Burning California

Throughout the 20th Century California symbolized paradise to most Americans and millions of people from the rust Belt and Deep South and Dust Bowl deserted their hometowns to populate the Pacific state. Towns became cities and cities spread into the mountains as well as up the coast with a foreseeable cost.

Gone are the Los Angeles River, orange groves, and the girls in bikinis. The river is dry, the orange groves are suburbs, and the girls are fat, but even worse is the suburban sprawl has overstepped into the parched scenery and this week home owners in Santa Diego were attacked by Mother Nature as wind-whipped flames flashed across arid slopes to scorch multi-million dollars houses.

Burn baby burn.

Thousands have been evacuated from the path of these fires.

"When will they ever learn, when they they ever learn?" from the song WHERE HAVE ALL THE FLOWERS GONE.

Obviously no time soon but then that's why we love California.

It can always be re-invented as something else.

To hear Pete Seeger sing WHERE HAVE ALL THE FLOWERS GONE, please go to the following URL

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1y2SIIeqy34

Pete Seeger Bridge

According to Wikipedia the Hudson River was known as Muh-he-kun-ne-tuk by the Iroquois and Muhheakantuck or 'river that flows both ways' by the Lenape tribe. The tidal estuary was a great passageway into the interior and provided fish and shellfish in great abundance. Back in the 70s my friend James Spicer cooked shad roe in season. None of us knew at that time how badly PCPs and other contaimenants, however the late folk singer Pete Seeger helped organize the Hudson River Sloop Clearwater to teach people how to respect the Great North River.

Recently proponents of a cleaner river have suggested that the new bridge spanning the Tappan Zee be named after Pete Seeger.

Personally I like the idea, but wish that the old ferry was brought back for the future.

Ferries are cool.