All Entries in the "Hard News" Category
THE ADVENTURES OF AMAX AND GANDHI
Part XXVII
“The Ghost Dancer of Washington Gulch”
Special appearance by Lightnin’ as Public Input
The scene: The Red Lady access road off Kebler Pass
Thingfish: Why wouldn’t you want us to mine molly, Mr. Gandhi? You know that mining interests are respected corporations that simply seek to improve the lives of us all without commitments or emotional baggage down the road.
Gandhi: Like a soul? It is immoral to scratch and dig on Pachamama, my son.
Thingfish: As superintendent of this shootin’ match its immoral if we don’t show a profit and placate our stockholders.
Gandhi: Many of your stockholders are already rich. Why do they want to level a beautiful mountain to enhance their fortunes?
Kingfish: Oddly enough the molybdenum we pull out of Red Lady’s guts will build mountain bikes for mindless recreationalists and tennis racquets for the idle rich…but that’s really not the point, Mr. Gandhi. The point is jobs. Jobs!
Enter Momma (the High Country Citizen’s Alliance spokesperson) and her daughter Sapphire, who among other accomplishments has been a questionable marriage to Thingfish.
Gandhi: Jobs, is it? That’s what the British said when they invaded India in the Eighteenth Century, and at least they built good roads.
Momma: They won’t come in here and mine. We’ll kick them out one way of the other like we did in the late 70s. Right over might! We’ll put signs up all over town and have a dance and…
Sapphire: Now, momma, mining might not be so bad. It’s progress like those Habitat shacks and Wal-Mart and the new City Market in Gunnison. It’s sure to help trailer sales and increase the tin building ratio from here to Saguache.
Momma: And the coal company came with the world’s largest shovel…What we need is a vigil…or maybe a hootenanny. That’s it. People will respond to this crisis. The people won’t let Amax come in. We’ll pool our funds and…set up another green belt, or maybe a conservancy.
Gandhi: Hold your horses, momma. Get real. The only way to defeat these molly mongers is by nonviolent resistance. It worked in India. It reminds me of a dream I once had while traveling by rail from Durban to Cape Town.
Thingfish: Will this take long? I’ve got work to do. Water rights are a very lengthy and messy business.
Gandhi: Once upon my dream there was plenty to eat and life was good. Then one day the caliph decided that he wanted to have more than everyone else. He called it divine right and said he deserved more due to his station as ruler of the land. He began to eat…and eat…and eat. After a short while the poorest of the peasants, who had been getting by all right, began to see a shortage of food. Soon he had none. The caliph told him to be patient, that he would be better off as a result of the redistribution of provisions. Things got worse. Their livestock starved. Soon the merchant class was hungry, then the nobility. In a matter of one year, the caliph had grown fat while the landscape was barren. No one had the energy to work the fields and grow food. After a while even the caliph was hungry. Soon the people had killed all the wild animals for food and were forced to return to their ancient origins in the sea where they were quickly devoured by giant fish who had never heard my story.
Thingfish: What’s your point, Mr. Gandhi?
Gandhi: My point, Mr. Thingfish, is that no mater how you attempt to rationalize it some things are just wrong…like tearing down a beautiful mountain to make fat men in some East Coast boardroom rich. Then, to complicate matters there is the impact on the lives of the people already living nearby.
Thingfish: What’s the matter with our plan for “The Last Great Mining Town in the West”? They’ll be jobs, and well…jobs…
Momma: And traffic congestion and all the social ills that go with booms. Then one day Amax will have had enough and they will move to the next slaughter zone, leaving behind an evil legacy for our children to clean up.
Thingfish: Now momma, Amax is a responsible, environmentally sound corporation.
Momma: What about Climax?
Thingfish:….Moly…That was then, this is now.
Sapphire: I liked Mr. Gandhi’s dream. Can I buy it on cassette? I want to find out what happened to the caliph?
Momma: Sapphire, honey, Mr. Gandhi’s dream was just a metaphor like skier days, bronze passes, trophy homes and tailings ponds. Now where did I leave my monkey wrench?
Continued sooner than we’d like
SOAP OPERA SYNOPSIS
By Brittany Celebe
Daytime dramas or soap operas in honor of longtime commercial sponsors) can be seen in fifty countries across the globe. Faithful fans
number in the millions, often skipping work and family responsibilities to follow their favorites and watch as the bad guys get their just dessert.
Sometimes rural viewing is not all that easy. Little things like avalanches, frigid temperatures, empty cupboard syndrome and fires and floods can not only interrupt lives but can play havoc with afternoon television reception. It is with this in mind that we have prepared a synopsis of what is going down on the screen. Missing an episode is a little like missing your birth control pills (not paid for by employers) or your Viagra (paid for by employers). Just miss one and it can foul up the whole month.
(Note: Some shows are current while others are classics from years gone by)
“The Young and the Worthless”
Troy is still seeing Angie who is recovering from a tedious surgery to remove her from her Siamese twin brother, LeRoy, who is chronically depressed over his failure to pass the television tech exam. He is hitting the bottle. Frank, Dr Bigelow’s attorney, continues to step out with Bigelow’s wife, Betty. Betty has quelled rumors that she is seeing LeRoy. Sherry’s divorce from Henry is not yet finalized because of a slight technicality over the possession of the couple’s James Brown records.
