Saturday, February 7, 2026
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Scamming pseudo-grandson

By
Milo Yield
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0
Thayne Cozart
Milo Yield

A telephone scam trying to coax money from gullible grandparents just won’t go away. The scammers have hit ol’ Nevah and me three times in recent years and the most recent wuz just yesterday. I call it the “pseudo-grandson” scam. Just for everyones’ information and warning, here’s how the scam works.

Each time our cell phone rang and a “pseudo-grandson” begins a sad tale of woe and he desperately needs good ol’ grandpa and grandma to send him money to get him out of his jam. He’s pretty convincing and an accomplished telephone phony.

The first scam 3-4 years ago wuz supposedly from a grandson — and the scammers knew his name — who told me he had gone to a stag party before a friend’s wedding in Oklahoma City. The grandson lived in Tennessee, which raised the first red flag for us.

The scammer bemoaned that he’d drank too much and hit a car and wuz now in jail for DUI. And he needed bail money. The only way to get the money to him fast enuf wuz to wire it to him. It wuz about this time in the story that we decided to end the scam and we hung up on the scammer and told the sheriff about it. Of course, nuthin’ happened.

The second scam wuz supposedly from a grandson in Denver who had a similar sad story and earnestly pleaded for money immediately. Again, we hung up on the scammer.

Well, yesterday the pseudo-grandson allegedly had a car accident, cracked his jaw, and had stitches in his lip. That’s why he mumbled and sounded so much different. He continued with his tale of woe until I decided to end the scam in a different manner.

I broke into his fake-tale-of-woe and said something like this: “Hey, buddy. you’re an immature, careless, irresponsible little punk. Your dear old grandpa isn’t your automatic ATM. I’m tired of your too-regular begging for cash to get you out of jams you got yourself into. It’s time you grow up. This time you can pay the price for your carelessness and get out of this jam yourself. Don’t call again!”

I didn’t need to hang up yesterday. My scamming psuedo-grandson did. I hope the scammer got the message this time — but I doubt he did.

***

Let’s change the subject to something funny that happened to me real life back when I wuz an elementary school kid. My maternal grandma, Anna, wuz among the most happy-go-lucky folks on planet Earth. I eagerly looked forward to her annual summer visit for a couple of weeks.

During her visit, we played card games, went fishing for both fish and crawdads, and in general had a great time together. Grandma wuz such an out-going, happy person that she could make even the most onerous, miserable work fun. And, that’s what she did on the day set aside to butcher the White Leghorn cockerels that my pappy, ol’ Czar E. Yield, bought every spring. As I recall, he bought 100 straight-run chicks, which meant we had to butcher around 50 chickens.

Grandma and mom sat up a chicken butchering “disassembly” line in the shade of a big elm tree. The line began with the cockerels in a chicken cage near a stump and a wooden box. An axe leaned against the stump. A pot of scalding water sat next to the box. Tables were lined out for plucking the chickens and eviscerating them. A big container of cold water waited to cool down the carcasses.

We each had a job to do. Grandma chopped off the heads and dropped the headless chickens into the wooden box to bleed. I wuz the cotton-picking chicken plucker. I yanked the chicken carcasses out of the bleeding box, stuffed them into the scalding water, and then plucked the feathers. Mom gutted the chickens, singed off the pin-feathers, and plopped the carcasses into the cold water.

It wuz a perfect set-up — until it wuzn’t. Here’s what happened. Grandma became too casual about lopping off heads. I know this is the truth because after I withdrew one chicken carcass out of the bleeding box, and scalded the carcass, and had the chicken about half plucked, I happened to look down and saw the chicken’s eye blinking at me. And its head wuz beakless. Grandma had missed the mark and chopped off the poor chicken’s beak, but not the whole head.

Of course, I screamed. Then grandma screamed and grabbed the chicken from me and finished the beheading job she’s blotched the first go around.

That little episode changed the atmosphere around the chicken assembly line. From that moment on, it wuz just another disgusting summer job.

