Burial @ MindSay 
We decided to go shopping before the zoo, my sister and I! What a great day we had planned. And it was going so well! Out of the six major Thrift World Stores in the Metro area of Omaha, we hit two. The two nicest ones with the Brand Name clothes! One on the Northwest side of Omaha and one on the Southeast side of Omaha near the Zoo.
What a great way to end our mini camping trip that just turned in to being a mini stay at my sister's house due to the varying weather that kept popping up! Instead of staying at the really nice free camp grounds we stayed at my sister's house for a few days, I wasn't going to chance being caught near a big man made lake that had extermly high levels near the banks of the camp ground!
Anyway, after a GREAT haul of a summer woredrobe for both kids from two different thrift shops and then treating the kids to lunch, we headed to Henery Dooley (sp?) Zoo for a nice afternoon. It started out great! We hit the Jungle, the Sea Lions, the Garden of Senses, the Cat House, part of the Avaiary, the Gorrila House, the Cat Complex, the feeding time for the smaller tropical birds, the Desert Dome, and the Giaraff House. With smaller enclousers along the way of course! Of course pictures are on here! Enjoy!
While we were just ouside of the New Butterfly House and the Aquareme deciding which one we were going to go in first before we started heading to the town were my van was sitting so the kids and I could head home and my sister and her kids could head home, we heard the tornado sirins go off! Now I know why so many ppl get killed in public places during storms! The tornado sirns go off and the majority of the Zoo visitors head for the Goddess Dayum parking lots! I kid you not! Well being country girls, my sister and I herd the kids to the aquarememe (sp?) house under the canapoy and bust out our cell phones. Each of us respectively calling our hubby's, asking them why the hell neither one of them called to tell us there was a storm system heading straight at Omaha! We informed both of them that we were heading for the storm shelters in the Fish house and we would call once the storm passed. Then we hearded the kids towards one of the Zoo Workers holding a door open to the basement of the complex leading to the exective offices and we were one of the first groups down.
There were a few other ppl down there already but what we found the most funny out of this was that everyone single person down there including us, were NOT from Omaha persay but from the surrounding communities and areas! We are NOT fools! While the main secruity guy was telling us and the few zoo workers what the plan was, he was getting reports from the weather radio and the few of us that stopped and made calls. Then he asked us to sit tight, while he and his other crew went outside to go round up the rest of the Zoo visitors and get them inside various zoo complexes till the storm passed.
We had a couple of upset kids of course, my daughter being one of them, and a lot of upset ppl, including ball players that stuck around after the College World Series before they went home. Those of us from the midwest were laughing and joking and calming the kids down. We kept telling everyone that we are in one of the safest buildings and don't worry about the animals they know what to do and the zoo workers were making sure they were safe also. Once all the zoo workers got in the main secruity guy came back in to our basement and said it was pitch black out and winds up to 90-100 miles per hour and they would not know if a tornado hit till after it was clear out. The lights did go out and thankfull the generator kicked on right away.
After we got the okay to clear out and leave the zoo, we got some pictures of the damage done in side the zoo. Down trees and one of the heavy glass safety entrance doors to the Wild Kingdom Palliviallion was completely blown off and laid gently down in front of the Pavillion! I missed that picture! There was hail everywhere! We had to make our way out of the Eastern Side of Omaha back towards the I-10 exit so we could head to Freemont NE which is an hour Northeast of Omaha, where my van was sitting! Damage everywhere! While driving the news said, the Art Festival got hit hard downtown Omaha, there was a boat taken off of a dock in the Missiouri and was dropped on the roof of a house, trees blocking roads, and down electrical poles all over Omaha downtown/metro area! We stopped on the outskirts of town to feed the kids and the Taco Johns we hit had running TVS. The area heading to Fremont NE was hit hard also and a semi rig was entangled in electrical wires! Cars of the road, rigs off the road, and major damage. This system worked its way into IA and massive damage and two killed on the IA side.
We got detoured outside of a town between Omaha and Fremont due to massive damage and accidents. Where I got a phone call from Randy when he got home. My dog Spud died during the day yesterday! Randy was upset and of course the kids and I were very upset also, but we also knew the dog was going to end up dying on us. Spud was the dog with the unknown seizures. At first Randy thought he somehow choked while he was outside on the chain but when he went up to examine Spud, there was plenty of slack in the chain and the collar would have slipped right off of his neck (we made sure that it could slip off if he was caught up when running or on the chain if something would have happened). The way Spud was laying and his facial features, you could tell he had a massive siezure. So trying to find our way on back country roads and county paved hiways we didn't know to get back into Fremont, we had upset kids and nobody was out directing the traffic. My sister and I again being country girls said fuck it and got on a country road and started heading towards the sun because Northwest was where we wanted to head. We picked up a truck in front of us from our home area just a different county and he had the same idea. We got rerouted via the roads with no help from anyone due to big trees, silos, fencing, and other debries in the mushy gravel roads! A normal 1 hour drive from Omaha to Fremont took 2 hours!
