{"id":34908,"date":"2025-10-11T05:00:17","date_gmt":"2025-10-11T09:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/?p=34908"},"modified":"2025-10-10T21:12:16","modified_gmt":"2025-10-11T01:12:16","slug":"firehose-of-alka-seltzer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2025\/10\/11\/firehose-of-alka-seltzer\/","title":{"rendered":"Firehose of Alka Seltzer"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Farmer Cthulhu in His Fields<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Thursday night we had our first frost here in Dunwich.\u00a0 It was light and wasn\u2019t a killing frost, at least not completely.\u00a0 There were hoverflies and dragonflies and of course bees buzzing around today.\u00a0 And the remaining flowers (wolfbane and Montauk daisies) are still more or less undamaged.\u00a0 But the writing, as they say, is on the wall.\u00a0 And wonder of wonders, Camera Girl asked me to turn the heating system back on!\u00a0 Turning the heat on before November is usually me throwing in the towel and her mocking my delicacy.\u00a0 Well, it really was cold last night.\u00a0 But I think the real issue is that Princess Sack of Potatoes is staying over on Sunday and she wouldn\u2019t want to be responsible for giving our granddaughter a cold.\u00a0 And tonight, we had the first butternut squash chicken soup of the season.\u00a0 Ah, what can I say?\u00a0 There are compensations for the end of the warm weather.\u00a0 Stuffed to the gills with such splendiferous food I am happy and content.<\/p>\n

But the sad truth is that I am on the cusp of the dreaded evil times in Dunwich.\u00a0 For the next four weeks I will be a veritable captive in the thrall of First Selectman Cthulhu and his evil regime of ghouls and bureaucrats.\u00a0 I will be forced to do their bidding and many days I will be incommunicado.\u00a0 This year it has been decided to make up the short fall in the town budget by having a raffle.\u00a0 Everyone\u2019s name goes in First Selectman Cthulhu\u2019s size 666 hat and whichever hundred names he draws have to make a choice; pay one hundredth of the shortfall or be summarily eaten.\u00a0 If they choose ingestion then we pick another name from the hat to make up the hundred.<\/p>\n

My job is to gather the money from those paying or alternatively, providing a firehose pumping Alka Seltzer from a nearby pond whenever the appetizers start to make the First Selectman a little verklempt.\u00a0 Mine is not an easy life.\u00a0 But it pays the bills.\u00a0 And the retirement benefits are pretty good.\u00a0 I hope most people pay.\u00a0 We didn\u2019t account for the price of Alka Seltzer going up.\u00a0 If we run low, I shudder to think how I\u2019ll get through the collection, never mind the audit.\u00a0 Well, no use whining.\u00a0 On with the show.<\/p>\n

So, this means there may be some dead air here at the site.\u00a0 Of course I am making accommodations.\u00a0 I\u2019ve loaded up a month\u2019s worth of \u201cQuotes of the Day.\u201d\u00a0 Twenty-two of those will be by Ernie Pyle in his capacity as a WWII combat reporter.\u00a0 Those will be starting in four days.\u00a0 And I\u2019ll be working tomorrow to put together a month\u2019s worth of \u201cPhotos of the Day.\u201d\u00a0 So, there will certainly be content.\u00a0 But the daily column may sometimes seem substandard, as if dictated by a drowning man.\u00a0 Well, they say that some people work best under pressure.\u00a0 Unfortunately, nobody\u2019s ever said that about me.\u00a0 So, there it is.<\/p>\n

And here we are a couple of days after the Gaza agreement and the Middle East hasn\u2019t reignited.\u00a0 Dare I hope?\u00a0 Stay tuned.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Thursday night we had our first frost here in Dunwich.\u00a0 It was light and wasn\u2019t a killing frost, at least not completely.\u00a0 There were hoverflies<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,3366,818,1263],"tags":[3341,4638],"class_list":["post-34908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-events","category-life-in-dunwich","category-ocf","category-stuff-that-personally-interests-me-miscellaneous","tag-dunwich","tag-first-selectman-cthulhu"],"yoast_head":"\nFirehose of Alka Seltzer - Orion's Cold Fire<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2025\/10\/11\/firehose-of-alka-seltzer\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Firehose of Alka Seltzer - 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