Island Richards

Some bad news to report. While I was away with my friends on my mountain biking vacation, Grandpa Zorko passed away. We all loved him and he will truly be missed.

Albert Zorko

Albert Zorko, 89, of Rock Springs passed away April 28, 2008, at Memorial Hospital of Sweetwater County.

A longtime resident of Superior and Rock Springs, Zorko had been in ill health and living with his daughter for the past year and one half.

He was born on Aug. 30, 1918, in Dunkirk, Crawford, Kan., the son of the late Rudolf and Franziska Mondelj Zorko.

Zorko attended schools in Superior.

He married Lillian Dixon Zorko in Rock Springs on March 15, 1947, and she preceded him in death Jan. 4, 2005.

Zorko was a United States Army veteran of World War II. He served in the 29th Division, 110th Field Artillery in Battery B. The battles and campaigns he served in were in Normandy, Northern France, Rhineland and Central Europe.

He was decorated with the Bronze Service Arrowhead, Good Conduct Medal, European, African and Middle Eastern Service Medal and American Defense Service Medal.

He worked in the D.O. Clark Coal Mines in Superior for 21 years and later worked at FMC as a miner for 23 years.

His interests included spending time outdoors and with his family.

Survivors include one son, Roger A. Zorko and wife Dorothy of Colorado; two daughters, Denise Z. Richards and husband Kelly of Rock Springs, Mary Ann Yuill and husband John of South Dakota; one daughter-in-law, Marilyn Zorko of Colorado; one brother Rudolph Zorko and wife Helen of Utah; one sister Jennie Ash of Green River; eight grandchildren Scott Richards and partner Justine, Island D. Richards and wife Teresa, A. Kelly Richards and wife Charity, Gary Zorko and wife Carla, Lya Johnson and husband Aaron, Janelle Zorko, Beth Zorko and Heather Stentz; 13 great-grandchildren, J. Island, Brandon, McKenna, Blaine and Xander Richards, Mikkayla Gonion, Adam Zorko, Scott and Kayla Franz, Elisha and Nakala Fry, Bridger Long and Rebecca Lehman; several nieces and nephews.

He was preceded in death by his parents, wife, one son Albert Lee Zorko, one grandson Troy Alan Zorko and one sister Frances Davis.

Funeral services will be conducted at 1 p.m. Friday at Vase Funeral Chapel, 154 Elk Street in Rock Springs.

Military graveside services and interment will be in the Paul J. Wataha Memorial Park Cemetery.

Friends may call at the Vase Funeral Chapel on Thursday from 4-8 p.m. and again on Friday one hour prior to services.

Pallbearers will be Roger Zorko, Kelly Richards, Scott Richards, Island Richards, A. Kelly Richards, J. Island Richards, Brandon Richards and Mike Large.

A poem from the blogosphere:

CONVENIENCE STORE DREAM NUMBER THREE

April 19th, 2008 by Zack

one thousand dollars
for a toilet, you put it
in the back of the van
and the you would not
stop touching me—

Well, this is it. I’m heading to Salt Lake City tomorrow to have LASIK surgery done on my eyes. I’m kind of nervous, but even more excited. The thought of seeing without anything between my eyes and what I’m looking at is just too cool. No more glasses to break, bend, scratch or lose. No more contacts to tear, lose or irritate the hell out of my eye with.

I’ll be having Teresa do most of the driving on the way to SLC tomorrow so I can spend as much time as possible looking around, just in case.

I’ll send Twitters as much as possible over the next two days for anyone who is interested, otherwise, I will see everyone Tuesday!

Socialism and environmentalism have crashed together to form a new creature I like to call socia(environmenta)lism. It’s roots lay deep in the socialist belief that all people are equal except for the few elite that are graced by themselves (since most of them don’t believe in God) and fertilized by the narrow environmentalist belief that man is the only animal who shouldn’t shape its environment to for its own benefit. The ultimate goal of this combined ‘ism’ is complete dominance over the everyday lives of all of us lesser beings.