Once we got to a lil town Southeast of Fremont which would have been the quickest route we got denied by a State Trooper directing traffic. Nobody was allowed into town where a small lake was surrounded wiht houses and such due to the damage! They weren't letting anyone through not even family members of the town or land owners with no houses. Ambulances and Fire trucks were all over the town and two of the rural fire trucks were making their way towards the other road leading to Fremont. We just turned around and followed the fire trucks into Fremont. Finally! Fremont NE had no major damage. Some trees down and some windows broken but no major damage. Then we pull up into the truck stop where we left my van. I got a lovely suprise! My rear windsheild was blown out or a rock got kicked up in the storm! I have no rear windshield now! Nothing was stolen. But everything was glass covered clear up to the front seat and everything was water logged! Thank GODS I had what ever paperwork I did have in there in sacks and covered up! My Leadership Manual alone would have cost me 100 some dollars to replace if it got water logged or damaged somehow!
So I called Randy yet again and told him we FINALLY made it into Fremont but I would be still a lot later because we had to clean up the glass and find places for the kdis to sit with out getting cut up! Thankfull we were able to pull a couple of the pillows from underneith my tent that dind't have glass on it and give those to the kids to sit on. My sister handed over one of her towels so I could sit on it while driving. And then we rearrange the back so none of my Thrift shop finds, my tents, sleeping bags, blankets, pillows, or other camping gear would go flying out for my hour drive home! I ended up pulling over twice on the way home to rearrange my back but FINALLY my normal two hour drive ended up being a 4 hour and 45 minute drive and we made it home at 8:45pm. where we promptly unloaded the van and shop vaccued it out so I could get some plastic on the windshield due to more storms coming this weekend.
After we got that done, we gave Spud my Fat Man Dog a burial worthy of a King. See we couldn't bury him. The ground is too wet and his smell would draw the local wild dog pack and the local coyote pack. Not to mention all the other wild critters int he area. So we took my lovely burn pile Randy made up for me this weekend and gave Spud a Funeral Pry. We didn't want any other anmals digging him up and eating on him. Randy loaded him on the bonfire and I threw some sage, cedar chips, and sweet grass all over Spud and we said a lil blessing for him and said our goodbyes.
Now today, I get to call his old family and inform them that he is gone. I am doing laundry from the back of my van and going to take the kids down to my girl's house because they are still stressed from last night. A lil fun down at Aunties house and coming home about the time Daddy gets home from work will do them good.
Now I am off to throw another sleeping bag into the wash! Pictures to come after this post!
In an ordinance posted in the council offices, Mayor Gerard Lalanne told the 260 residents of the village of Sarpourenx that "all persons not having a plot in the cemetery and wishing to be buried in Sarpourenx are forbidden from dying in the parish."
It added: "Offenders will be severely punished."
The mayor said he was forced to take drastic action after an administrative court in the nearby town of Pau ruled in January that the acquisition of adjoining private land to extend the cemetery would not be justified.
Lalanne, who celebrated his 70th birthday on Wednesday and is standing for election to a seventh term in this month's local elections, said he was sorry that there had not been a positive outcome to the dilemma.
"It may be a laughing matter for some, but not for me," he said.
Burials Prompted First Tree-Sitter
By Richard Brenneman (09-18-07)Zachary Running Wolf, pointing to two little known UC documents, said that the university has admitted that the place where it plans to build its $125 million Student Athlete High Performance Center is a Native American burial ground.
“They want to build a gym where my ancestors are buried,” he said.
Running Wolf said he recently found the two short entries in the environmental impact report (EIR) the university assembled for its 2020 Long Range Development Plan—a plan that specifically excludes the stadium area projects.
Buried in that EIR’s public comments section are two paragraphs, one from a local historian and the other an unsigned response from the university—or rather Design Community Environment, the Berkeley company hired by university to prepare the document.
Richard Schwartz, a Berkeley author and amateur historian, notified the university that “there is a record of about 18 Indian burials unearthed when constructing the UC stadium. There would be many more still there.”
His e-mail pointed to the state archaeological records repository at Sonoma State University. Those documents are unavailable to the press and general public—a measure to protect burial sites from those who raid burials for bones and artifacts.
“UC Berkeley has conducted a records search at the Information Center and is aware of the burials you mentioned,” stated the university’s response.
The university has prepared an “archaeological site sensitivity map” of the area, and if “ground-disturbing” work is begun in highlighted areas and, the brief report added, “UC Berkeley will take appropriate steps to ensure any resources that may be present are properly treated in accordance with archaeological protection laws.”
“That proves there are burials here,” said Running Wolf. “Let them build their gym someplace else that isn’t over our graves. And it’s on the earthquake fault, too.”
The four-story, $125 million combination gym and office complex is planned adjacent to the stadium’s western wall, which would be seismically retrofitted before gym construction starts.
The stadium itself is literally split in half from end to end by the Hayward Fault, which federal geologists predict will be the source of the Bay Area’s next major earthquake.
The city and three different community organizations have sued to block construction pending completion of a new EIR for the complex of buildings the school plans in its southeast campus quadrant.
Those buildings were included in a second EIR approved by the UC Board of Regents last year.
