In the past I've crticized new construction as putting a load on our dwindling water resource. This, even though the business that I'm in is dependent on new construction. Briefly, I don't believe that long time residents of the city or county should be put in the same boat of inconvenience to accommodate development and expansion. Those dwindling the resource should be the ones to carry the load. Water wise, this would be prohibiting watering lawns, gardens and washing cars in new developments except with water gathered from cisterns or other non-aqufier sources. On site water recycling of gray water should be included with conservation efforts.

Preparation for the diminished used of petroleum should be implimented in the the building code too.  Electricity is the energy of the future. We will power anything with a petroleum engine with it and we will heat our homes with it. As an expert in the heating and cooling business, I can see gas furnacess going the way of oil furnaces in the next twenty years. Honda has shown a natural gas powered fuel cell generator to recharge electric cars and provide power for the home's electric furnace and heat pump/air conditioner. For those of you with hot water heat, there have been electric powered boilers so don't feel left out.

GM will be introducing the electric car, the Volt, which will run entirely on electricity, recharge at home if desired, but have gasoline back-up so you don't get stranded. In my needs, the electricity range is adequate for most all of my driving around. So the Volt can replace one of my cars and the other can be the guzzler used to pull the boat and so forth.

The building code should anticipate the plumbing changes and increased electrical service needs of the near future and require that it be install NOW in new construction and remodeling of existing homes and buildings. 

"We have met the enemy and he is us" Pogo, Earth Day 1970

OK class, take your Sunday newspaper and turn to page 12A and read the headline; "Judge rules against oil drilling in Michigan forest". Let me start by pointing out that Congress, our body of lawmakers, presently has a national approval rating of 9%. This is one reason why. People are sick and tired and getting poorer partly due to federal judges legislating from the bench. Congress seems to not be interested in doing anything about that. 

We hear the word pristine used often as a reason why we can't drill here or there. Yet I've gone geocaching in seemingly pristine places only to find out that they were restored landfill sites. The things out of place were the occasional pipe sticking out of the ground for water testing. The Discover Channel recently did a special on earth without humans. If we were to vanish from the planet, our roads and buildings would crumble as nature grew in the cracks and crevices. Pollution would be cleaned up by micro-organisms.

Use your best whiny nasal voice here; "Well the big oil companies aren't drilling where they already have leases". Could it be because it isn't cost effective to go after it there, yet? In my travels, I've seen small oil rigs inactive one year and a year or two later they are pumping up and down. Cost effectiveness is why.

We need to get the whole mess going so that we can satisfy our present need for oil while at the same time work toward eliminating our need for it. Congress's approval rating will never get higher than 9% until they begin getting things orchestrated and stop worrying about re-election funding for their cushy jobs. Slapping down judges that are creating roadblocks to this progress would be a good step!

Snapshots are usually thought of as still pictures. A capture of a brief moment in time. Sometimes they can fail to tell the whole story and lead one to incorrect conclusions.  Like taking words out of their context. Politicians love to do that to each other. Sometimes opinions and even conclusions are based on snapshots of information. Wise people are flexible enough to change their opinions and conclusions when presented with the whole video rather than the snapshot or the whole text rather than the snippet. Even wiser people don't come to conclusions without seeing the whole story.

I shudder when world leaders (G8) decide to put economic stress on their countries, such as carbon dioxide emissions, based on a snapshot of the history of the world. I don't think that even a crazy Iranian leader would deny that there was an ice age.  Evidence of warm weather plants have been found at the north pole regions, so it is logical that there have been times of unusual warmth. Global Warming, in other words.  Man was not there to cause it. While the snapshot shows it appears to follow man's industrialization, the video shows otherwise.

The planets Mars and Jupiter have been detected as warming up slightly. Jokes have been made about that but doesn't that mean that some serious evidence to the pop culture beliefs about global warming are being dismissed? Could it be that the sun might be to blame here?

I'm a ham radio operator. We are very familiar with how the sun affects radio signals and every eleven years the sun has a cycle that hugely affects radio.  What other cycles might the sun have that we don't understand or are aware of that could be responsible for climate changes?

