About cactus and clocks

This week we bring you a column George Ostrom picked out from 1970 ...

There have been numerous comments and suggestions come in the past week from various readers of this column regarding ways to avoid sitting in cactus plants and what to do if you accidentally become a victim of the “endfamous” prickly pear. I do appreciate these helpful words of sympathy and wisdom, but regrettably they are all too late.

All I ask at this point from anyone who observes me still “sittin’ light in the saddle” is that they remember everyone is apt to get stuck in the end… sooner or later.

The transition each fall from daylight savings time to standard time is always a difficult proposition, and I was so thankful for the graphically explained procedure outlines in the press by the U.S. government this year.

The official explanation said we said we were to turn our clocks back one “at 2:30 a.m. Sunday morning, October 25.”

Most of you people who don’t go to John Wayne movies and/or wear a Spiro-Agnew watch probably cheated by turning back your watches Saturday evening at bedtime or when you got up Sunday morning.

But I don’t buy this brand of Americanism.

I set our bedroom alarm clock under the old time for 2:29 a.m. and when that baby went off, I leapt out of the sack and races through the house setting back all the time pieces.

Last watch or clock I set belongs to my eldest son, who sleeps on his stomach with his watchband under the pillow, so this presented a small problem. But, I rolled him over fast and got that one set back to 1:30 in the nick of time, according to the laws of the land.

In the days since last Sunday, I haven’t talked to one other person who readjusted their clocks at 2:30 a.m. like the government told us. No wonder this country is in trouble.

It’s surprising how much snow is in the high country already. Mike Strand and I went over the Whitefish divide last Sunday in my pickup and bucked two feet of snow on top.

We were on the Trail Creek crossing and saw no game except for a huge bull elk killed by a lucky fellow on the North Fork side.

This trip gives the observer one more sickening opportunity to see at first hand the wonderful results to watershed of current “stand improvement” programs of the U.S. Forest Service.

Next Tuesday is election day and I for one am not an advocate of your typical “get out and vote” campaign.

I feel that anyone who has to be coerced, begged or enticed to the voting place is not emotionally or intellectually prepared to cast an honest vote.

My reaction to this type of voter is simply, “Let ‘em stay home and get what they deserve.”

See ya next week when my oldest daughter will say, “Dad! Howcum you always fall asleep when your favorite team is six points behind?”