still sleep with a light on...

 we have had several fires this winter, this was a hotel mid construction.  i know a few have been determined to be arson.  i think this may be one of those. i pulled over on the way to the dog pool tonight because it looked kind of cool with the alpenglow behind it.

 i have successfully wiped out the dogs these past few days.  today's combo of hike and pool really have them sleepy...it's all always erased the next day.

 i head back to work tomorrow night. 

 since the quake on Nov 30, i have slept with a light on down the hall.  silly really as often the electric goes out during a quake...but still, as i ponder flipping off the switch....i stop myself.  perhaps it will be like this for a while... but i doubt it.  soon the light will naturally be here all night anyway.  then I'll just get out of the habit.

 this weeks hikes have taken me to prospect heights, then to powerline pass and then today we did a loop up the campbell airstrip and then a side trail which connects that to the back end of rovers run. I'd done that once a few years back, but in the other direction. switch it up sometimes.  the dogs like the new and different smells.

 our trumpy governor is putting forth a horrific budget plan.  takes tons of money from education and healthcare...leaves all sorts of money and tax incentives for corporations and oil...no surprise there.  the GOP seems to have forgotten the suffering of humans and only bow down to large corporations.  at least the dems are being shamed out of accepting big pac money.  hoping one day we can get the big money out of politics.  pay to play...

 this last inauguration made over twice what others have made and spent like half of what others have.  it's of course, being looked into.  huge donations from an owner of a coal company. the iitoo just tweeted that specific counties must continue to use coal from this particular company...even though their plan was to faze the coal out. investigations are ongoing in this area of this corrupt regime...there seems to be no area that this administration is not corrupting. 

 looking the other way seems pretty insane...in the end it's all fine as long as it's the GOP screwing over everyone but if it's a Dem than all  hell would break loose.  breaking the law is acceptable on one side but not the other.

 Manafort willfully lied.  funny that suddenly his lawyers are trying to convince a judge that he's too old and feeble and that this has caused him to be forgetful of details...odd since he was perfectly capable of working with Rus contacts in order to try and shore up plans for Ukraine after the iitoo got in and shove election polling data to Rus.  it's all about money, oil, sanctions and a hotel in Moscow. 

 the iitoo was not supposed to win, they were supposed to just be able to profit from running.  be able to parlay this all into the hotel there and other things, but Rus wanted him to win.  Rus used social media to shovel lies to an audience begging for anything nasty they could find on their hated candidate.  look and ye shall find...at least Rus will help ye find what you yearn for.  as i always say though, hate makes people easy to manipulate. 

 the manipulation is continuing.  at his latest rally, he repeated lie after lie.  now he's changing build that wall to finish that wall...trying to make them believe that despite the wall not being built at this moment, it is...and by and large it's working.  you can see the fox news "think tank" adjusting their lines to accommodate the failure on the wall funding.  they had more before the iitoo refused to sign before the holidays.  you can see them tweaking their messaging through the week..finding ways to blame the dems or just not mention it at all and focus on the jr congresswoman who has put forth a green proclamation...not a law mind you, just like an "i have a dream" manifesto. stoking fears of the dems making the us a socialist state...it's amazing what people will believe. 

 they need an enemy for some reason and the conservatives are in a full press to make the enemy the liberals, the scientists, the educated. 

 started reading a new book.  i thought it was a novel, but it's a memoir. 

 a girl raised in one of those families in Idaho where they are raised to be paranoid of government.  stock piles of ammo and supplies waiting some end of the world event. not allowed to go to school or get a birth certificate because then the government would have a record. 

 then as I'm reading it turns out they are Mormon.  people will take any religion and bend it to their will.  I've seen a few cases where the promise of personal revelation has taken some strange twists.

 the social network of the Mormon church has gotten more pious i think.  not that the average member is stockpiling ammo and guns, but in general.  reading my Grandpa's diary.  it didn't seem odd in his writing that he smoked a bit and drank as well.  my Grandmother's family wasn't keen on him before they married, but it also doesn't seem like he was any sort of outcast from the religion.  my Grandmothers father had hosted high ranking members of the church before they immigrated to the states and in her diary, back in Ireland, it seems she spoke of those high ranking members laughing and encouraging her father to stop smoking those cigars.

 i figured our family was fairly strict but really not nearly as pious or strict as others.  we had face cards in our house and played often, which i guess was not allowed in other homes. my Dad even allowed us to swim at the beach from time to time on a Sunday. 

 Sundays were more mellow but i recall my brothers and i hitting some Dodger games and not being chastised for this growing up. 

 is it just the nature of any religion as it grows to have a period where they grow more pious and rule oriented?  i don't know.  it seems many of my siblings follow more rules in their own families than we did growing up.  nobody has gone the way of this family I'm reading about. i guess i tend to think of those sorts of Mormons as having gone off the rails or being part of polygamy groups

 should be an interesting read anyway. 

 the pups found this little cave under the trees.

 it was pretty dark in the valley by the time i got out on the trails

 several of these planes flying over.  figure they must have been military.

 not many out on the trails and i didn't see any creatures.  usually you run across some ptarmigan. 

 just these creatures.

 the dogs are all sweet and fluffy from their post swim bath this evening.  funny, the dog that arrived as we were leaving clearly was a regular.  he runs up the ramp to the pool, jumps in, and then just swims in circles in the pool until he is dragged out...such a lab...haha.

 hiked on my own all week. regulars either working or out of town this week.  I'm a bit of a loner at times anyway.  sometimes i need a break from the humans...just feel pushed in at times.  demands, needs, drama.  dogs are drama free, demand free (other than walks and food) so relaxing.

 Denali off in the distance

 fog moved into the city below.  that is sleeping lady across the inlet

 closer view. 

 so many more things that are more concerning for our nation than the border.  the GOP under trump have a one track mind.  home grown gun violence is bound to get you before any asylum seeker will.

 i like the concept in America that all are welcome, that all can be successful here with hard work. many do not like that though.  it is the big experiment.  it is tough for so many from so many different backgrounds to all get along.  best to embrace that which is different and learn from it.  there are many ways to the same end.  overall, we all just want to find peace, happiness and love. 

 change is threatening to some, differences are threatening.  many just don't want to face that fear in themselves i think.  i seen people act crazy over the smallest changes in their lives.  let alone changes in culture in a nation...for those people are just going bat shit crazy.

thankful for: A.  diversity, we all have much to learn from each other.  embrace it B. a dog pool and the happiness that brings C.  fresh air, clean water, wild that hasn't been destroyed.