Given the direction that both of these individual philosophies would take us in, it is a scary proposition that they have combined under the infinite wisdom of Al Gore to create a mass paranoia that has sucked in almost all the major news agencies, most of Hollywood’s soapbox politicians, and the majority of the one=world-government-under-us United Nations elitists. Never mind that socialism has failed over and over again. Never mind that man made global warming is scientific balderdash.

The government has fallen into the quagmire of socia(environmenta)lism and has slowly been chipping away at our individual rights, moving us away from capitalism and democracy and toward socialism using environmentalism as the tool of choice. Even the more conservative leaders of our country have fallen victim of this decades long appropriation of our common sense and freedom. President Bush has ‘admitted’ to man made global warming, and republican presidential nominee Senator John McCain has proposed what amounts to a socializing of the home mortgage system via simple forms to be filled out at the post office.

We are close to the brink of losing what this country stands for, and we all need to open our eyes to the direction we are heading. We are about to lose our freedoms of economic and environmental choice, and we are about to turn them over to the intellectual elitists like Al Gore.

-Wisdom

Really, I am me. No, I’m not that other guy! I’m really me!

This is kind of funny, but it is also kind of a pain in the butt. A few days ago I signed up for a facebook account. Well, I tried to anyway. When I typed in my name I got an error that said ‘This name request has been rejected by our automated approval system.” So I followed the link that told me how to appeal the name rejection and sent off a troubleshooting form, in which I said:

My name really is Island. A google of “Island Richards” would quickly prove
my existence.

. A while later, I received the following e-mail:

Hi,

Facebook requires that all users sign up using their full first and last names. We do not process any requests for name changes unless the full first and last name is included.

Please note that if you are concerned about your privacy you can always restrict who can find you in searches from the Privacy page. I’m sorry if this policy poses any inconvenience. Let me know if you have any further questions.

Thanks for contacting Facebook,

Rufus
User Operations
Facebook

I responded with…

I did sign up using my full first and last name and it was rejected. I know my name is non-typical, but it is still my name.

Island Richards

In the meantime, I signed up using ‘Isla’ as my first name. That worked. Then I tried to change it to ‘Island’ and got the message:

Your name change request has been rejected by our automated approval system.

I settled on changing it to ‘Islan’, as close to my real name as I could get. Funny isn’t it? ‘Isla’, the Spanish version of my name is acceptable, ‘Islan’, a word that doesn’t exist is acceptable, but ‘Island’, my real name, gets rejected. Two days later, I received this:

Hi,

Thanks for providing this information. At this time, we cannot verify the full name. Please provide a scanned image of a government issued ID (e.g. driver’s license) to confirm your full name. Please black out any personal information that is not needed to verify your identity (e.g. social security number). Once we have received this information, we will reevaluate the status of the account. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

Thanks for contacting Facebook,

Rufus
User Operations
Facebook

I sent them what they asked for — a copy of my drivers license and I threw in a copy of my hunters safety card for good measure — along with this reply:

Attached is a copy of my Wyoming Drivers License and Wyoming Hunters Safety Card. Is this enough so that I can start using my real name on Facebook now? I have been using “Islan Richards” so far. My login is xxxxxxxxx. Simply googling “Island Richards” would have shown that I exist and that my name is really my name.

I can’t wait to hear back from good ol’ Rufus. Until then, if you want to find me on Facebook, you’ll have to search for me as ‘Islan Richards’ instead of ‘Island Richards’. I hope you’re happy Jimmy Buffett! I only tried this whole Facebook thing because of you! Now it’s a challenge and I have to see it through.

-Island

5/16/2008 UPDATE — I’m me on facebook now! I got an email from good ol’ Rufus telling me that my name was Island now! Whoo Hoo!

Just hanging out at the house today. Have to go in to work for a bit, but it shouldn’t be long.

Me and a few buddies are heading down to Fruita, CO for the Fruita Fat Tire Festival during the last week of April. Derek Milligan is coming out from California and bringing a couple of friends. We’re planning on spending Friday and Saturday burning up trails around Fruita and then heading over to Moab on Sunday and early Monday for some slickrock.

I’m going to have LASIK done the week before so I won’t have to have contacts or glasses on when I ride for the first time in 20 some years.

I’ll post some pics when we get back.

In the meantime, here are some pics from mountain bike trips during 2007.