Now I hear that clean air may be partly responsible for global warming! Makes sense. What happens to the temperature when a cloud goes overhead on a sunny day? Is man a factor in the particulates clouding the air or might it be volcanoes spewing ash at irregular times?

So long as political science and theories make extreme conclusions based on snapshots, real progress will falter.  We need to see the whole video.

Happy 4th of July. Independence day.  We celebrate our independence from the oppressive British monarchy.  We shot their soldiers and theirs killed ours. In Brookfield there is the grave of a man who fought in the Revolutionary War. Private Nathan Hatch. Since we are now buddy buddy with the British, it seems that today should be more of a birthday celebration of becoming a country rather than the day we officially flipped the bird to the king of England.

Which brings me to the point of the blog today.  You see, we still owe England. We also owe China along with some of the oil producing countries. It's called the national debt. It something that we've all heard about but is obscure to most of us. I understand that we are actually borrowing money from these countries to pay for things that we do. How is it that we need to borrow money from other countries? I though we were the rich people in the subdivision.

My dad once said, "If you're so smart, why aren't you rich?". I'm sure he heard that from someone else and it won't be found in the book of famous quotes but it does say a lot. I'm not rich so I'm not ashamed to say I don't understand money well. I understand gold and silver being worth something and exchanging pieces of same for value received. We used to do that. Gold coins could change value but our silver certificates were always worth a dollar's piece of silver. No more silver, no more silver certificates.  Now we exchange numbers. We can print as many dollar bills as we want because we'll never run out of numbers. 

I've got some stocks. One had numbers of being worth $44 a share when I bought it. Before last Christmas the numbers ran up to $128. Now it's got numbers of around $46. Same company. Doing good business too. Sales are way up. Like I said, I'm not ashamed admitting to ignorance of money and speculation. Nobody in the government seems to understand speculation on oil commodities or they'd be clambering to announce opening new areas for exploration and drilling for oil. It seems when there is more supply, the prices these speculators are willing to bid for oil goes down. Politicians don't understand that. Some think more taxes on the people that do the work keeping gasoline available for our tanks will lower the price of gasoline. Further, these same politicians believe that the cost of the taxes won't be passed along to us, the consumers. So let me modify my dad's quote to; "You may be an elected official but that doesn't mean you know squat about money!".

So continue to celebrate Independence Day. After the grill is put away and the firecrackers are all fired off, remember that Uncle Sam has loans out there from some nasty countries so we can appear to be a wealthy nation. Uncle Sam needs to better explain what this really means to those making the payments on everything that Sam does. It appears that the finance charges are greater than our minimum payments. What politician is going to tell us what we need to hear rather than what it take to get on their power trip and stay on it?

Happy Dependence Day.

Last heard from Mama Celeste, there is an abundance of things since the rain! Around the Bukosky home it is mosquitos and maple seedlings.

I've spend a few dollars in trying to have a nice lawn and pretty much got the weeds under control and the grass lush and dark green. The maple seeds, helicopters to some, were also in abundance and practically paved the driveway. I've been amazed how many maple tree saplings are growing and how easily they sprout and root. It seems that the seeds need only be about an inch from the soil and it sprouts and takes a root hold.

I'm sure everyone is busy swatting mosquitos too. My grass was two days late in getting it's twice weekly mowing and was a bit tall. As I navigated the back lawn with the mower, the critters flew up in small clouds! I soon went to the car and got my can of Deep Woods Off and sprayed on a film of protection.  I bought this can just last week while on the way to Minooka Park with Kanook. Walmart was on the way and as I passed a couple check-out isles, there was a large display of OFF prepared for people like me. It made for one of the quickest Walmart trips that I ever had.

We also finally have some of the warm and slightly humid weather of the summer. Guys in my business have bee anxously waiting for it. Many air conditioning technicians have not been getting a full week of work in until now. So, remember to keep those air filters clean and if you haven't had your air conditioner checked over for a while, call you local heating and air conditioning company and schedule a checkover.

I've long been bothered by just who "they" are who put up the stumbling blocks to withdrawing the oil reserves that are rightfully that of the people. I also wonder about how "they" wield so much power. Congress operates in fear of them such that our so called representatives do not change the laws so that exploration and drilling can take place. It would eliminating much if not all of the need to be concerned about the politics of the middle east or Venezuela.

