I thought I was en route to the Waterfront Cafe for a steak and some wine. But as I walked down 3rd street I recalled that I had not eaten at Roy's Club since the last MCLE (continuing education for lawyers) I attended there years back. Then I saw the sign off in the distance and like a moth to flame I was drawn towards it.

Roy's is an old style Italian restaurant, not as flamboyant as Mazzoti's (the Mazzoti's sign plays on the Italian Mafia connection and not quite as fortunately situated. I recalled the street level dining room as being dimmly lit, and I was right. I could read the paper, however, so it was bright enough for me. I thought about the steak but I have a hard time ordering an entre that's over $20 - call me old fashioned, when I really think about it a $1 coke makes me pause, too - so I got the ravioli. Great call, it was delicious and plenty of it - so I have a doggy bag of ravioli for lunch. Big issue: Microwave it or eat it cold? I got a Syrah and it seemed just about to turn - but I had 2 glasses so it wasn't all that bad.

The diners at Roy's all seemed to be having a good time. Lots of laughter from adjacent tables. This happens at the Ritz too, if you are at the end near the group tables. It makes for a pleasant meal.

Garden Grove v Superior Court, or something close to that. 4th Appellate District

This is a case about whether a legal medical patient can get his 8 grams of medical marijuana back from the city after they busted him, but the DA refused to charge the case.

City and law enforcement, to their shame, claimed:
1 - Federal law forbids them from returning legal pot
2.- Medical marijuana has caused a rise in crime
3- Giving back the pot sends bad message.

The court told them to give back the pot. As I've always maintained (at least to myself) Federal law immunizes local cops who give back mmj, local cops do not enforce Federal Law, and there is no conflict between California MMJ law and Fed mj law. The court declined to discuss a 10th amendment claim.

Remember years ago when then-Humboldt Sheriff Denis Lewis turned someone's pot over to the Feds instead of following a court order to return it? The Federal court said that was wrong. Lets hope that this decision will finally settle this issue, and stop the theft of legal medicine from sick people by government officials who don't like the law and attempt to obstruct it instead of doing their duty.

Decision by the California Fourth Appellate District Court
Felix Kha's return of property case

Sounds like a headline from a shopping news, huh? But that's what they told me. Meanwhile there are only 4 or 5 hardwired rooms and your internet in the other rooms will be intermittent at best. i don't have to go there again till Feb 08 & so I'll let you know.

Purple Plum closed at 8 pm so I had a client meeting at Dennys. Tried to figure what they couldn't mess up, and ordered a steak. I was right, it was good. They don't serve alcohol, which is a drag, but water is still good.

Nadalines is the Thai place. Really easy to miss, but its on the main drag south of town by the Rodeway Inn. Pad Sweet and Sour, excellent.

"On a Friday morning, just about 10 o'clock, the cruise ship Explorer, began to reel and rock. Husbands and wifes, little children..." - got into lifeboats in the -5C temperature, and were picked up by another cruiseship before anything serious happened to them except a few cases of hypothermia. This was right off of the Antarctic Pennsula, today. I've been following the store with some interest as I am going to be on a cruise ship in the same locale in about a month. The Explorer, with 100 passengers and 54 crew, hit an iceberg which punched a fist sized hole in the ship, and judging from the last photo I saw, sank it. (very slowly). "Well", someone in authority said, "Antarctic travel is dangerous". Now they tell us?

Luckily the seas were calm, and while chilly, the weater was not bad. We're expecting warmer weather. And we're expecting the Marco Polo not to strike an iceberg and sink. Still, its something to think about. Lifeboat and evacuation exercises are manditory for sea vessels, but on every cruise ship I've been on (5) they are also cursory, poorly thought out, and in some cases incorrect in details like the route one would take to get to the lifeboat. If we have hours like the Explorer passengers and crew did, ok; but if its an emergency that requires quick action, then as the song continues, "...lost their lives."

If you heat with wood as so many of us do, you are probably aware of the problem of getting the wood to fit the stove. We buy firewood, and get more from down and dead on the ranch, but somehow when it hits the woodshed its never small enough to get into the stove. In the past we have resorted to labor intensive, pre-industrial revolution techniques to size the wood. I mean sledge hammer and maul to split it. No more.

We are proud owners of a DR hydraulic wood splitter. Had it for over a year, and can't live without it. There is wood that will split - fir is great for splitting - and there is wood that won't split. How about knotty oak or madrone? Here's where the DR comes in handy. It has yet to encounter a round of firewood that would fit on the splitting deck and not split. Today as it wasn't heating up very well in nature, I built a fire in the wood stove, then notices I was a bit short on firewood. No problem. Plug in the splitter, and bingo three wheelbarrows full of rounds split and stacked in no time.

Some inventions are worth their weight in gold. The hydraulic logsplitter is one of them.