“Love and Money”
The return of Pamela’s father, believed to have been lost during a walrus hunt in Greenland, has prompted curious behavior in the town of Shady Corners. The girl’s mother, Pearl, who was legally separated, had embraced polygamy and married the offensive line of the Buffalo Bills. Isn’t it enough that these privileged, albeit tumultuous lives are intertwined in idleness and receivership? And now Pam’s father might not make the play-offs! Tess has left town with Delbert G., a clever ear and throat man. She will be a long way from Covington, Kentucky by nightfall. The annual onion festival reignites aromas long since muddled. What about Delbert’s love child and his fondness for her dancing instructor?
“Search For Yesterday”
With the announcement that Judith is indeed pregnant, half of the male population of Fruitcake Grove leave town. Allen has run into more medical problems prior to his operation when it is discovered that he has ice water instead of blood running through his Mohawk veins. Meanwhile Joan has filed for a divorce from her eighth husband, Harry, who was filmed in a Flemme Springs motel room with the Escucha al Monte cheerleading squad.
“As the Stomach Turns”
Gail is wrongly accused and arrested after he twin sister Margot robs a local pornography shop while assaulting the local rugby team. Her simultaneous acts of bipolar schizophrenia win Psychic Booth honorable mention at the Marigold County Fair. Lou’s lost son returns after a year in Trinidad and begins a co-dependent fling with Jack Iron, a local rummy and proprietor of the local sugar refinery. Joe leaves Debbie for Stephanie, Phil leaves Audrey for Debbie, Ted leaves Julie for the last time.
“The Guiding Blight”
Everyone in Honkeyville is shocked when Trapper Jeanie trades her illegitimate stock brokerage for a new snowmobile. Malbec Marlene confronts Scary Larry who drunkenly told Little Edward she was frigid contending that beyond all doubt she was not frigid with Canadian Art or Benjamin the Salami. Warren attempts suicide by jumping off his sofa in front of household pets. It will be his last act of defiance and he will be removed from the program’s cast in a painful and humiliating manner.
Blue Mesa Mermaids Tough Lot
(Gunnison) The local year-round mermaid population is composed of some “rough and ready gals” according to boatmen and nautical observers here. Not only do they co-exist, eluding bothersome fishermen and hungry Mackinaw, but they handily survive the brutal winters on these stark, windy shores.
Unlike the more “wimpy species” that inhabit the Ridgway Reservoir, Lake San Cristobal and Miramonte the Blue Mesa Mermaids exist in a tightly controlled symbiotic society where group survival is paramount.
The aquatic humanoid sirens of the sea do exist, although are generally salt water creatures according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration . How this colony of fresh water mermaids evolved is a mystery still unsolved.
The expanding colony has been part of the ecosystem since 1966 when the dam project was completed. Mermaids here refrain from eating meat, staying up late and cavorting with humans, especially the male variety.
“These ladies don’t even socialize with the fish much less talk to men,” said a marine biologist on loan from the Rocky Mountain Biological Weapons Laboratory in nearby Gothic. “Despite what may appear to constitute a major frustration in the onset, most mermaids say thy live simpler lives without social entanglements.
“Most men are hopeless bores interested only in the kitchen and the bedroom,” said Sarah Finne, a human who has lived with the mermaids for 20 years. “These ladies rarely produce offspring so the colony relies on recruits from other groups and an occasional human. The transformation is a tedious process and most times it ends in disaster. I have lived here for two decades and I am just now beginning to grow a tail and breath properly.”
Finne went on to say that most initial recruits are women who are searching for adventure and those rebounding from failed romantic endeavors. Many have had surface relationships and deep water realities do not always coincide. Due in part to survival instincts and and a keen sense of social order, the majority of these recruits don’t make it past the first swim.
Local women are agin reminded that post-snagging season is the most opportune time to approach the Blue Mesa Colony.
“One can view the mermaids lounging on the shore after the hunters have gone home,” said Finne. Sessions run full or half days. I suggest warm clothing and an open mind.” – Popeye Manatee
Last Seduction of Summer
This lovely Victorian lady has spent the last 135 years on the wall behind the bar at the Hotel Victoria in Mañana. This morning she wasn’t there. “It’s quite common for nudes to abandon their post if the vibe isn’t right or if they get a better offer,” said owner Red Sverdveson. “We hope she hasn’t fallen in with one of those artist types.”
Mandatory Unemployment Bill Passes House
(Denver) Amid gay marriage resolutions, NRA-sponsored recalls and marijuana tax codes a controversial new bill requiring residents to take at least a month off from work per year has narrowly passed the House here. The plan, which calls for a sharing of resources by the established work force, is aimed at reducing, even eliminating, bothersome employment statistics once and for all.
“In simple language we are striving for full employment on paper,” said a representative from Cahone who demanded animosity. “If Colorado has more job seekers than jobs then it stands to reason that the jobs be spread out more effectively.”
At present state determination of unemployment numbers is based on data compiled on behalf of only those who apply for Unemployment Insurance and does not calculate those who are simply without work and have not registered or do not qualify for assistance.
When finally implemented the program calls for more leisure time and an increase in legal diversions available to the idle. If a resident has held down a job for twelve months he will at some time have to relinquish his post in favor of someone who is out of work.
“That’s how they do it in Europe,” said the Cahone source. “How else could all of those sidewalk cafes be so busy in the middle of the workday?
The bill may have trouble passing the senate in that most of the elected members take recess amounting to about four months of relaxation and another six for campaigning. That leaves about two months to change society for the betterment of all.
“Most of my colleagues are way out of touch with the everyday struggles of their constituencies,”said the source, “so don’t expect them to cast a favorable vote. They fight every time the subject of minimum wage comes to the docket and don’t know the price of a carton of bread or a loaf of milk.”
It is hoped that the amendment will become law since it could both increase productivity while giving people more time to sit on their fat arses and watch important television programs.
– Manual Flushe
