dorm” where any kids who got into trouble on the center would lose most of their privileges and have to move into my open space dormitory. I hit it off with the kids from the very start for several reasons: (1) They were impressed with my skills on the pool table in the rec hall. (2) I was young and enjoyed interacting with them. I would also play basketball with them in their own style. It turned out that they played without rules in a totally free-for-all style. They didn’t pick teams since everyone played as an individual and they didn’t bother with keeping score. It was rough since some of these kids were built like large tree trunks. There was no such thing as a foul, double-dribbling was allowed, and the primary strategy was a full bore charge to the basket. It was fun if a person could take the punishment. They knew the rules and could play by the rules, but preferred not to. Anthropologist’s have studied the connection between sports and culture. There is clearly a cultural tie between American football and our war machine. (3)They were basically nice kids with most of their troubles happening when they were under the influence of alcohol or sniffing glue or paint.
Sorry about the diversion, let me get back to the point I want to make here. Many of these boys had spent a portion of their young lives in penal institutions. Some in juvenile halls and a few of the older ones in the federal prison system. One consequence of this was that some of them had been sexually violated while incarcerated. This wasn’t a worry in my large one room dorm but in the other two dorms were more private rooms for two to share making it more of a concern and we had to deal with a few incidents. Over time I made an observation on who was trying to sexually assault others and went in to discuss it with the director of the Center who also taught psychology at the University of Arizona. He had structured the center on the B.F. Skinner behavior modification model. I shared my observations with the director and he confirmed my conclusion that it was a standard mode of operation for the abused to become the abuser. It still seems contradictory to me that a person who is damaged by another person would want to damage others in the same way. However, there seems to be something in the human psyche that causes the oppressed to become the oppressor. I will let people draw their own conclusions on whether this applies in today’s Middle East.

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Mendocino County Today: Sunday 9/1/2024

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