***

My son-on-law works in the sun, so he’s no fan of high temperatures. However, last week he showed me a map of the U.S. showing the all-time, one-day high temperature in July all 50 states. Here are the single July day record temps and the year for the states where my column is read: Kansas, 121 degrees, 1936; Missouri, 118, 1936; Oklahoma, 120, 1936; Arkansas, 116, 1901; Colorado, 115, 2019; Wyoming, 115, 1988 and Nebraska, 118, 1934.

Note that not one of the all-time July high temps have occurred during the current global warming discussion. Know one knows for sure, but perhaps Mother Earth is just going through another of her perpetual climate changes and it’s nuthin’ new. I looked at the upcoming weather map and saw the next five days are predicted at more than 100 degrees. I will admit that’s hot and I’m not looking forward that string of hot days.

***

I met for the first time a faithful reader who happened to drop by our morning old Geezer GabFest at the Short Stop. He’s Wynn D. Bidd, a retired cattle buyer from Green, Kan. He said he wuz glad to join the “Riley CAVE Men” group for the day. He said CAVE men stands for “Citizens Against Virtually Everything.” That pretty well describes our group. And his comment will stand for my wise words for the week. Have a good ‘un.

 

Dressage Rider Borrows Horse For Seventh Olympics Competition

By
Frank Buchman
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0

British dressage great Carl Hester is set to ride in his seventh, and possibly last, Olympics with a seventh different horse and a film of his life story waiting to be made once the Paris Games are out of the way.

Winner of team gold (2012), silver (2016), and bronze (2020) in an Olympic run that started in Barcelona in 1992, the 57-year-old will partner Fame, a 14-year-old stallion lent by 2016 silver medalist Fiona Bigwood.

If all goes well, Hester could go out at the top. “He’s certainly one of the best horses that I’ve had in my career,” Hester said. “He has a lot of quality, a lot of personality. He is a horse I can describe as loving his job. “I know that sounds a bit cliche but literally every day that I have ridden that horse he comes out with a work ethic of 100 percent every single time, and he’s just an absolute pleasure to ride.

“If it is my last Olympics Games, I couldn’t be happier to finish it on a horse like that. I don’t think, well, I say this every time, probably wouldn’t find another one like that. He is very special.”

Whether or not the oldest member of the British team in Paris calls time on his Olympic career, after equaling show jumping compatriot Nick Skelton’s British record seven Games, remains to be seen.

He will be in his 60s by the time Los Angeles 2028 comes around but still younger than Australian eventer Andrew Hoy was when he took silver in 2021 at the age of 62 and way off Canadian show jumper Ian Millar’s 10 Games ending in 2012.

“I would like this to be my last Olympic Games if it goes well but of course you can’t say that,” said Hester, who won his gold with Uthopia, silver with Nip Tuck, and bronze with En Vogue.

In 1992, he competed with Giorgione, in 2000 on Argentille Gullit, and in 2004 on Exquis Escapado.

“I try to say nothing because I just think what happens if something goes wrong between now and then? I wouldn’t want my career to end like that.”

“I know that Fame will go back to Fiona after the Games anyway so although he might have another Olympics in him it won’t be with me.

“So again, it’s that question of ‘will I find another one like that?’ I’ll just wait and get Paris out of the way and see how I feel.”

Whatever happens in France, Hester’s story is written.

A script has been finished for a biopic charting his journey from a humble start on Sark, a tiny Channel Island with donkeys but no cars, to a gold medal and mixing with the social elite as one of the world’s top dressage riders and trainers.

Producer Andrew Curtis said that Hester’s story was akin to ‘Billy Elliot’, the 2000 movie about a working-class boy growing up in a gritty mining community with a yearning for ballet.

