To San Jose and Back

Now that the trip is over, I can reveal that Sheila and I were up in San Jose within the past week so that she could meet my parents.  The trip was not foreseen at the beginning of the month as that I was involved in a hot project at work and that Sheila didn't think she could get the time off.  I decided to take the week after the Fourth off thinking that I would be spending it in Tucson, but Sheila made some inquiries at where she works and she learned that she could get a block of time off.

Since we didn't know when we would have this opportunity again, we took it.  We left Tucson on Thursday the 10th and we were up in San Jose the next afternoon.  We bypassed both Phoenix and L.A. on the way up, and with a detour at the Tehachapi Loop there were 892 miles on the trip odometer when I pulled into my parents' driveway.

We took three days to drive back as that I had my heart set on taking her down Route 66.  Ever since I did that drive in November 2011 I had been wanting to repeat it, and with some company this time.  I have to devote a separate post as to what we saw that day, as that there was more than one abandoned gas station between Victorville and Barstow.  Also, what I thought was once a truck stop east of Barstow was instead an agricultural inspection station.  The Spirit gas station next to I-40 is now a Valero station, and is operational.  And there's some new graffiti at the old gas station at Cadiz Summit.  I plan on posting some pictures of this trip and the previous one.

As for San Jose, there wasn't much time to play tourist.  There were my parents, some longtime friends, and we got to visit Mark's parents with the help of Skype.  I didn't get to see everyone that I wanted to see either.  That will have to wait until the next time.

I hope we can be back in San Jose for the holidaze, but all indications are that Christmas will be spent here in Tucson.

I do know one thing.  I really enjoy being with Sheila, and like me she thought that 66 was the "bomb".

Fourth of July, 2013

It's the Fourth of July today, our national holiday where some of reflect that it was on this day that our Founding Fathers declared their independence from Great Britain and King George III.  Fighting had been going on for well over a year, and those brave men in the Continental Congress who voted for this Declaration were committing an act of treason against the Crown.  The penalty for doing so was death by hanging, but they were willing (and committed) to the cause.  Independence was formally won in 1781 with our mother country recognizing it via treaty in 1783.

So where have we gone since then?

We went westward.  We had an internal war.  We took in more rejects from Europe.  We invented things.  We built railroads.  We built highways.  We fought the Kaiser almost a century ago, and we fought the Nazis a generation later.  We put several men on the moon and we brought them back.  And right now, I'm asking where we are going.

There's a strange collection of news lately that suggests that there is something wrong.  IRS official Lois Lerner testified under oath before a House Committee and then invoked the Fifth Amendment (which I happen to believe in, for the record).  She now wants immunity from prosecution, which is a strange demand if she really did do nothing wrong, and if she needs immunity then that suggests that she's already committed perjury.

Not too long before that, we had Attorney General Eric Holder running guns to the Mexican drug cartels, of at least which one of them was used to murder a Border Patrol agent.  The person who pulled the trigger of that gun is exactly the type of person that the Obama administration wishes to give amnesty to, and for reasons I can't understand the Republican Establishment (an organization which is a very grave threat to our national security!) is going along with this too.

We have allegations in the news as of late as to how the NSA is reading emails, listening to phone calls, monitoring Facebook, and the emails of journalists.  (I don't really have a problem with the NSA trying to figure out who the terrorists are, for the record.....though I'd prefer you guys get a warrant from the FISA court).

And over in Florida, we have a much publicized trial going on, which in my opinion is only happening due to unusually high pressure from Organized Media, who would love nothing more than to see riots, burning, looting, destruction, and mayhem, so that they can report higher ratings and try to collect more advertising revenue.

Yes, it's strange out there.  Very strange.  You have to wonder where we going, and why we are in this handbasket.

In spite of all that, I happen to believe in this country.  I like living here.  I like enjoying the freedoms that I have, in spite of my concerns of them being under attack from radical leftists who hate this country more than Al Qaeda does.  And although I have some reservations about policies coming from the federal level, I at least, as I write this, still have the right to write my Congressman with my concerns.

However, freedom isn't cheap.  Many thousands of brave Americans have perished on the battlefield to preserve what we now have on this day.

We really need to think long and hard about this before we surrender that freedom.