Each year, millions of burros and donkeys are being slaughtered for the production of ejiao, a medicinal gelatin that is made from boiling the skins of the animals. The burro and donkey skin trade is now decimating the global populace.

This is the season when we lose sleep buying for family, friends and neighbors, but a word of warning. Three a.m. shopping is usually the time of artists and writers, but for purchasers, as our grafted-in-daughter points out, “Those are dangerous hours.” One morning last December, I woke to the thought, “Was I dreaming or did I actually place a 498-dollar order to Eddie Bauer last night?”

Question everything and understand why we are doing what we do.

Wild horses may have reverted to the wild state from domestication, but they have become symbols of freedom. They are part of the mythology of the American West. Like nearly all Americans, the wild horse is an immigrant and has secured its place as an American icon.

Americans spend just over a billion dollars on Thanksgiving food. A billion dollars would buy a roundtrip ticket to the moon, but would that include a turkey dinner? You could buy an NFL team for that kind of money and make them cook. You could also buy a private island, but who’d kill the turkey?

Social conformity is a type of social influence involving a change in belief or behavior in order to fit in with a group. Humans have a common tendency to adopt their opinions and follow the behaviors of the majority.

This week I’m sharing a few of my bewildering thoughts that arrived from the unknown and unlimited origins during the month of October.

There are sweet sounds and lights of a drilling rig above Pinedale. This promises to help refresh dwindling natural gas supplies that are less than 40 percent in the field.

Rocky Mountain Power gambled very large on renewables and they want us to pay for it.

After reading the Oct. 26 letter to the editor published in the Pinedale Roundup and written by Michael Kramer regarding hypocrisy on Pine Street, I felt the need to respond.

I am not one of those people. I have a motto, “Buy high, sell low,” which unbelievably has a label, “loss eversion.” Put simply, it supposedly means I feel more emotional pain from loss than emotional pleasure from gain. The think tank who came up with that are dolts.

Despite the fact that free speech is a critical part of the First Amendment and considered the backbone of freedom, book banning has returned as a politicized and discriminating issue.

I couldn’t agree more with the statement, “81 MILLION VOTES MY ASS!” If this statement leaves a bad taste in one’s mouth or offends, I suggest moving to a “liberal utopian state” with “safe places,” like California, where you will be protected from being exposed to ideas and reasoning contrary to what you have been brainwashed to believe.

While reading the Oct. 5 Pinedale Roundup Street Talk on page 3, I found one of the respondents’ answers to be blatant hypocrisy for everyone on Pine Street to see.

The use of digital identity has evolved together with our hybrid lifestyles. Several countries have explored digital vaccine passports for travel to secure a confirmation of a traveler’s health status. This exploration has driven home the value of digital identities to both private companies and government entities.

After all these years I think Gar thinks he really knows me, but every now and then wonders, “I thought she was as weird as she was ever gonna get, but here she is takin’ it to a whole new level.”

We, from the skillfully influenced artificial society, now know more stress than ever before. We respond to so many types of stimuli that disturb, or interfere with our normal reflective philosophical equilibrium. We are being pulled one way even though within who we are, we may allow this tug in a particular direction, but we do not want to go. In psychology this is known as “cognitive dissonance.”

The mule deer migration corridor passes through the area where ungulate species birth fawns and nourish themselves on the wild plants, following long-established trails passed down from ancestral memory. It is the corridor that goes from I-80 in the south, which is the winter range, to the Hoback Basin in the north, which is fawning and summer range. This corridor has been identified as the longest ungulate migration corridor in the lower 48 states. In addition, the Red Desert area contains winter ranges for mule deer, pronghorn antelope and elk. It is virtually an area undeveloped from an industry perspective, which is important for many species.

After standing there for a bit watching the world go by, I happened to look up and there in huge red letters was a sign attached to the front of the building, “TAX PREPARER.”

We are no longer talking about helping humans who are impacted by mental and neurological problems, who could benefit greatly from such technologies. The true goal is to market a device that can be used to record intracranial activity and optimize mental processes. This is the new world order that a reckless tycoon, holding an icepick and hammer, is nudging us into living in.