Jack makes it on time for a change – –

When Wendy and I first moved to Big Stone Gap in faar SW Virginia, we early on took a drive up to Black Mountain just a few miles away on the border between VA and Kentucky. There’s a parking place up there where you can look over to where there used to be another mountain. It’s no longer there because the easiest and cheapest way to get coal was to get rid of miners, hire a few machine drivers and a lot of explosives.

The coal companies are mainly owned directly or indirectly by the power companies who run the coal fired plants and answer to their shareholders – maximize profits and dividends.

So when the coal is extracted the land should be returned to its original condition but never is because it’s cheaper to just walk away and nobody with any influence seems to care.

So the natural water courses are clogged up, there are mudslides, contaminated rivers etc. The coal fired power plants add to carbon which adds to climate change, and which results in a ‘perfect storm’!

The news reports have focused on the tragedies of lost lives and the coming together of communities to provide support just as communities around the world do on such occasions. But I’ve seen very few that even try to make the connection between coal mining legacies, mountain removal, carbon emissions and flooding in east Kentucky last week.

The Monday Book is non-existent this week, along with a few other posts, due to the following series of unfortunate events:

My sister and her family came for a work trip to my parents’ house. Their house is small, so I got a hotel to avoid overstuffing the house with people. The hotel turned out to be a stress-adder as I had to fight for a working television, bathroom light, and wifi access. But I wasn’t going to spend a lot of time in it, because this was a work trip with my sister.

My parents like stuff.

My sister and I began cleaning out the garage–which consists mostly of putting things into piles to be looked at later by one of the parents.

We were allowed to dump some broken things.

We found a dumpster guarded by a guy who was higher than a kite and nice as nine-pence. He had dropped a big box of carpet tacks very near the dumpster. He warned us to drive over the high cement curb rather than use the driveup to the dumpster.

I managed to avoid the carpet tacks and we waved as he danced in the rear view mirror, wishing us well. To date no carpet tacks have taken down my tires but we remain vigilant.

My sister and I took my mom to lunch and her favorite thrift store as a break from cleaning the garage.

My sister left her phone in the thrift store.

Someone stole it.

We got a crash course in how to have a phone: regular plan, pay as you go, second-hand. It proved interesting.

We got my sister set up with a new phone. We did not return to cleaning the garage.

Families are exhausting–kinda fun, but exhausting.

We’ll get back to the blogs on Friday. Meanwhile, please enjoy the schadenfreude of other people’s families.