Dakota Today

**Kidstuff..well over 50 years ago..Baseball in Yankton

For some reason, the term "Yankton Terrys" popped into my head this morning. I knew there had been a Winner Pheasants team back in the 1950's. Sometime around 1953, 54, 55 or so, one of my uncles who liked baseball took my brother and I to a semi-pro baseball game in Yankton. My memory of that is less than clear.

Anyway, I started trying to find information. The Yankton P&D requires somekind of registration for some reason to see their web pages, so that was a waste of time. Anyway, Google found the link below. In that
story is a list of the teams and some of the more famous players that got a taste of South Dakota back in those days.

I am no big sports fan, but interesting reading anyway and more than a few familiar South Dakota names turn up in the stories.

LINK-- Basin League Baseball History

So if Sturgis TITANS, Yankton TERRYS, Valentine HEARTS are not familiar names, stroll back through some sports history. A full list of the teams in the continuation. Incidentally, if you like me wondered why the Yankton,SD teas was called "Terrys", it apparently came from "The Territorials" harking back to the days Yankton was the territorial capitol. Which while stringing things along here, reminds me of one of my father's landlords. One of Basil Wright's favorite stories was telling about making a job application and then being questioned about having been born in "Yankton, DT. " He also always put butter on potatoes before putting on gravy. He said it was to counteract the poison in potatoes, but I think it was more because he really liked butter. Bill Fleming of HOT PINK consulting of Rapid City (That's a free plug there, Sonny) thinks we should be collecting good old stories before we are too old to remember them. Might be a good idea.
Some of the stuff we might dredge up could be truly funny and human in the best sense.

**Stay tuned and yes, I would be in a better mood with a little sunshine and a few less clouds..Today at least..no sense not being really particular about things we can't change--Doug Wiken

**Who are these People anyway and why are the attacking US Rep. Herseth-Sandlin

Apparently some radio stations are playing attack ads against US Rep. Stephanie Herseth-Sandlin, self proclaimed Blue-Dog Democrat from SD. PP at SDWARCOLLEGE has them at his site. David Newquist at his site has an attack on the ads and most everything else that smell in SD politics and blogs right now. He must have had a hard time hearing the website of the attackers. I sure could not tell what it was. PP has generously provided a good link to the Northern Valley Beacon. See the Blog links below:

LINK-- South Dakota War College " From the sound of these commercials, maybe Herseth should have stayed home."

LINK--Northern Valley Beacon post " Fat, unseemly men playing gynecologist, former candidates plagiarizing, and now the anti-Sandlin ads "

There is a bit of ships passing in the night in the above posts. Now and the PP hits some home runs on issues, now and then he should rename his blog "SD Propaganda Collage."

Here are some details related to the ads aimed in the direction of SD Rep Herseth-Sandlin.

LINK--SD Common Sense "About Us"
At that site is a link to a web site design outfit.

LINK-- Wyattopia .."About Us"

At the "home" site from the above link is a list of clients. Hyperlinked at the site: # Kevin Langford for Rankin County Supervisor, Citizens for Community Values, Florence Church of God, HomeSchoolMentor.Com, InsureMyCPC.Com, Dexterity Media, Ohio Election Central, Quantum Integrated Systems, Republican Party of Texas, VizionInteractive, and Zunch Communications.

I did not look at any of these sites, but we might wonder why a web design outfit which seems to like some fundamentalist churches and the gack ..Texas Republican Party is doing putting together attacks for use in South Dakota. I guess webdesigners have something in common with lawyers.

Meanwhile, "CommonSenseSouthDakota" doesn't appear to be really excited about indicating who is actually paying for the website. It is apparently legal to hide behind some skirts covering something obvious.

Domain Name: commonsensesouthdakota.com

Created on..............: Thu, Oct 26, 2006
Expires on..............: Mon, Oct 26, 2009
Record last updated on..: Mon, May 14, 2007

Administrative Contact:
Domain Discreet
ATTN: commonsensesouthdakota.com
P.O. Box 278
Yarmouth, NS B5A 4B2
CA
Phone: 1-902-7495331
Email: b4770d640a1e6728011e5d5e59254ef7@domaindiscreet.com

Susan Carson is listed as Treasurer. There sure are a lot of "Susan Carson"s in the US. This outfit does not have a mailing address or actual location that I can find.

