Andre and Annabelle and are from Holland visiting the Nevada Desert Experience and doing prison work. At one point in his life, Andre had been a disc jockey.

Charleston Peak is  about  35 miles from Las Vegas and climbs nearly 12,000 feet skyward. It still has three to four feet in places and it is possible to go in hiking in the snow  if that is your desire..  Below the high peak area and the beautiful Ponderosa pine  is a desert recreation area filled with many canyons and arroyos. Arroyo is a Spanish word for an intermittent dry stream. I had to look it up as I thought it meant canyon.

Standing on highway 95, just at the fringes of Indian Springs, a drone flew overhead, circling  and landing, then repeating the process. It was a typical training regimen at Creech Air force base.  8 of us stood on the edge of the highway protesting drones and the high tech assassins who worked inside the bases. There were  3 state trooper cars and one base security vehicle apparently assigned to watch us. We wondered how was it they had so little to do that there would be almost as many police  as protesters.

It has been brought to my attention that the Nevada  Desert Experience (NDE)  has the same acronym as Near Death Experience. And it is so apropos as nuclear weapons and nuclear waste are bringing us to the point of extinction. It we have a nuclear war we will have an amazing distinction, the only species of animal to collectively commit suicide by becoming the ultimate suicide bomber.  Cool huh?  Duhhhhh not cool. Not cool in the least.

I went to Walmart today, (I know some of you are muttering infidel) and tried to buy a tea kettle for the house I am living in. (Walmart was within walking distance and I only have a vehicle some of the time, presently.) Seeing none I asked and was politely informed by the house wares clerk  that the Walmart Super center had none and that for reasons she did not fully understand she could not order them. I told her this was beyond amazing that Walmarts did not sell tea kettles here and that this truly must be a sign of the apocalypse. She did not smile.

In 1976, Jesuit Father Richard McSorley  wrote, “Until we squarely face the question of our consent to use nuclear weapons, any hope of large scale improvement of public morality is doomed to failure.”   Some 35 years have passed since  Fr. McSorley’s comments.  Hiroshima and Nagasaki clearly were humanities moral nadir.

Did Staff Sgt. Amy Tirador commit suicide? The story surrounding the circumstances of her death has changed many times and the U.S. Army, in other cases concerning female soldiers found dead, has made a number of very questionable rulings which are being challenged by some families of the deceased. We will begin to look at this case and the treatment of women in the military and discuss it at our next meeting.

Protection or intimidation? and Ehud Olmert Comes to Union College. Both articles concern Ehud Olmert's visit to Union College.