My shooting range is gone!

Charles Graff

Moderator Emeritus
Being born in the wrong century, another adventure I missed was riding with Custer during his Black Hills expedition.

The drive from Cheyenne to Keystone was a visual treat. Mt. Rushmore was more inspirational than I imagined, and the night lighting was the highlight. The Pactola Reservoir seemed a serene jewel. Deadwood was Deadwood. Rapid City looked inviting.
My father was from Montana and his Grandfather lived in Rapid City. I did not meet my father until I was 32, so he and his ancestors played no part in my life. I married a Texas girl and her family is where my roots extend.

My most closely guarded secret was I was born in Lost Angeles CA, July 16, 1942. I tell everybody that finds out that I was born there because my father was going overseas to fight the Yellow Peril. Well, that is a fib, he worked for the Bank of America there. He did go to fight the Yellow Peril and my mother moved with me and my sister back to Texas to be with her parents. The marriage did not survive the war.
 

RBHarter

West Central AR
I'm a desert rat mid west Nevada is my home I guess .
The Arkies laugh , most of Sierra California laughs when I say my birth certificate is filed in the capital of Oklahoma , Bakersfield CA ......Okies aren't so amused even if they have 500 acres of Vineyard leased to Gallo and 3 oil wells pumping outside Delano ....... I miss the day trips out to 40 miles from nothing . Oddly enough I'm only just west of where Dad's side spent the better part of 300 yr .
The decision making of home almost every day decreases any desire to be there . Then a car commercial or I watch one of 8-900 movies filmed in the Owens Valley or anywhere in a 150 mile circle of Mt Whitney , Blanco , or Mammoth mountain and the want of dry air , altitude , and nights black as ink with the Milky Way a bright belt across sky makes me want to run as fast as I can back home ........ Is the posting on the Macy chrystal display warning it contains lead that's terrible stuff and will turn you into a toad just about stupidest thing I've ever seen ......well no not really , but it makes the hot 100 . It's right there with big game legal weapons that include the 25 ACP as a minimum cartridge for deer and "a hafted spear" ..... Maine and Georgia .

I wouldn't move back to California if it were a condition of acceptance for a Billion dollar lottery and came with royalties on every oil well , almond , orange , and grape grown there ......maybe if I could get one of those state line straddling properties someplace between US 6 and Nevada 359 with say the WSW wall siding of the garage and eve's hanging over into California to meet the living in requirements . Yep the Mojave and Great Basin deserts are home ...... It's taken 3 years and the moss is starting to stick . The green hell , no matter how many deer wander into the yard and commit suicide in the freezer and the blow overs make me a millionaire , will never be home .

As a former resident of California a massive flood that washed Sacramento and most of Napa into the SFO bay in time for the San Andreas to move the coast line back to the east side of the coastal range miraculously sparing Baja would cure about 98% of what ails California . Yeah so I-5 west would about do it .

Grain of salt guys this comes from a guy in a dry county that's jonesing for a strawberry margarita and a Spanish omelette at 5:30 Sunday morning because that's what I want . I'd settle for a pitcher of Bud with a pizza ..... Draconian laws I tell ya !
 

Charles Graff

Moderator Emeritus
I'm a desert rat mid west Nevada is my home I guess .
The Arkies laugh , most of Sierra California laughs when I say my birth certificate is filed in the capital of Oklahoma , Bakersfield CA ......Okies aren't so amused even if they have 500 acres of Vineyard leased to Gallo and 3 oil wells pumping outside Delano ....... I miss the day trips out to 40 miles from nothing . Oddly enough I'm only just west of where Dad's side spent the better part of 300 yr .
The decision making of home almost every day decreases any desire to be there . Then a car commercial or I watch one of 8-900 movies filmed in the Owens Valley or anywhere in a 150 mile circle of Mt Whitney , Blanco , or Mammoth mountain and the want of dry air , altitude , and nights black as ink with the Milky Way a bright belt across sky makes me want to run as fast as I can back home ........ Is the posting on the Macy chrystal display warning it contains lead that's terrible stuff and will turn you into a toad just about stupidest thing I've ever seen ......well no not really , but it makes the hot 100 . It's right there with big game legal weapons that include the 25 ACP as a minimum cartridge for deer and "a hafted spear" ..... Maine and Georgia .