Anyway, I'm sure these people so interested in attacking a SD Representative will gladly make themselves public figures here in South Dakota instead of hiding... nothing behind this curtain.

*** Say tuned to those of us willing to put our names on the line if we criticize or compliment SD politicians--Doug Wiken

**State Senator Frank Kloucek writes letters

I am not sure Frank's letter will do much good, but a few more thousand might start to get our congress critters seriously interested in the problem of our heavy reliance on petroleum energy sources with a heavy reliance on foreign sources where full costs are buried in things like the Iraq War. In the short term, I guess we must rely on congress to insure we aren't getting screwed by price and product manipulation may be about all we can do.

A few weeks ago, Sen. Kloucek hosted a meeting on alternate energy sources. Alternates to foreign oil are essential. But for now, letting our Congress critters know we aren't happy with fuel prices relatively high compared to our recent prices.

Senator Kloucek Requests Full investigation into alleged: price gouging, collusion, illegal blending! Advocates raising ethanol blend from ten to twenty percent immediately! Today SD State Senator Frank Kloucek requested the South Dakota Congressional Delegation to immediately initiate steps to conduct congressional inquiry on dramatic price increases of gasoline and fuel, monitoring of wholesale suppliers to prevent illegal ethanol blending, immediately raising the ten percent ethanol blend to twenty percent and federal incentives for middle and lower class purchasing of more fuel efficient transportation.
"As we approach Memorial Day weekend the need for action by our Congress is critical to avert the continuous price gouging by the oil industry!" concluded Senator Kloucek. [Letter in continuation below was sent by email and US Postal Service]

The actual letter is as indicated in the continuation. My guess our Representatives and Senators are already pretty much bought and paid for by the fossil fuel companies. And we will need to get a nearly whole new Congress not wedded to the Iraq War before we get significant re-orientation of US energy sources and uses.

****Stay tuned. No sense driving anyplace when you can get news like this right here at Dakoto Today ---Doug Wiken

**Disappearing Bees. Salon asks some experts for discussion

Most SD newspapers have had stories on "disappearing bees" and most such stories give an indication of the enormous contribution bees make to crops and the huge costs likely if all bees disappear. Salon Online magazine has a story today which they describe as follows:

Who killed the honeybees? A round table of experts answer all our pressing questions about the sudden death of the nation's bees. What they have to say has a bigger sting than we ever expected.
By Kevin Berger

You can read the whole story at the link below. If you are not a Salon member, you may have to watch a commercial ad of somekind for 20 or 30 seconds or so.
LINK--Salon "Who Killed the Honeybees?"

This appears to be a more or less balanced story on the subject. If I find more online information on this, I may tack links in here.

***Stay tuned if you like honey or you like bee-pollinated foods and crops--- Doug Wiken

**Memorial Day Flags and Memorials need balance by a Folly Day Memorial

Today was not a bad day for photography of flags her in Winner, SD. The wind was blowing too hard perhaps 25mph and flags were outstretched. Sun was bright enough, but there were no puffy cummulous clouds in a bare blue sky. Air was hazy. Anyway, the local veteran's groups got the flags memorializing veterans service in wars up for one more memorial day. With declining population and aging of population, the willing workers for this may diminish. Anyway, below are small versions of several photos. Click on any of them to view a larger version.
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There is a beautiful sadness in these photos. They represent prosaic service and nearly unimaginable sacrifice and heroism. It is good these things and these people be remembered.

But, when we have politicians and influentials making all kinds of speeches regarding memorial day and memorial day celebrations, we may want to also annually have some kind of balance to these celebrations which both memorialize and encourage sacrifice and duty.

We need an annual day reserved for expensive political folly, great political lies, fraudulent political propaganda, great and monumental failures of business and government. Memorial days tend to make death and destruction seem to be national accomplishments. They tend to make us favorably inclined to support future death and destruction with further sacrifice and courage.

George Santayana famously warned that those who fail to learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat it If we learn only the lessons of Memorial Days, we will surely fail to learn the lessons of history or seriously misinterpret them.

How many millions have died needlessly for nothing or next to nothing because they blindly followed those ignorant of history or were cheered on by them? We need somber warnings of the consequences of folly, ignorance, greed, unwarranted confidence, and a dozen or hundred other ways to generate expensive failure.
Annual reminders might help us avoid filling more cemetaries with beautiful waving flags capable of filling one's eyes with tears.