Hester joked he would be happy, at this stage in his life, to be portrayed by George Clooney.
+++30+++

Equipment Repair Major Ordeal

By
Frank Buchman
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0

“Keeping farm machinery operating in the field when work needs done is essential to profitability.”
When tractors and small line equipment were first produced, farmers could often do the repairs personally.
With rapidly increasing technology that’s often not the case nowadays. Fixing a farm machinery breakdown requires a high level of ability, often requiring a computer program to figure it out.
Then, sometimes the problem still can’t be solved, forcing technicians to call the factory or other upper-level knowhow for help.
On top of that issue, farm equipment repair businesses typically have long waiting-lists of machinery needing repaired.
Sometimes, that can be up to several weeks. Plus, most repairs must be done in the main shop where the computers can be utilized.
Situations do arise infrequently when a repairman will come to the field to fix machinery, but not often.
Fortunately, when this ranching operation was getting started, Dad had the ability to fix most of the problems. He typically had natural ability and learned by doing, but that would not be the case today.
His son never had any mechanical ability period with “It won’t start” a frequent response to any breakdown.
Uncertain why the high school boy was teamed up with his cousin in the state fair small engine trouble shooting contest. Despite the teammate’s extensive knowledge, that gas engine never would start.
A small engine repair class was required for agricultural education students in college. There was an old lawn mower in the garage that wouldn’t start.
Dad suggested his son take it as a college class project to see if he could get the mower running again. A classmate didn’t have an engine to repair so he volunteered to get credit for assisting with fixing the mower.
The engine was disassembled with all parts on the bench without a clue how they would all go back together.
The knowledgeable college professor was very patient helping his students with the project. Believe it or not, when the engine was installed back on the lawnmower, it started and ran to pass the course.
Excited to get back to the ranch so Dad could try out the mower, “It wouldn’t start.” The uptown mechanic never got it running again either.
Reminded of Isaiah 58:12: “People of faith are led to fix things that are broken.”
+++ALLELUIA+++
XVIII–29–7-15-2024

Risks in Peace

By
John Marshall
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john marshal

In September we will mark the 23rd annual memorial for the 9/11 attacks. It also will be 30 years since Yitzhak Rabin and Yasir Arafat signed the Oslo peace accords that included creation of a Palestinian state.

The accords have since gone dormant and our policies in the Middle East have reignited furious passions ‒ a reminder that the risks in war are no greater than the risks in peace.

For two generations, the United States has gambled in the far, oil-rich deserts where war and oppression have become the rule and the headline. We have waffled with Israel on the most sensitive flash points of Israeli-Palestinian conflict. We have allowed the International Criminal Court to be smeared and threatened. Under Trump, we blessed the contested city of Jerusalem as the Israeli capital and ended our long-running aid for Palestinian refugee camps. Under Biden we fret over the slaughter in Gaza and the West Bank.

As Israel’s grudging partner, we are a co-conspirator in a region where we continue to demonstrate our ignorance of the land, its cultures, its complex history. Small wonder that we are hated there yet.

Over the decades we have sent to that region nuclear capability. We have sold aircraft and arms and extended credit. We have offered industrial know-how and technical assistance and we have invited investment opportunities.

And all of this for nations that with the exception of Israel are so oil-rich that they could, if inclined, restart heavy pressure on the world petroleum market. (Israel has its own treasury here.)

This has been a high price to pay for our version of group therapy. And it’s an even higher price now, because the Palestine question remains unsettled in a region ripe with the potential for all-out war.

*

In earlier years, we paid for gala desert receptions for our dignitaries while buying options on oil, although on an open market. We thought we were buying a new sphere of influence and shutting out the Russians.

We set loose domestic drillers and invaded Iraq to recover and protect its vast oil reserves. Against the global turn to cleaner fuel and alternative energy sources, Washington remains handicapped by repeated failures to engage and understand the Arab region.

The Middle East holds historic attraction for empire builders. American fits and twitches recall the British spasms as the footings of its desert empire began to collapse. The French, the Turks, and Russians also lost their shirts trying to control the region. We were at war there for 20 years at a cost of thousands of lives – Americans, innocents, insurgents – and, at last count, more than $5 trillion. And yet there is no end in sight to the bloodshed or to the hemorrhage of dollars, euros and rubles.

As America buys peace and power with U.S. Treasury borrowings and tax cuts for arms manufacturers, the national debt tops $30 trillion.

This is no fault of Trump’s Tillerson or Pompeo, or Biden’s Blinken. So long as presidents and the Congress want it this way, our few remaining diplomats try to hold things together. Even with our full and mortgaged pockets, it remains hard to bargain with the wily Arabs and their cousins across the Red Sea.