I wouldn't move back to California if it were a condition of acceptance for a Billion dollar lottery and came with royalties on every oil well , almond , orange , and grape grown there ......maybe if I could get one of those state line straddling properties someplace between US 6 and Nevada 359 with say the WSW wall siding of the garage and eve's hanging over into California to meet the living in requirements . Yep the Mojave and Great Basin deserts are home ...... It's taken 3 years and the moss is starting to stick . The green hell , no matter how many deer wander into the yard and commit suicide in the freezer and the blow overs make me a millionaire , will never be home .

As a former resident of California a massive flood that washed Sacramento and most of Napa into the SFO bay in time for the San Andreas to move the coast line back to the east side of the coastal range miraculously sparing Baja would cure about 98% of what ails California . Yeah so I-5 west would about do it .

Grain of salt guys this comes from a guy in a dry county that's jonesing for a strawberry margarita and a Spanish omelette at 5:30 Sunday morning because that's what I want . I'd settle for a pitcher of Bud with a pizza ..... Draconian laws I tell ya !

As a Border Rat, I cry foul on a strawberry Margarita. Margaritas are made from lime juice, triple sec, simple syrup and tequila. Fajitas are only made of flank/skirt steak, no chicken or shrimp. Got to stay pure...got to stay pure. I will go the pizza with you, but there must be Dos Equis. Viva Mejico y'all.
 

CZ93X62

Official forum enigma
Mexican food nomenclature corruption is yet another manifestation of the evil work done by the human sub-species Angelenus fornicatus omnia (city people that screw up everything), acronym is AFO. Say it to yourself, it will feel good.

I like fajitas, because I like carne asada (grilled beef) VERY MUCH. Someone in the kitchen was nice enough to cut the carne asada into bite-sized chunks and grill it a bit more with some onions, peppers, tomatoes, and whatever other verduras were handy in the cocina. It wasn't called fajitas, though--it was carne asada con verduras, or pollo asada con verduras, or camarones asada con verduras. AFOs corrupt anything and everything they touch, they are like locusts in a grain field. I never saw or heard of "fajitas" until my mid-thirties, when some toney restaurant I got dragged to featured them on their menus. I heard them before I saw them, sizzling and crackling as the waitstaff brought them to an adjacent table. OK, I knew THAT sound well enough, I was raised on such food. I wrote the matter off as just more cultural appropriation by corporate America, imitated poorly and lamely.

I infest family-run Mexican food places that employ actual Mexican people making actual and authentic Mexican food. The food that Buckshot et al used to get came from one such place (Rosa Maria's), and you won't find "fajitas" on their menus, or on the menus of the other similar places in Redlands and San Bernardino. Jimmy's Carnitas and Mitla's would be very happy to make any meat in the con verduras y arroz on a plate upon request though. I lived on that stuff through college. So delicious.
 

RBHarter

West Central AR
As a Border Rat, I cry foul on a strawberry Margarita. Margaritas are made from lime juice, triple sec, simple syrup and tequila. Fajitas are only made of flank/skirt steak, no chicken or shrimp. Got to stay pure...got to stay pure. I will go the pizza with you, but there must be Dos Equis. Viva Mejico y'all.
I spent some time in Baja , Tecate' , clam cocktails and proper margaritas .

In Reno there's a 5-7 am happy hour in several clubs , doors without locks , and it's unusual for a store or gas station to not stock beer and liquor . It's 39 miles to the the Oklahoma border store and 48 to the closest instate liquor store . In Nevada a beer and a shot at 7 am is just another graveyard after work snort .
 

RicinYakima

High Steppes of Eastern Washington
Owens Valley or anywhere in a 150 mile circle of Mt Whitney , Blanco , or Mammoth mountain and the want of dry air , altitude , and nights black as ink with the Milky Way a bright belt across sky makes me want to run as fast as I can back home ........
Then why are you where you are at? I left my family and 250 years of occupation to move to WA, and never regretted a second.
 

Charles Graff

Moderator Emeritus
Fajitas originated in my part of the world, The Rio Grande Valley. They took a cheap cut of beef (skirt stake), which isn't cheap any more. Fajita means little skirt. The beef was seasoned with salt, pepper and garlic and grilled on whatever was available. My first fajita was cooked on the lid of a steel drum over mesquite wood coals. This was a quick meal in the field for cowboys, hunters and beer drinkers. The meat was sliced and eaten in a tortilla with some lime juice on top. From those humble beginning the fajita has taken on a life of it's own.

Addendum: Most Mexican food can be cooked by Mexicans on a plancha. A plancha means any flat hot iron/steel surface. Clothes are ironed with a plancha and food is cooked on a plancha, which would be a large griddle. It is amazing what a good "Planchero" can do and a good one is in high demand. Thusly the drum lid was a plancha. An ember or a hot coal is a "brasa" so pollo a la brasa is chicken cooked over coals. A grill, as we know it is a "parilla", so parriada is meat of any kind cook on a grill. I would starve to death, if forced to eat Gringo food three times a day.