**Stay tuned...got ideas for the Folly Memorial or Museum? Drop me a line--- Doug Wiken

**Bill O'Reilly compared to dog crap...dog crap wins

The Rapid City Journal prints a Bill O'Reilly colum. Today's paper had his "Who would you dine with: Blair or Fonda?" Only would somebody who apparently regularly eats Bush's shit would set up something that absurd. [On edit 5-29.. I notice that the Mitchell Daily Republic has title O'Reilly's vomit as "Don't Listen to Jane Fonda"] The rabid right always trys to kill the messenger. It would seem newspapers should be aware of the ploy.

O'Reilly blames the Iraqis for not cooperating with Bush and Blair. They just didn't behave like the Kuwaitis. He launches into an attack on "actress Fonda" for "launching into her "Bush lied" routine. Apparently the problem with Bush lies is that some people have noticed them by now. The revenge of the "Fool me once, Fool me twice" crowd is crushing down on Bush, Inc. even if Bill O'Reilly still thinks his and Fox News propaganda campaign is somehow going to convert Bush lies into truth by killing the messengers.

His column is self-serving crap from start to finish. Toward the end O'Reilly writes, "But gimlet-eyed Jane and her crew despise people with whom they disagree and routinely assign them with sinister motives...." A paragraph later O'Reilly writes, "the irresponsible America-haters should be ashamed of themselves".

He asks if "any rational person on earth believes that Bush, Blair, and Powell lied?" And soon follows that with this, "The bottom line on this is that there are Americans who despise their country...."

In fewer than four short paragraphs, O'Reilly manages to attack those who haven't gleefully swallowed Bushit and then does exactly what he attacks them for doing or being. It is dangerous to assume motives for behavior, but it seems to me that "hating America" as a motive for being critical of Bush lies is something on the edge of insanity or the most egregious conscienceless shilling for a failed President as is possible. O'Reilly is so adept at projection, that his columns are the print form of projectile vomit.

A question for O'Reilly, "How many million Americans do you believe would prefer dining with Jane Fonda than dining with Bill O'Reilly?" Never mind Tony Blair. O'Reilly linking him and Fonda makes about as much sense as watching TV as he did and noticing a flood killing thousands of people or an earth-quake killing tens of thousands and also seeing notice that Falwell died and deciding that somehow those should be connected because you happened to see both on TV on the same evening.

Bill O'Reilly does not warrant space in newspapers or anything else. His logic and facts are as disconnected from reality and truth as a symphony concert and a dog defecating on grass are disconnected. Why papers continue to carry his dribble is beyond me unless they want to use it as an example of dreadful propaganda...which the RC Journal doesn't.

***Stay tuned even if the image of O'Reilly dining on a Bush turd has left your stomach churning--- Doug Wiken

***Is this a scam or a Spam Scam or pure as the driven snow????

Tonight I received an e-mail from a person I have exchanged e-mail with a number of times in the past. No need to know the name. For all I know they may not even know the e-mail was sent or received. Anyway, from what I could find on the web, you might want to be wary of responding "yes" or "no" to any e-mail messages that include something that looks like the image below but with the actual name and place removed.

Click on image for a slightly larger version. A google search turned up a number of blogs and other sites which suggested you might want to be cautious about responding; but if you do, don't do it with the "yes" option in the email image. Respond to your friend via his regular e-mail address with a new message that is not a reply to the actual message.

Here is one example of a blog commenting on this:
LINK---Blog with comment on "Tagged"

Right now I don't know if this is really a problem, but you might want to be cautious and do a little Google checking yourself.

**Stay tuned....and be careful out there--- Doug Wiken

**Another DIY today..Headlght lens restoration

This is not the usual menu of posts for Dakota Today, but recently I have been trying to make our 1993 Dodge Intrepid a bit safer to drive at night. According to some consumer magazines, these cars came from the factory with dreadfully poor lighting. Our old clunker 30 year old Volvos had much better lighting for night driving. Add on to the original poor engineering about 14 years of driving and the plastic lens was pitted and aged yellow. Also, we had hit a pheasant or two and the plastic mounting brackets for the lights had been cracked and broken.

I checked some websites for replacement lens and brackets. New would have cost about $200. That was more than I wanted to spend. I added some running lights. More on that in a post for another day or three. I checked local Automate car parts store. They had Permatex Headlight Lens Restoration Kit for about $15. I figured I could gamble on that and some epoxy glue and paste to fix things up a bit.