Does America want it this way at the price of inflation at home, the peace abroad falling away, our power growing illusory against the Russians and Chinese?

If you think this has nothing to do with the home front, visit a gas station, a

grocery store, a car lot, a farm export office.

Congress aside, Americans really haven’t come to grips with this question. The problems are too complicated, too fragmented, too rarely explained in full, clear and accurate terms.

Nor is the question often put with any frankness. It is far easier to be concerned with a president’s age, or where our cars are made, whether the fuel for them comes from oil or lithium. We should worry whether there will be any fuel at all. We head toward catastrophe, and a good part of the globe could burn away before the next anniversary of Nine-Eleven.

Champions Named At Santa Fe Trail Ranch Rodeo

By
Frank Buchman
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0

By Frank J. Buchman
Cowboys from throughout the Midwest came to Council Grove for the Santa Fe Trail Ranch Rodeo sponsored by the Morris County Youth Rodeo Association.
In the Working Ranch Cowboys Association (WRCA) competitions with 15 teams Friday and Saturday evenings, the Rocking P Cattle/S&P Cattle team from Latham was declared champion for the combined scores from both performances.
Hat Creek Cattle Company, Mount Vernon, won the WRCA Youth Ranch Rodeo with the top total points out of eight teams.
Both top teams are now qualified to compete in their respective divisions at the 29th annual World Championship Ranch Rodeo in Amarillo, Texas, November 14-17.
Members of the Rocking P/S&P team are Chris Potter, Colton Potter, Carlee Potter, Justin Peterson, Jake Peterson, and Dillon Sherrick.
The Hat Creek Cattle youth team is composed of Blaine Roberts, Kasen Brewer, Luke Campbell, Jared Campbell, and Branch Horn.
There was a tie for second place in the two-performance open rodeo between Lonesome Pine Ranch, Cedar Point, and Buford Ranches Rock Creek Division, Adair, Oklahoma. The teams split the winning payback.
Riding for Lonesome Pine Ranch were Bud Higgs, Troy Higgs, MaKenzie Higgs, Frank Higgs, Bob Krueger, and Brett Cloud.
Buford Ranches team members include Ty Davenport, Slade Davenport, Lucas Langenderfer, Ty Scott, Ethan Hill, and Gabe Wiedel.
Fourth place team was Beachner Brothers Livestock/Mill Creek Ranch, Erie and Fort Scott, with members including Calvin Kendall, Cody Kendall, Caden Kendall, Coy Hyer, Logan Delinte, and Gary Herrin.
Riding for the open Hat Creek Cattle Company team, Blaine Roberts was named recipient of the Top Hand Award.
Sooner Cattle, Pawhuska, Oklahoma, was second in the youth ranch rodeo with team including Ian Dyck, Dax Godsey, Brodie Godsey, Tagen Carney, and Tripp Carney. Since the first place junior team Hat Creek Cattle had already qualified for the national finals rodeo, Sooner Cattle became eligible to compete.
Third place junior team was California Creek Ranch, Delaware, Oklahoma, with team members Owen Dean, Brody Grisgby, Nathan Dean, Casden May, and Briar Horn.
The 3:16 Ranch team composed of Corbin Bailey, Dylan Chrisman, Wyatt Walker, Jaden Bartosch, and Clancey Jones placed fourth in the junior ranch rodeo.

CUTLINES
Representing the Rocking P Cattle/S&P Cattle championship team from Latham at the Working Ranch Cowboys Association Santa Fe Trail Ranch Rodeo in Council Grove were Justin Peterson, Jake Peterson, Chris Potter, Colton Potter with the new Morris County Youth Rodeo Association Queen Rylee Williams. (Amy Allen photo)

Hat Creek Cattle Company, Mount Vernon, won the Santa Fe Trail Working Ranch Cowboys Association Youth Ranch Rodeo at Council Grove. (Amy Allen photo)

Riding for the open Hat Creek Cattle Company team, Mount Vernon, Blaine Roberts was named recipient of the Top Hand Award at the Santa Fe Trail Ranch Rodeo at Council Grove. (Amy Allen photo)

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