NaBloPoMo #6

NaBloPoMo - National Blog Posting Month

Question #6: How do you balance your children, relationship, and work life? 

My Response: This one is kind of easy. There is essentially only relationship left of those three. My children are adults, gone from home now a couple of years, and my corporate job of nearly 29 years evaporated, so that leaves only relationship, mainly one in particular. But I am only semi-retired, a whole bunch of things have replaced my job, tightly knitted into relationship.

Key word: Balance

But relationship has become complex because now the daily "efforts" and time that previously went into the children now go into my dog Cooper. (((I have never had a dog quite like Cooper! My sister-in-law says he's really a person in a dog's body.))) My job has been replaced with learning the HVAC business and helping my wife with our businesses, retail products and services, that keep growing like crazy. Now if they would just turn a profit, eventually, that would be nice as well. 

The essence of today's question is balance. I try to have balance by doing the most important thing, whatever it is, without getting sidetracked, and finishing that task to completion. Try. I constantly look at the big picture and long time frames. I invest. 

When I feel it has been too long without communicating with my children or my mother, then I strongly focus on that issue. I am in constant communication with my wife so most of the time that is not an issue. I do like having some alone time with just Cooper and housework, hobbies, reading, and writing. I love to groc shop because it is a time to eXplore and a social "see a bunch of friends", because I am a small town soul now living in a slightly larger town than at any time of my childhood.  

I grew up in a large family of 4, then 7 children, when my parents suddenly adopted three younger cousins. My childhood was either a rural setting or very close. I was outside a lot, playing, exploring, bicycles, building tree forts, constantly in my father's tools. I find myself always talking to people when I am in public. I was never taught the "Never Talk To Strangers" rule as a child, and if I was (?), my parents would have been hypocrites! But I go beyond mere talk to entertaining folks with stories and jokes. 

I now sell shoes! Who would have EVER seen that a year ago?!?!? I have never been a salesman in my entire life before this last year. But I love bringing Vibram shoes to the people of Borger Texas.

I hug a lot   I help a lot   I have a big heart,  I care

Balance? I know enough people who think I am probably UNbalanced mentally, (hah!) but they don't even begin to know the real me. But I have had a few people on eXtremely rare occasions tell me I'm a super genius. (again, HAH! - fooled them as well) ... So I round up this whole mess and message that is me, and mash it together, and

[-poof-]

out pops my writing.

Why I Hate Today

I hate today because:

A) I tried to reach my son by telephone and then Facebook, but never got to talk to him. I pay an incredible amount of money for unreliable cell phone service with a company who's first letter is A and the last two are ampersand T, I'll make you guess the rest of i"T".

B) There was an earthquake in the neighboring state that measured 5.6 on the big R scale, but we didn't feel anything here. I've never felt an earthquake or seen a tornado.

C) It was too cold.

D) I can't sleep.

E) I really don't want to sleep. I want to hear my son's voice. While playing with my ink pen I have practiced my slow precision drawing skills by writing his first name abazillion times.

F) I think the "Follow Someone's Blog" technology is messed up at Blogger at the moment, getting strange behavior from their system.

G) I hear the theme music to Law & Order playing on the teleBision; ick.

H) It was quiet in here (the kitchen) but now the compressor to the refrigerator kicked on just a few feet away. No wait, scratch this one, it effectively drowns out the Law & Order noise from the bedroom.

H) It appears that the pineapple plant that I am trying to grow for someone is not working. I am usually successful more than half the time to get them to start growing. I have given one plant away as a present so far and I have three of my own that have huge beautiful leaves. But at least the potential failure will give me another reason to buy another pineapple to eat. It just deflates and tarnishes my reputation as a pineapple plant grower. I enjoy telling people that I have one of the largest pineapple plantations in Borger Texas. (Three plants) I give away my secrets, too.