While enjoying a wonderful morning, weather wise, on the patio and reading the Sunday newspaper, Several articles, all in the first section, began to make me feel uncomfortably warm. The heat was turned up higher when I read about "they", a so called environmental group, going to court because the government has leased land to some oil companies for exploration. There are some polar bears in the region and what amounts to wording that the human beings making up the oil companies can protect themselves from the bears without fear of legal repercussions, seems to be the call to court for "they". In this case we know the "they" are an environmental group but just who are the individuals that make up the "they" and how do they get the money to cause the people of the country such trouble and who is it that provides the money?

The oil companies are not the villain in all of this. I'm happy that the gasoline is there when I need to fill my tank. In that they are doing a superb job. The real villains are the nut groups that have hijacked the name "environmentalist" and turned it into something for their own misguided purposes and the politicians that fail to work for the benefit of the constituency.

It's been established that wildlife and the environment in the northern regions continues to thrive with oil exploration and the shipping of it. We've proven it with the Trans-Alaskan pipeline.  We witness that adaptability of wildlife locally with the herons, crane, deer, turkey and even eagles which have had their habitat diminished.

Come on Washington! Stand up to them for US!

To some, being proactive about drunk driving is knowing that there are consequences if caught. The hot topic is toughening up those consequences.  While I am generally for that, I also like to see some assistance for people who do choose to drink, not become legally drunk if they intend to drive after doing so.

Pat and I had a rather lively discussion while having breakfast this morning at Christina's. We were talking about the Wednesday committee meeting in Madison regarding drunk driving proposals. There are a whole lot of ideas that are floating around both before and after the act of driving while intoxicated.  I'd like to start somewhere soon.

I've long thought that people really don't know how much they can drink and still be assured that they are within legal limits when driving after drinking. The simple solution is to not have any alcohol before driving.  That's a sure thing. But we know that people will often have one or two or more, thinking that they are fine. My point is how do they know when they cross the line into legal intoxication?

I've a whole bunch of ideas, but here is one that is simple, affordable and just might be subliminal in nature, planting a message into the mind for the future. Every drink that I've been served usually is either placed on a coaster or with a napkin.  Usually that item has some printing on it. Why not require each drink be served with a chart showing the maximum drinks a given weight of a person can consume before entering the gray zone before becoming legally drunk? That chart can be printed on the coaster, napkin or on a card that one could take along and put in their wallet or purse. A step further would be to require the same information printed on containers of alcoholic beverages. There are many more proactive steps that can be taken from there.

We need to act somehow in an effort to change our culture of drinking. Do you agree that this would be a reasonable initial step in that journey?

Next Wednesday will be a committee meeting in Madison regarding some proposed changes in the drunk driving laws.  To be discussed are proposals to require ignition interlock devices on all repeat offenders and on first time offenders with a blood alcohol content of 1.6 or higher. The Bukosky family and friends will be present to participate in the discussions.

In a related news item, Mark Benson, the person who crashed into and killed my daughter in law and two granddaughters is looking for a reduction of bail so he can be free after he serves the 72 days in jail that he was ordered to serve after his third drunk driving offense.  It is important to note that when he killed my family members, he had his license revoked and was ordered not to drive a motor vehicle. I can't imagine a judge letting him out and allowing him the opportunity to slide behind the wheel of another vehicle and thumb his nose at the law, again putting the people of Waukesha County in danger. His lawyer argues that he is innocent until proven guilty.

This man has repeatedly shown that he has no consideration for the law. Even though he has these violations and charges on his record, he still owns an apparently large collection of firearms. These were one of the few things that mattered to him when he made his phone call home from the police station right after the collision.

A man who has been repeatedly driving drunk and is apparently an abuser of drugs and driving cannot be let loose, able to access firearms and motor vehicles. Knowing that he is facing serious time in jail, who knows what he could do when free?

There is no shortage of articles about the flood. I didn't realize just how bad it was until I got out of the neighborhood, even though the intersection of Bel Ayr and Pine Street, just a few houses from me, had water that appeared as deep as four feed deep and many flooded basements in the vicinity. This is not the time to talk about it here. It'd get lost in the flow of things. Later.

