Lion’s Journal

Wednesday, I tried a .40 ml dose of Trimix. I hoped this would be the magic amount needed for a firm boner. No such luck. I was a little harder than I was with the .35 ml dose, but nowhere near good enough for insertion. The erection lasted about a half hour before it started to taper off. I don’t get completely soft, just too soft for any fun as the drug wears off. It’s completely gone in about two hours. My next try will be .45 ml. Maybe I can do that tomorrow night. We’re going to run out of Trimix pretty soon. I’m hoping to hit the magic amount before we’re out.

Even though Mrs. Lion worked hard to get me going, her efforts to jerk me off just didn’t do it. Maybe I was distracted by my studying for the ham radio license exam. I’m scheduled to take it today (Friday). I’m scoring over 90 percent on the practice exams. They use the actual question pool that will be on the test. With any luck, I’ll pass.

Mrs. Lion is set to get on a ladder and mount my antenna. I always worry when she does things like this. She doesn’t want to pay a handyman to do this work. I know she’s good with tools, but still, she’ll be at least fifteen feet in the air. It’s a little tricky. She has to strap a chimney antenna bracket onto the wood stove’s chimney. Then she has to deal with the ten-foot steel pole that carries the antenna. That isn’t easy. It’s heavy, and mounting the antenna is a little tricky. I’m going to try to be on the ground to hold things and to help. If I can be there, maybe we can mount and wire the antenna on the ground, and then I can hand it up for her to mount to the chimney.

Wish us luck.

Maybe I’m trying to avoid writing more fiction. Out of the blue, I decided to take up amateur radio; you know, ham radio. I’m not sure why at this point in my life, I want to pick up that old hobby, but I do. I had a novice license when I was fifteen. My parents moved from New York to Chicago that year. I was alone and friendless for summer vacation. My dad bought me a small transceiver, and I used it to chat with people all over the Midwest.

That fall, after I returned to school, my father died, and my life changed forever. My mom moved back to New York and my ham radio hobby was forgotten. Memories of that summer came back to me a few days ago. I remembered how proud my dad was that I passed the Novice exam and was on the air chatting. I hated having him in the room with me while I talked. Hey, I was a teenager. My radio transmissions leaked into our stereo, and my dad would sit in the den listening to my side of the conversations.

After he died, I regretted locking him out of my evenings on the air that summer. They would have been the last real quality time we would have spent together. I don’t remember much about contacts I made on the air or what I discussed. I clearly remember finding out that my dad sat in the den listening to me talk on the radio. I still get a twinge when I picture him.

Before cell phones and the Internet, ham radio was a gateway to a world of discovery.  Now, it’s pretty much irrelevant. Everybody has a sophisticated two-way radio in his pocket. The Internet and social media make it trivial for me to talk to people all over the world. This blog lets me broadcast in over fifteen languages. Talking on the radio is something we all do more than once a day.

Even so, there are about 750 thousand licensed ham radio operators in the US. You have to pass a technical test to get a license. When I was a kid, it was exciting to talk to someone hundreds or even thousands of miles away. We would exchange postcards with our call signs on them. From what I’ve been reading, hams still do that. I don’t want to collect postcards.

In the old days, about the only way you could have a two-way radio in your car was to be a cop or a ham. We have so many now; laws had to be passed to keep people off the air while driving. I would be afraid to add a mobile ham radio to our plug-in hybrid. It would most likely interfere with the complex computers built into the car.

Why would I want to resurrect this largely-antique hobby? When the notion to study for the license tests occurred to me, I wasn’t sure. After I started learning the techy stuff, I remembered that summer in Chicago. Maybe this is a way of closing the emotional loop left open by my dad’s death. I’m sure that’s part of the reason I decided to pick this hobby up again after all these years.

There’s another reason, a much more important one. There is a slender thread that binds us together. Each technological advance has increased our dependence on systems we don’t control. Most people don’t have landline telephones. If the cell system is out, so is communication. Cell service is likely to fail in a natural disaster or war. What if Mrs. Lion and I are in different places, and there is an earthquake? We would be separated with no way to find one another. Our cell phones will be worthless.

The only reliable hope is a decentralized communication system. That’s right, ham radios. If we had portable ham radios, we would almost certainly be able to contact someone outside of the disaster area. As in every other natural disaster, amateur radio operators are always willing and able to provide help. If we were both licensed operators and had our radios, the vast network of other ham radio operators who were safe could help us find one another.

In a less drastic scenario, having these radios would make it more likely we could reach help if we needed it and we were in the mountains, outside of cell phone range. We have a small supply of drinking water and non-perishable food bars in our car, along with those foil emergency blankets. We have them in case we get stranded. It happens in this part of the world more than you would think. Adding another way to communicate adds another layer of protection. Mrs. Lion isn’t excited about studying for and getting a technical license. I hope she’ll do it. It only takes about eight hours to learn the needed stuff. The test can be taken at home. I’m scheduled for mine on Friday.