I) The time is changing and people are gaining an hour which sounds like a good thing, BUT I know I am going to have to listen to people's nonsense of how the time change messes them up for weeks. It's happened toooooo many times in the past. I never change the time on the clocks in my vehicles, so for the next half year my car will be off by an hour and the truck will be correct. Most people have Standard and Daylight Savings Time modes they switch between semi-annually. I have Car and Truck.

J) I am at my house right now and would like to clip my fingernails, but I can not find the clippers. The ironic part is that we own a store that sells them several miles away. In the dark. In the cold. And we just drove near there a few hours ago on the way to supper.

K) The Safari browser keeps crashing more than once a day on my iPad. Sometimes as often as ten times in one day. I guess that's a reason to hate every day and not just this one.

L) The level of town gossip, involving the recent massive arrests by the DEA of the longtime town drug lord family, has reached new levels of stupidity. The public online chats have people mentioning how their several businesses have helped the community. I think its just the cocaine and meth talking. There are plenty of rumors about the illegal gambling issues, counterfeiting and the local police department as well.

M) After being at home most of the week I had been promised that Saturday evening would involve a long trip to Amarillo and a nice restaurant. A chance to drive my truck. I love driving my truck. But someone else was too tired so that didn't happen. I had ran out of certain favorite things that require trips to Amarillo. I had been looking forward to one of my favorite places there where my meal, with part of my wife's, consists of salmon, shrimp, asparagus, chicken, salad, baked potato, shrimp, and fresh made bread. I really only eat one meal the entire day on that occasion.

N) Someone died recently after running into a horse on the highway. He was my age. In another local accident, today a 90 year old man driving a Chevrolet Camaro caused an accident that killed a 62 year old man in another vehicle head-on by swerving into the wrong lane. I am thinking, why is someone 90 years old driving a 2008 Camaro? I am leary of trusting 90 year olds using a walker by themselves, much less a muscle car. Actually I don't know for sure how old the dead man was. In the first paragraph of the Amarillo online news broadcast he is 62, and in the second paragraph he is 63. Maybe it was something to do with daylights savings time? UPDATE: The Camaro became newer in the second news report, it is now listed as a 2010 model.

O) The last of the Butterfinger candies from Halloween are gone. How sad. They are the miniatures and so wonderful with a cup of cold milk. (But I have a new unopened secret bag hidden in my bedroom night stand, so don't tell my wife. She never reads my blog.)

Update: conversation later on Sunday morning

"Are we going to Amarillo today?"

"Yes, I was just waiting for you to get out of bed"

"Have you taken a shower yet?" - obvious answer is no based on what she is wearing.

"No, [momentary pause] I wish this fly would leave me alone"

"I bet if you get in the shower that the fly will not follow you in there"

The Economic Stimu-lust Is Working!

I am glad the Occupy Wall $treet movement is creating jobs!

Policemen are getting riot pay overtime, tear gas cannister & tent manufacturers are hiring, and park & sidewalk sanitation workers are in strong demand. Throw in more work for newscasters on a slow day, and I feel the stock market climbing back soon and paying hire dividends, _oo00O_Ooops, that was s'pposed to be 'higher' dividends.

The cities just need to start charging admission to their parks, just like federal campgrounds at National Parks, more money! Economic stimulus! Free speech is one thing, free camping is something else: wrong

Forget about Wall $treet, DEoccupy Afghanistan

NaBloPoMo #5 Point Nothing

NaBloPoMo - National Blog Posting Month

Question #5: How do you feel about national writing contests that can't seem to get their act together and give their writing prompts in a reasonable time frame?

My Response: The real fifth question has not arrived yet from NaBloPoSLOWPokes so I made up a question of my own. It is now well into the day at 7:30 AM and there is no prompt question from their system and I am tired of waiting. I guess I will offset the days and -hopefully- give you the real fifth question's answer tomorrow.

Update: 8:30 AM - still no prompt, and to think they actually encourage the participants to do their blog post early in the day. I wonder if that is why my dog woke up this morning? He came in the bedroom and made his normal Iwanttogooutsidenownoise but when I arrived at the living room he stopped there AND the wife was already up. Ah, how sweet, togetherness! (actually semi-grumpy me went back to bed. He did come back to bed to warm my feet an hour later, so all is forgiven. I did give him a Beggin' Strip earlier as well.)