Sunday I did decide to visit Mitchell Park and Minooka Park's Dog Parks. Kanook and I went to Mitchell first as I knew it would be flooded and that the flooding would be over the sod which would allow Kanook to splash around and not get muddy. It was more than I expected.

It is not unusual for River Road along side the railroad tracks to flood out just east of Mitchell Park Road. However, it was not only flooded between it and Barker road, Barker Road was also flooded with a good flow of water heading east into the park's marsh. A car could negotiate it so long as it wasn't going fifty miles per hour.

Once in the dog park, there were several dogs splashing and even swimming in the water. Kanook immediately joined them. While watching them splash in and out of the water, I noticed something splashing at various location near the new shore. Closer inspection showed them to be carp. The ones that broke water appeared to be ten to fifteen pounds to this seasoned fisherman. Once the waters recede, these fish will be trapped and die off leaving not only a smelly mess, but for whatever reason, many dogs love to roll in such stinking stuff. This is not the first time fish have wandered into the park.  Last spring someone was complaining about a dead carp near the end of the fence that their dog rolled in. Once again, I'd like to see them put up some snow fencing to block off the area.  Soon it will be a mud hole from the dogs running in and out.

Speaking of mud holes, out next visit was to Minooka. Two months of evaporation and seepage were erased and the "seasonal pond" was restored to near winter melt off conditions. Except there is a rim of mud surrounding it.  Even fewer visitors are seen at the large dog area because of it while the small dog area thrives and continues to have many users.

In closing, I do want to acknowledge the people of the city who suffered flooded basements.  I know what  it is like as I endured several floodings when In Milwaukee near the Lincoln Creek. So much destroyed and so much work to clean up. More about this when we've had time to finish the work, rest and think about what happened.

It's been a year now that I've been transfered from working in Pewaukee to West Allis. I'm in the middle of the action between State Fair Park and Miller Park. Last week it was interesting as I frequently heard the roar of the race cars qualifying for the big race. Not much different than the Harley's roaring up and down in front of my house.

I also suffer the effects of a clogged up freeway when the Brewers have a game where the traffic coincides with the evening rush hour. This is one of the concerns that I have about the proposal for Frame Park. The traffic patterns in the area are not designed well to handle traffic. I suspect that the roads are typical of older cities in that they started out as horse trails and didn't change much when Mr. Ford facilitated us from horse apples to carbon footprinting. 

It seems clear that most people don't think that it would be an attraction to Frame Park. Indeed it could spoil it. I do think that it would be good for the area. I might even consider attending a few games with family. But I don't want to get into a traffic snarl either. Nor do people living or passing through the area.  So it would seem to best be located close to the Hwy 59 bypass. Perhaps the old Nike missle site by 59 and Broadway. It's free from the Federal Government and is just sitting there gathering mulch. I think that there is plenty of room for both the stadium and parking. Has it been checked out and considered?

I've read heaps of news items and editorials about how drunken driving laws should be toughened.  Excuse me, but while that is needed, we need to also consider a proactive measure that closes the gate before the cows get out of the pasture, so to speak.

We have created the precedent for it, so nobody should be shocked when it is proposed. We have begun changing things in our culture. It is now time to make a bold step forward in continuing these changes.

Movies reflect culture. It is arguable that they may create it. Movies from earlier years glamorized smoking and drinking.  Offices had dry bars and an offer of a drink to a visitor was a polite and friendly gesture. Homes also promoted drinking.  Many new "executive" homes feature a full blown wet bar right in the living room.  Great for entertaining guests before they head home playing "Russian Roulette" with our lives. Once while having fixed a heating problem in a big house on the north shore area of Milwaukee county, the owner asked me "what do you drink?", assuming that I drank hard liquor. He generously wanted to give me a bottle from his vast selection of distilled beverages. When Pat and I got married, one of the things that showed we were now adults was assembling an assortment of liquor and the items for mixing various drinks.

When I grew up in Milwaukee, it seemed there was a tavern on every corner.  Perhaps a good thing. They were walking distance from home.  As I played with my friends on 44th street, a neighbor would walk by nearly every night babbling some kind of wisdom to us.  He walked the half a mile back and forth to the taverns around Hampton and Hopkins and never was a threat to anyone but himself.

