Stokes Castle near Austin was completed in June 1897. It was built of local granite in only a year because it wasn’t a full-sized medieval castle, but a smaller, three-story turret, square on each side. The family apparently referred to it as “the Tower.”

The kitchen and dining room were on the ground floor, living room on the second, and two bedrooms on the third. All were supposedly ‘richly furnished’ and it had interior plumbing. The walls of the castle extended above its roof, with square crenulations that might allow defenders to fight off a siege.

Anson Phelps Stokes, a New York banker and lead financier of the Nevada Central Railway, reportedly built the castle as a summer residence for his sons. They occupied it for two months right after its completion, but never returned.

It is still standing, even though it has been vacant for more than a hundred years.

The year 2006 was our pit-bull, Roxy’s first Christmas with us. She had been a Christmas gift the year before to a man who couldn’t take proper care of her – so he gave her to us.

We’d had her jus’ short of a year and felt she was progressing fine in her general socialization with the other dogs as well as the family. Because of this we let our guard down.

Shortly before Christmas, we went got a tree from the local Boy Scout’s lot jus’ down the road from our home. We brought it in and set it up, leaving it undecorated for a couple of days, allowing the dogs to get used to it.

First thing that happened was our black lab, Yaeger, raised his leg against it. I had to take it out in the back yard, hose it down and let it dry off, before bringing it back in.

I chalked this up to his desire to declare ownership over the pine tree.

A day or so later, I dragged the tree back into the living room, where it was left until the following day. That’s when my wife decorated it, using lights, bulbs and her many  heirloom ornaments.

Things went along fine for about a week, so we felt brave enough to start setting out packages under the tree. Each of the dogs took their turn sniffing the brightly colored wrappings, but none of them touch any and there were no more “canine watering” incidents.

Two days later, I returned after being in town for about three-hours, to discover the majority of the tree was missing from our living room. I say “majority,” because there was a number of broken branches and tons of pine needles scattered around the room along with broken bulbs and ornaments.

It took only seconds for my shock to ware off and turn to anger as I raced out the back door and found what remained of our Christmas tree. Roxy had managed to pull, tug and drag the tree through both dog-doors and outside.

For hours afterwards, all I could say was, “G-d damned dog!” as I spent the next several hours cleaning up the mess she had made. Oddly enough she never touched one package that had been placed out – jus’ the tree.

That would happen the following year. G-d damned dog!

It cost Nevadans five cents a mile to travel on the Central Pacific Railroad in 1885, while it cost Californians only three cents a mile. This disparity also applied to freight being shipped. It cost more to ship most goods from Reno to San Francisco than it did to ship the same goods from San Francisco to New York.

This chicanery began when the transcontinental railroad was completed in 1869, although it was modified slightly in 1881. The problem was that the CPR bought successive Nevada State legislatures through bribery and kept them in a pocket.

The problem happened in other states, so Congressional action on regulating the railroads began in 1877. This resulted in the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887. However, the US Supreme Court didn’t rule against the railroads in any lawsuit until 1896 and didn’t allow the Interstate Commerce Commission to establish uniform rates until 1917.

Until then, a railroad monopoly built through government subsidy charged whatever the market in Nevada would bear.

My wife was going through some of her boxes of Christmas ornaments — notice how I say “her” instead of “our” – it’s not that I don’t like them or the Christmas season – it’s jus’ that I’m too dysfunctional to truly enjoy the excitement of decorating. I’d much rather hear everyone else argue over how to do this or that, than join in myself.

Anyway, she found an item I thought had been lost years and years ago. It’s a simple, hand-made Christmas stocking that I was given as a little guy in Klamath.

Mom made one for me and one for Adam when we were still living on Sanders Court about 1965. At that time our sister’s, Deirdre and Marcy, had yet to be born, and because of this I don’t think Mom never made them a “special” stocking for the fire place.

When my wife pulled it from the bottom of the box — for some reason – perhaps allergies – I got all choked up and my eye-balls started leaking.  It’s a silly thing for a dysfunctional man like me to have happen at such a moment.

It’s the best present an old man could receive.

In January 1860, Governor Isaac Roop wrote a letter to General Clarke of the US Army, Pacific Department: “We are about to be plunged into a bloody and protracted war with the Pah-Utah Indians.”

On February 18, 1860, the Territorial Enterprise published another letter written by Governor Roop. “Citizens of Nevada Territory: Finding that we of Honey Lake Valley are unavoidably about to be plunged into a war with the Pah-Utahs, you are requested to prepare yourselves with arms and ammunition …”

The Enterprise also published letters from other settlers and they wrote that no such thing was about to happen. Some of them felt that incidents with Native Americans were due to traders along the Humboldt River giving them rifles so they could steal horses from emigrants and allow the traders to recover abandoned wagons and their contents.

Others explained that starving Native Americans were afraid to accept food from the settlers because they feared it was  poisoned.

We’ve decided not to go with a real tree or our fake tree for Christmas this year. Instead we’re going to use the ceramic cookie jar made by Spode, in which I bought for my wife several years ago.