There are any number of differences between Tex-Mex fool and real Mexican food. But the most noticeable one are shredded yellow cheese and fried tortillas (chulupas and or chipas (chips). These you won't find in Mexico, except a few places right on the border that caters to tourists.
 
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RBHarter

West Central AR
My story is one of doing the wrong thing for the right reasons .....I think that's it .

The politics as they stand make me just as happy I'm not there . Gas is pushing $4/gallon , my former front lake is basically dead the kids are spread all over and I'm closer to 2 of them now than I have been in years , milage wise . I actually talk to my neighbors here . I don't have the wind storms and weeks of 0° weather . Fighting the rust is getting easier . The taxes on 1500 sqft and a half acre corner lot is $350/yr vs 1/3 acre with a garage at 900 and my Homestead gets me a 375 credit vs zero . I think we have better schools here too . It's not 70 miles to Wal Mart or a movie .

I don't drink enough to make the liquor laws any kind of a deal at all and my daughter boot legs in Lone Star when she comes up . A box of 24 will hold us and guests about 9-10 months if I throw in a couple of bottles of fake wine and a quart of Rye it'll go a year .

Nothing is perfect and I don't mind so much the rain and mowing even though I whine about it .
 

RicinYakima

High Steppes of Eastern Washington
The only "perfect" place is in your mind. Taxes where I live are on consumers, not income or wealth. So if you don't buy much, it is inexpensive. Pot and alcohol is expensive, but that doesn't mean much to me; only gasoline is a killer. Four seasons that are OK, except for the smoke from the fires and the cold from Montana. White people are the minority compared to Mexican and Native Americans and that is fine with me. People are people and we all get along, except from the dopers.
 

Tom

Well-Known Member
Mexican food nomenclature corruption is yet another manifestation of the evil work done by the human sub-species Angelenus fornicatus omnia (city people that screw up everything), acronym is AFO. Say it to yourself, it will feel good.

I like fajitas, because I like carne asada (grilled beef) VERY MUCH. Someone in the kitchen was nice enough to cut the carne asada into bite-sized chunks and grill it a bit more with some onions, peppers, tomatoes, and whatever other verduras were handy in the cocina. It wasn't called fajitas, though--it was carne asada con verduras, or pollo asada con verduras, or camarones asada con verduras. AFOs corrupt anything and everything they touch, they are like locusts in a grain field. I never saw or heard of "fajitas" until my mid-thirties, when some toney restaurant I got dragged to featured them on their menus. I heard them before I saw them, sizzling and crackling as the waitstaff brought them to an adjacent table. OK, I knew THAT sound well enough, I was raised on such food. I wrote the matter off as just more cultural appropriation by corporate America, imitated poorly and lamely.

I infest family-run Mexican food places that employ actual Mexican people making actual and authentic Mexican food. The food that Buckshot et al used to get came from one such place (Rosa Maria's), and you won't find "fajitas" on their menus, or on the menus of the other similar places in Redlands and San Bernardino. Jimmy's Carnitas and Mitla's would be very happy to make any meat in the con verduras y arroz on a plate upon request though. I lived on that stuff through college. So delicious.
I'm guessing you're familiar with birria?
 

BudHyett

Active Member
The Pacific Northwest is a melting pot of cultures with restaurants abounding. The trick is to find the local restaurant with the true food made by the family, not a chain restaurant. And also to know what goes in the food, menudo is out for me. Salmon is the great dish here, better even than Mississippi River catfish. .

I left Illinois in 1985 with several regrets, the Windhill Range, family and friends. Divorce over a decade earlier forced a decision to stay after college graduation to be with my son. I returned to machining, a chemistry degree does not fare well in the Quad-Cities region where the primary industry is agricultural implements. This first was a career move to Southern California (then to Seattle areas with Boeing) and aerospace. Between my machining experience and chemistry degree, I was assigned to the then-new field of composites. This was fortuitous, I've had a great career.

I am 2117 miles from my son's front door, but who is counting. I told my son I do not want buried in Illinois, I do not want to spend eternity voting for Democrats after I am gone.
 
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smokeywolf

Well-Known Member
While he did not burn his bridge with them, College Boy just turned down a very lucrative offer of employment from the other company that Mr. Musk owns, but he's happy with the company he's currently with and already feels a sense of loyalty to them.