The lens restoration kit included 4 small sheets of sandpaper grades 1000, 1500, 2000, and 2500 for wet sanding. Some rubber gloves, flannel polishing cloth and some "plastic restoration polish" and some relatively good instructions. Soak the paper in water. Alternate horizontal and vertical sanding directions as you move through the grades starting with the coarsest. Keep the paper and plastic wet by dipping in water.

The first plastic that was sanded off turned a paper towel yellow. Gradually the sanding water turned white.
I was watching TV and doing this otherwise it would have been mighty boring. The two headlights required something between and hour or two of more or less continuous sanding. After the sanding, the lenses were rinsed and dried and the lenses then polished with the polish and flannel which required heavy pressure.

Below is a photo of one of the lenses after sanding and polishing using the kit from Permatex.

I may have needed to sand a bit more. There were a few pits left, but at least it was again possible to see the bulb clearly. I had no idea this could be done, but it seemed to work. I suspect you could buy larger sheets of the sandpaper and some plastic polishing paste and do a dozen lenses for the same price, but not sure. The package is convenient if you have only one set of lights to work on. I suppose it could be used for polishing and restoring other clear plastic besides that on headlights.

Below is a photo of the lens showing the repaired plastic mounting on rear of lens housing repaired with two- part epoxy glue and epoxy paste. I happened to have PC Super Expoxy glue and PC-7 epoxy paste..both are two part epoxies. I assume there are other brands which might work as well or better.

Screwing with this kind of stuff may take a few days because the epoxy needs to set and parts must line up with brackets. So if one part must be repaired first and set before another installed to adjust it for repairs, you might as well plan on having the lights off for several days. Of course, if you fix this kind of crap instead of wiring it together with wire in an emergency and then leaving it until it must absolutely, positively be fixed, it might not take so long. Getting stuff together may take longer than actually doing the work if you happen to live next to an auto supply store.

Any way, here
is photo of the slopped on epoxy repair. Depending on the location of the crack and the fit, this may require some care, or the parts won't fit together with the bracket on the vehicle. Clicking on either of the photos should show a larger version.

***Stay tuned but probably not for more penny-pinching time-wasting DIY repair hints---- Doug Wiken

**Flowers blowing in the wind...Memorializing Memories

2007 Memorial Day is nearly here. My wife decided to put some flowers on her parents grave. The local cemetery in that section has no monuments that rise above the grass. There is a provision for a flower vase on memorial days. Actual flowers would be shredded by the wind and wilted by the sun in a matter of hours, so she bought some genuine fake made-in China flowers that almost look more real than some real flowers.

She put them in the vase carefully arranging them. Next day I drove by and wind had turned her nice assortment into a jumble. Wife came back later and found wind had blown them out on the ground.

Below are photos. One indicates the flowers in the vase, and one indicates the approach I used to make them
just a bit more secure in the wonderful South Dakota wind.

Click on the images for a larger view. I used a discarded caulking tube because it would fit in the vase. A slightlly larger plastic bottle would have been better, but that was all I could find. I put a few inches of crushed rock in the bottom. Sand might be better if you have it. My wife arranged the flowers as she wanted them and stuck them into the sand. Then I squirted in some expanding foam of the kind used for plugging cracks and air leaks, etc. Looks like it will work. A little scrap aluminum foil wrapped around made it relatively snug fit in the vase.

Might be an idea you can use for the same or similar purposes. Kind of fiddle-diddle the first time you do it however. Getting the stuff together took longer than the actual do-it-yourself.

***Stay tuned for another years worth of Memorial Day flags if the weather cooperates on Monday---Doug Wiken

**New Feature at Dakota Today -- Google Group

If you take a look in the upper right hand corner of this page, you may see a Google Groups logo. If you wish to join and get e-mail notification of posts here...at least that is my current intention.. plug in your e-mail address and we will see if this experiment works.

And if that doesn't appeal to you at all, I guess you can look at the sunset picture below taken yesterday. I may have to add an album just for sunset pictures because for many weeks around here, sunsets are about all that is interesting for photography...or perhaps only interesting to me and I may not have the full range of interest and creativity of really good photographers. Oh...well.

I guess sunsets have something to do with weather. Almost chilly here today. Most of the day temperature has been around 51 degrees. Did warm up a bit during the afternoon.

***Stay tuned and if you want to be really tuned in, subscribe to the Google Group for Dakota Today Readers---Doug Wiken