Go ahead — say “Bah humbug!”

Yes, I know – it lacks the wonderful odor of pine and it’s not as festive as a tree set up and twinkling it’s lights in the corner of the room, but it also doesn’t need to be watered and there no pine needle shedding either. Besides if we really want that “oh, so fresh pine smell,” I’ll go buy an automotive air freshener and drop it inside the container.

On top of that — it’s much more dog proof than the one’s we’ve had over the last few years.

Sandy and Eilly Bowers began construction of a mansion in Washoe Valley in 1861, while at the same time preparing to tour Europe. They were Nevada’s first millionaires and they spent enough money to prove it.

The Bowers were advised they should give a banquet at International Hotel before they departed on their journey. For this, they ordered every luxury anyone could think of.

In a speech to his guests during the party, Sandy announced, “I’ve got money to throw at the birds.”

Sandy and Eilly had started in poverty. In 1857 they weren’t far ahead of living hand-to-mouth.

However, their destiny was to have adjacent mining claims that had tons of gold ore in them. Four years later, they did have enough “to throw at the birds.”

These days most people think they have that much money when they come across the state line. Remember to thank them.

Could another shooting-war be coming to the mid-east? It appears to be a strong possibility.

Much of this is speculation on my part — but drawn from various news sources throughout the world. So take it for what it’s worth.

On Tuesday, November 28, 2011, Iranian protesters stormed the U.K. embassy compounds in Tehran. The assault prompted Italy, France  and Germany to recall their ambassadors from Iran.

Yet, after following several strings of information, terms like “false flag” has been put into play. This string includes The Washington Post reporting the attack had the blessing of Iran’s government — something Tehran disputes — which is not surprising.

A false flag operation is the setting up of an event to provide cover for another more  important event. In this case, it’s being proffered this event was so the Brits would have a “legitimate reason,” to withdraw its staff without tipping it’s hand to further action.

What is surprising  — is so far — no proof has been offered up by British government that Tehran had knowledge of or had a part in the planning of this raid. It’s either non-existent or MI-6 is completely blind in regard to the usual chatter that precedes such events.

This situation has been further exacerbated by the U.S. Senate, which plans to target the Iranian central bank in an effort to choke off oil exports. The Associated Press reports the senate bill gives the president the power to bar foreign financial institutions that do business with Iran’s central bank from having correspondent bank accounts in the U.S.

If enacted, it could be much harder for foreign companies to pay for oil imports from Iran, the world’s third-largest crude exporter. It could also be seen as an act of war in itself by Iran.

The Obama administration, which is against sanctions, says they threatens the U.N. Security Council’s work at pressuring Iran over its nuclear program, and could send oil prices upward.  And though the EU remains divided over calls to halt purchases of Iranian oil,180 Iranian officials and companies have been added to their sanctions list.

Also Russia opposes new sanctions against Iran, believing negotiations with Tehran can be resumed. Russia’s also critical of the November 8th report by the U.N. nuclear agency detailing Iran’s alleged secret weapons work.

But oil isn’t the only thing fueling the possibility of a shooting-war. An Iranian general claims Tehran will target a NATO antimissile early warning system in Turkey if the U.S. or Israel attacks the Islamic Republic.

Turkey agreed to the defense system in September, which is designed to countering threats from its neighbors. NATO insists the system doesn’t target a specific country, but Tehran claims it’s meant to protect Israel from Iranian missile attacks if a war breaks out.

None of this sounds like a path to peace to me — and I hope — no, I pray — I’m mistaken.

The four-dollars-a-day miners who worked at the Ophir Mine in August 1859,  dug up ore that had four or five times as much silver in it as gold — quantity, not value. Since there were no local mills capable of extracting silver from the ore, the mine owners had to send it to San Francisco to be reduced to bullion.

The shipping cost for the forty tons they sent was $20,000. Since only five-percent of the ore was gold and silver, they spent $19,000 in shipping worthless rock. This is why building mills capable of reducing the Galena (raw silver ore) was important.

If the ore could be reduced to bullion at the Washoe mines or on the nearby Carson River, then shipping costs would be greatly reduced. If the local milling costs were about the same as they were in San Francisco, then the mine owners would see increased profits of $500 or more, per ton.

Marcy was having a hard time finishing up her third plate of spaghetti As a six-year old, it was obvious that her eye’s were bigger than her stomach.

She was on the verge of giving up when she asked Dad to bounce her up and down in order to make more room. Marcy believed what she had been told — she “had a hollow leg.”

He picked her up at the waist and lifted her off the ground several times in rapid succession. She laughed as he did this and we kids and Mom joined in.

Then without warning Marcy’s laughter became three-dimensional as she tossed up most of her dinner. It hit Dad in the chest and fell in his lap.

We were all about to get sick at the sight ourselves, but Marcy saved the day by exclaiming with a big smile, “So that’s why I couldn’t eat anymore!”

Everyone but Dad practically busted a gut laughing — he was too busy trying not to be sick himself, at the moment.