We have banned smoking in many places. We've come close to banning it in all business and even in outdoor places. Usually the reason is the dangers of second hand smoke and other less lethal reasons. 

It is time to modify our culture of drinking alcohol. I'm no tea totaler.  I've home-brewed beer in the past and enjoy a beer or glass of wine with a meal. I think we all know the legal limits of evidence of intoxication is .08. But how many drinks is that?

A little bit of Google searching on the Internet show various devices for determining blood alcohol level. Disposable breath analyzers are available for around $3.00 per test.  Less than the price of a drink in most cases.

Issuance of a liquor license should be contingent on always having an adequate supply of these for use by customers.  Any store selling liquor should be required to market these too.  The time has come to stop guessing and not tolerate both the drunks and those that facilitate it. This would be one way of beginning the culture change.

The Oconomowoc High School marketing student's organization, "Grilling To Give" will be hosting a lunch grill out Friday from 10:45AM to 1:30PM to benefit the Jennifer Bukosky Memorial Fund which was established to educate teens about driving while impaired.

Jennifer and her daughters, Courtney and Sophia, were killed after being struck by a driver about to serve jail time for his third drunk driving conviction. They are survived by her husband Michael Bukosky his son Joshua and son Zachary Bella.

I graduated from Messmer High School in Milwaukee and even at a parochial school, the opportunities and peer pressure to drink and drive were there. It is the hopes that the resulting work from the fund will prevent tragic losses of life. 

Stop by and enjoy something from the grill!

Forgive my obsession. I love Waukesha County. But the past two weeks have had death and road rage, both centered around alcohol, as things that make me question if this is so great a place to live?

I pray that the ball keeps rolling to bring Wisconsin from the weakest drunk driving laws in the country to something that makes it safe for people to drive their kids to and from school and back and forth to work and shopping.  Enough has been way too much.

I share the hope of my daughter-in-laws father, Mike Farney, that given that the politicians and adults can't make the roads safe for people, maybe the kids with a lifetime ahead of them will pester and protest until our government does the right things to make us safe.

Zach Bella and his stepfather and stepbrother will be with us today for a cookout, trying to keep the family as intact as we can and make life go on. But it will never, ever be the same without Jenn, Courtney and Sophie.

Never forget!

The Bukosky and Bella families have had expressions of sympathy given via the forms of media and in person. As the head of the Bukosky family, I give my appreciation to all of you.

I'm sure all of you know the details of the tragedy. It still has not registered with me fully. There is still some disbelief present in my mind. I'm amazed by all of the coverage by the press, television and radio given this.  Even in blog-land I have found much discussion of it and picked up new bits of information and perspectives. I compliment the reporters for being sensitive yet thorough.

The mourning in the family continues, having gathered up the picture boards and flowers today. The many envelopes and cards have yet to be read. This will be done by my son in a condo empty of wife and daughters and with son and step-son at other parent's homes. The nursery recently assembled and many gifts from the baby shower less than two weeks ago are a heart wrenching reminder of what was to be but was taken from him, and us.

Major changes in life-style now have to be thought of, while the bills continue to come due.  It is a tragedy repeated many times a week to people who may not have their loss so well covered or may be from natural causes rather than something senseless. It is these times after the mourning that survivors need support, understanding and guidance.

I was told that Thursday, the day set aside for the high school and middle school to visit, there were over 3,000 visitors. I witnessed hundreds of them pay their respects. I believe that these students will be better for their mourning as they better understand that nobody is indestructible. Drug and alcohol abuse kills and destroys. Perhaps a rendezvous with fate for one of more of these young people may have been changed for the better. The Jennifer Bukosky Fund and MADD will see that the word continues to get out.

Bukosky Fund/Oconomowoc Public Education Foundation
P.O. Box 444
Oconomowoc, WI 53066

Mothers Against Drunk Driving
P.O. Box 51159
Milwaukee, WI 53203

In God We Trust.  It is printed on our money.  However, if a father and mother do so, and their daughter dies, why would we even consider persecuting them in their time of mourning and confusion? Is it just some nice sounding words that don't really mean anything?