For the City of Berkeley and neighbors, the key questions involve the impacts of the stadium area development stemming from construction and increased traffic of heavy trucks it will bring, as well as long-term effects from the growing demand on city infrastructure and the potential for enhanced dangers from earthquakes, wildfires and landslides in an area with limited access and narrow roads.
For environmental activists, concerns focus on the fate of a large stand of Coastal Live Oaks, some dating from before the stadium was built.
Running Wolf said the trees are important to him, as they are to many Native Americans. But it is the burials that are his main concern.
Leigh Jordan, coordinator of the Northwest Information Center for the California Historical Resources Information Center, located at Sonoma State University in Rohnert Park—the office cited by Schwartz in his e-mail to the university—said she couldn’t comment on any burials at the site.
“I really can’t say anything, particularly about Native American sites,” she said.
The California Public Records Act, which gives public and press access to most official records of state and local governments, exempts information about archaeological sites, she said.
“Only landlords and participants in a project with a need to know” are able to access the information in the state files, she said.
A two-day court hearing starting Wednesday in Hayward will determine the fate of the lawsuit, and with it, the fate of any burials that may lay beneath the loamy soil at the foot of the oaks now occupied by the tree-sitters.
http://www.berkeley dailyplanet. com:80/article. cfm?issue= 09-18-07&storyID=28025
Tamra Brennan
Founder/Director
Protect Sacred Sites Indigenous People, One Nation
www.protectsacredsi tes.org
"Our sacred lands are all that remain keeping us connected to our place on Mother Earth, to our spirituality, our heritage and our lands; what’s left of them. If they take it all away, what will remain except a vague memory of a past so forgotten?"
Well, it's been 17 years since I put mom's ashes in the river, & my husband has since lost his mother too, so we do our yearly pilgrimage to the river, with the roses from our yard, & slowly think of our moms, the hell they lived, the hell they caused us to live, but they are forgiven. My mom was MPD, like mother like daughter. She could never have recovered. Way too much guilt in remembering the things she had done to me as a child, like not stopping my molestation, & sending me to school daily with bloody welts on my legs. Mom had a fun alter, who everyone loved, but they feared her just as much, because she would change in a heartbeat. I still have a boning knife I took from her one night when we were all drinking, & she was chasing people with the knife. When she wasn't looking, I got the knife. She also tried to run over her boyfriend, but only hit a tree. She would have killed him, but for a huge man, he could sure run & hide from Dottie!
Mom, I love you. I forgive all that has happened in the past. You were sick, mom, same as me, & I know how hard it is to hold yourself together. I'm just so sorry you never got any help for yourself, but you would have played the sweet little grey haired lady, who was a mega Jeckle/Hyde. I will always miss you mom, no matter what. Our last years spent together were good ones, unlike childhood, when things were so complicated. I'll seeya when I get there mom. In the meantime, Happy Mother's day, mom. I do still love you so....
By Sgt. Sara Wood, USA
American Forces Press Service
Jan. 10, 2007 – A new law that took effect Jan. 1 changes the way the remains of servicemembers killed in combat are transported and handled. The 2007 National Defense Authorization Act states that the primary mode of transportation for remains of servicemembers being returned to the U.S. is military aircraft or military-contracted aircraft. This is a change from the past, when commercial service was used to transport the remains of fallen troops.
"It was a provision in the law, and I think ... there was some interest to make sure that the remains were moved in an expeditious manner," Air Force Col. Michael Pachuta, director of morale, welfare and recreation policy for the Office of the Secretary of Defense, said in an interview.
Every servicemember who dies in a theater of combat is transported by military aircraft to Dover Air Force Base, Del., for processing and burial preparation, Pachuta explained. This law changes the way the remains are transported from Dover to their place of burial.
In a memorandum to senior military leaders, Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England wrote that this change is to ensure the transportation of fallen servicemembers is given priority. England instructed the military services and departments to work together to ensure air transportation arrangements are handled properly and efficiently.
The law also directs that an honor guard escorts servicemembers' remains from Dover to their final resting place. The servicemember's next of kin can request that commercial air transportation be used for the remains, or that the honor guard not escort the remains, Pachuta said.
Another recent change that is giving more recognition to the remains of fallen servicemembers is the use of honor covers on coffins, Pachuta said. The honor cover is a reinforced cardboard cover that fits on top of the airline industry's standard air tray for coffins. The cover is embossed with an American flag, and the Defense Department seal on both ends.
The idea for the honor covers, which the Army has been using since October, came from feedback from family members and military members who had escorted remains, Pachuta said. "Our intent certainly is to make sure that those handling the remains along the way understand that this is a fallen servicemember and certainly should be handled expeditiously but also with care and respect," he said.
The Army designed the honor covers in cooperation with the Air Transport Association, so they are standardized throughout the airline industry, Pachuta said. The covers are not used more than once and are treated to make them waterproof. When the remains reach their final destination, the honor cover is removed and an American flag is placed over the coffin, he said.
Article sponsored by police and military personnel who have become writers; and professionals involved in criminal justice leadership.
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