Reader J.H. sent an fascinating video that illustrates why so-called dry washes can be so dangerous: Amazing Flash Flood / Debris Flow Southern Utah [1]. J.H.’s comments: “The amazing thing is that the heaviest rain fell 40 miles away from the film site and the peak rain came six hours before the wave passed through. Local weather conditions give no clue as to what is about to happen. Swimming in the trash laden water is an absolute non-starter. Pity the camper who has one of these walls of wet wood squash him while he is wrapped in a sleeping bag, zipped up in a tent. Take home message: Never completely trust a ‘dry wash’ in desert country.”
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A misinformed reader in New Jersey wrote to chide me about recently posting a quote from Adam Baldwin, complaining: “The Baldwin brothers are all leftist weenies.” To clarify: Adam Baldwin, (who played Animal Mother in Full Metal Jacket [2] and the role of Jayne Cobb in Firefly [3]) is a libertarian conservative. He is not related to Alec Baldwin (a stridently statist left-wing PETA member. The mass media-magnetic Baldwin Brothers were born in New York. But Adam Baldwin was born in Winnetka, Illinois. The latter and Alec’s brother Stephen Baldwin (an outspoken Christian conservative) would be well-received in The American Redoubt [4]. But Alec Baldwin would probably get the bum rush. Oh, and speaking of Adam, he apparently visits SurvivalBlog [5]. Shiny!
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Bad news for Mayor Bloomberg’s police state ambitions: NYPD’s ‘stop-and-frisk’ practice is unconstitutional, judge rules [6]
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M.O.B. sent this news from Wisconsin: Libraries ‘overwhelmed’ by interest in patron seed share programs [7]
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F.J. liked this piece over at Instructables: How To Make A PVC Water / Air / Vacuum Pump [8]