Update: 9:30 AM - nothing new, no prompt yet.

Update: 10:06 AM - sorry, I finally read the fine print. There are no updates on WEEKENDS. I guess they aren't creative enough to have daily prompts be every day. It appears there is no 'system', just a human who types something once a day, no robotic program. And I was so hoping for a robotic failure. Possibly they ran outta questions? November has thirty days, only 22 of them are weekdays this year. SO ... now ... what to do, what to do, hmmm, I decided to make you a chart so that the next time you have a November you can know how many weekdays (Mon-Fri) there are in the month of November based on whatever the first day of the month is. I also added what date in the month the fourth Thursday is, for Thanksgiving in the United States of America.

21 - Sun - TDay: 26

22 - Mon - TDay: 25

22 - Tue - TDay: 24

22 - Wed - TDay: 23

22 - Thu - TDay: 22

21 - Fri - TDay: 28

20 - Sat - TDay: 27

NaBloPoMo #4

NaBloPoMo - National Blog Posting Month

Question #4: When you are writing, do you prefer to use a pen or a computer?

My Response: The question didn't specify what I was writing, just the mechanistic method, so I am not restricting my answer to just blog writing.

When I am making my groc store list I use a pen. I love to be creative with fonts. I sometimes write left-handed for the fun of it. My pens are eXtremely fine point gel pens.

MITSUBISHI uni-ball Signo bit, size 0.18 mm

I have a whole buncha colors, maybe 14 or so, a mixture of size 0.18 and 0.28 mm. I draw cartoons with pens and pencils. There are also strange, surreal landscapes. All other times my writing, such as blogging, is performed almost eXclusively on my iPad. My favorite computer font is Trebuchet. My margins are usually justified, unless it's poetry, most of that is centered.

By pen I write a few personal letters per year (3 to 12) that go by regular mail. I usually write to either my mother or my longest term pen-pal, my best friend from childhood who lives in south Texas. My current local best friend lives near by and she never receives paper letters, only electronic media.

I spent about 8 months of my life making daily to-do lists for projects in a certain elaborate manner. This was during my final days as a chemist. I wrote on plain unruled paper, but there was a framework of lines and margins on a template sheet tucked underneath that allowed for beautifully spaced writing.

The to-do lists used a system of rotating 4 color pairs which I stepped through daily in a pattern of

Day 1  A-B

Day 2  B-C

Day 3  C-D

Day 4  D-A

Day 5  A-B

.

.

.

I had so many colors that I don't remember eXactly which 4 colors belonged to letters A,B,C, and D.

The first color would be used for the chronological header, then alternate with the second color for each item on the to-do list for the day. Color A was the first header color alternating with B, then the next day color B would be the header color alternating with color C for that day. Then I would continue on through the pairs cycling every four days back around to A-B.

One day before morning meeting someone asked me if my "notes" (to-do list) were printed on a computer. I thought my to-do list was elegant and organized, but I didn't think they looked quite that good. But I was flattered. I remember my elementary grade teachers telling me that I wouldn't be able to print when I got older, that I would have to use cursive. Hah!

When I lost my job I left behind approximately sixty-six 8.5x11 inch beautiful pages of to-do lists. They were most likely destroyed by barbarians. The pens were my private property so they were eventually returned to me. Our group secretary had refused to buy them for me so I found my own at Jet Pens.

Pens are available at Jet Pens: www.jetpens.com go to "Gel Pens" category

NaBloPoMo #3

NaBloPoMo - National Blog Posting Month

Question #3: “Can you listen to music and write? What song did you hear today?” 

My Response: No, I never listen to music while writing. I want dead complete silence.