Citizen band radios were supposed to fill this need. Cell phone technology pretty much killed that for everyone but long-haul truckers. The thing about ham radio, and from the old days, citizen band, is that lets people connect easily and instantly. Information can be exchanged without fuss or muss.

I’m not sure what I’m going to do with my license if I pass the test. I figured that we could get a pair of walkie-talkies for emergency use. Beyond that, there are all sorts of interesting possibilities that appeal to my geeky side. In the meantime, I like acquiring new knowledge. Also, my spidey sense is tingling about the need for a reliable form of communication that doesn’t depend on the local infrastructure. I’m not predicting an earthquake or volcanic eruption, but I know enough to trust my instinct.

The battle between Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and The Walt Disney Company raises some interesting possibilities. The most extreme is what would happen if Walt Disney decided to close Walt Disney World temporarily. Disney World employs over 70,000 people at its Florida resort. It’s the largest single-location employer in the country and the largest employer in Florida.

Just for fun, consider what would happen if Disney World shut down for a month. 70,000 employees would go on unemployment. Florida pays about $250 a week per out-of-work citizen. That would cost the state $17,500.000 a week in direct unemployment costs. That’s far from all. Disney World attracts over 50 million visitors a year, about one million a week. 92,500 of these people fly in and out of Orlando Airport a day. Let’s be generous and assume that only half are brought in by Disney. That’s 46,000 people. This translates to about 250 flights a day. The airport employs 18,000 people. At least half would have to go. That’s another $2.25 Million a week. You can see that the direct impact alone is to the tune of $20 Million a week.

The indirect costs have to be much more than that. The other theme parks in Orlando depend on Disney to attract visitors. Hotels, restaurants, gas stations, supermarkets, and all sorts of retail businesses depend on Disney to survive. Florida’s economy could be badly hurt if Disney closed even for a short time.

Closing would certainly hurt Disney too. Disney World brings in an average of $55 Million a day in revenue. Only a portion of that is profit. However, Disney World is not Walt Disney Company’s largest profit center. It makes more from movies and TV, as well as continued revenue from its other theme parks, cruise lines, and resorts. In other words, leaving Florida would hurt but not put the company in any danger.

Such a drastic move would almost certainly kill DeSantis’ chance of becoming president. It would also damage the lives of thousands of people, not to mention disappointing millions of guests who had to cancel their plans. Without a doubt, businesses large and small would go bankrupt if the interruption lasted more than a few months. The state treasury would be badly dinged by the economic crises caused by the closure.

can you move disney world?

Some consider the possibility that Disney could uproot its Florida operations unthinkable. It would be expensive but could happen. If another state, say, South Carolina, decided to attract a new Walt Disney World, it could. It would take about ten years to build the resort again in a new location. During that time, the Florida operation could keep going, so its revenue wouldn’t be lost. The new location infrastructure, including the airport and roads, would have plenty of time to be built.

It would be expensive. State and local bond issues could cover infrastructure and low-interest loans to Disney. There is nothing sacred about the Orlando location. I don’t know anyone who would refuse to visit the resort if it were in another state. I’m sure that Disney doesn’t want to make such a drastic move, but it can and will get a lot of help from its new home. When you consider a resort that attracts 50 million visitors a year and generates over $70 Billion, a lot of help is available for a move.

Orlando is dependent on the Disney money machine for survival. Like it or not, the health of Disney World is critical to Central Florida’s survival. De Santis claims that Disney has a private arrangement that no one else has. That’s not true. There are hundreds of other special tax districts in Florida, including Daytona National Racetrack and a huge retirement home complex. Disney’s special district has a fifty-year track record of providing excellent husbandry to the Disney World property. No one, not even DeSantis, has pointed to any mishandling of civic responsibility. The Disney World theme parks have fantastic safety records. The roads are in excellent condition, and guests love to visit the resort.

Disney has filed a First Amendment lawsuit against the governor. The New York Times quoted a legal authority that chances are good that Disney will win the suit. The problem is that DeSantis wants blood. He’s challenged agreements between Disney and the old board and is threatening additional safety inspections for Disney attractions that other operators don’t have to endure. He’s also threatened to build a state prison next to the complex.

As I see it, if DeSantis succeeds and Disney’s business is hurt, Orlando will be the big loser. Disney, on its own, brings over $55 Billion into the state. Well over 150,000 people depend on the resort for their living. Why would a governor and his pet legislature want to break this money machine? He might be upset that the former Disney CEO criticized the anti-gay law passed in the state. I can understand that. But what he did is like killing your cow because it kicked over a milk bucket. The Walt Disney Company is a global enterprise. It doesn’t depend on its Florida operations to stay in business.

Would you elect the man who tried to kill his own state’s economy as president of The United States? DeSantis makes Trump look good