High Summer Report, 2026 Edition

Of anniversaries indifferently observed, and blessings counted.

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I’d written a tedious 1,000-word rant on why my wife and I were checked out of the 250th anniversary of the U.S.A. this year. It was just another Saturday chore day for us. Given the fire restrictions in this unusually super-hot and dry summer, grilling out and fireworks were prohibited. It made sense, as there was nothing to celebrate. So it goes.

We’ve been checked out of patriotic celebrations for years already. Call it another COVID-19 casualty. I’ve seen others talking about their lack of enthusiasm for the semiquincentennial celebrations online and watched them get dragged for giving up. For our part, we remember an America where there was still hope for the future. I could go on and on about things as they’ve become over the years, from the sad state of our military to how even our movie stars aren’t pretty anymore. I certainly went on and on in my rant.

As the saying goes, IYKYK. If you don’t know, I don’t know how I can make you see. If you do know…well, can we please find something else to talk about? We already know we’re not voting our way out of this, and there’s no help for those who still cling to the oft-disproved notion that we can.

The news is awful this year. Our government finally started the war Trump was allowed to be re-elected for. The movies we’re expected to be excited for are all deliberate insults to the audiences that supported the better movies that were made once upon a time. On top of all that, the weather is insufferable. Ninety degree Fahrenheit days are now the new normal in the high country where you used to never see such temperatures.

The most unsettling piece of news is how, very suddenly, so-called AI “data centers” are being planned and built all over the country. In an instant, it was declared this was inevitable, it had to be done, artificial intelligence isn’t going away, and we’ve got to accommodate it by building vast centers that require vast amounts of fresh water to cool the servers while emanating strange frequencies that cause cows to birth stillborn calves, etc. We’ve got to build them right now, and to make matters even more unsettling, the powers that be insist on building them in places that are already suffering from drought and declining aquifers. That these centers will not be used to make cute anthropomorphic cat videos, but store the personal / tracking information of every citizen is just...well, whaddya gonna do?

It just stands to reason many communities are having these forced on them by paid-off county commissioners and city council creatures who have you cited for trespassing and arrested if you show up to complain at one of their meetings. Our real-life sci-fi dystopia is here, with all the murderous totalitarian trappings one can pile on.

The best thing I can say about this summer is monsoon season is finally here. We’re not getting nearly the amount of rain we need in this high valley, but at least the sun is blocked from baking us alive at 7,600 feet.

This means I can finally get outside and “touch grass” as the old Internet admonition goes. I heard birds chirping, see the squirrels playing, watch the cumulonimbus clouds stacking up like lightning-charged mashed potatoes on the horizon. A few precious drops of rain kiss my bare flesh and I’m reminded that this is what it looked like, this is what it felt like thousands of years ago. Only the clothes and the houses were different. Also cars and trucks and stuff, but you get the picture.

Touch grass, seek God. Focus on the Kingdom to come beyond this doomed world’s future. That’s all.

Meanwhile, There Are Still Bills to Pay