I tried very hard to remember if I heard any music at all today and the answer is zero nothing no. I didn't go shopping, never play my automotive sound system, and only ventured out for supper at a restaurant which had no music. bam-WRONG-bam!!! I suddenly remembered that the long table of people in the far corner sang the Happy Birthday song to someone, but I was at the cash register paying out, so I didn't see them. I also "sang" Happy Birthday to the state of South Dakota shortly after midnight TWICE because it has two time zones. SoDak turned 122 years old today. So quite by accident the first and last song of my day will be the same one. There was no music in between unless you count my cell phone ring tone, the noise of the dishwasher, clothes washer or dryer. I do not.

See blog post H.B.S.D. for SoDak's birthday story

NaBloPoMo #2

NaBloPoMo - National Blog Posting Month

Question #2: “If you knew that whatever you ate next would be your last meal, what would you want it to be?” 

My Response: I would want it to be a tiny nuclear powered reactor capable of [-safely-] energizing my body for an eXtremely long time period. I just wouldn't want to be the physician somewhere down the road in the future dealing with my nuclear waste, or my nuclear waist. Or would I need to see a physicist? (Note to George W. Bush: if you are having trouble with that foreign sounding looking word, its your "new-que-lar")

NaBloPoMo #1

NaBloPoMo - National Blog Posting Month

Question #1: “What is your favorite part about writing?”

My favorite part about writing is that my entire life [almost] seems to revolve around it.

Writing is my constant eXperiment.

Writing feels effortless and stressless.

Writing feels so wonderful when you perceive a project's flow and then completeness.

It is cool when you can look back on your body of work and say, yes, that was an interesting mental journey, yes, I created that poem, that song lyric, that mental image, that photograph, that piece of art.

My blog in all its grand silliness: Is me

I hope you are always entertained and sometimes enlightened, that was my main goal.

Amish T-Hair-errorists

Hair's something religiously stupid: Amish T-Hair-errorists

[No, I didn't stutter just then.]

Amish vs Amish Violence _?!?!?

Supposedly an Amish man was attacked by a group of Amish men who shaved off part of his beard. According to the news article: A group of men armed with scissors and battery-powered clippers attacked Miller, holding him down and cutting out a chunk of his beard, according to the Millers and law enforcement.

Notice: BATTERY ->POWERED<- 00ps, I'm thinking there's a motor in there! The guys claiming the superior Amish traditions were the ones doing the cutting - with the motor.

Reference: CNN Article

(I know, the first word of this blog post is supposed to be "Here's", but I just couldn't resist the pun)

H. B. S. D.

South Dakota became a state on November 2nd, 1889.

So I was hoping to be the very first person to sing happy birthday to the state this year, so I am trying to publish this very close to a wee bit after midnight on the Nov Two.

(waiting anxiously)

(nine more minutes to go)

(I wonder if I have time to make a cup of coffee?)

(this is eXciting!!!)

(suddenly yawning - must fight sleepies)

(zzzzzzz)

(what time iz zit?!? Oh, I'm still okay ...)

(ready, set, go!)


Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday, South Dakota,
Happy birthday to you!


OOPS - Update - I just realized a few minutes ago at 12:45 AM Central Time Zone that the western part of South Dakota is in Mountain Time Zone! So this necessitates singing again in a few minutes. I did some math as well, its eleven years on each side of a century, 1889 & 2011, so the total is 122 years.

(ready, set, go again!)


Happy birthday two you,
Happy birthday two you,
Happy birthday, Western South Dakota,
Happy birthday two you (at one-twenty-two)!!!


Update later in the morning: my aunt from SoDak mentioned that only I would know this particular fact.

My Response: I hope not, otherwise they are forgetting to teach one particular fact in State History Class throughout the Chinese Ringnecked Pheasant & Coyote state. Have fun celebrating today! Bake a cake, I'm going to - German Chocolate, yum. No candles on the cake though, it would take too long to light 122 of them. At least we have SoDak shaped cake pans - how thoughtful of them to shape our state pretty much in the shape of a rectangle that is close to a 9x13 pan. At least we aren't shaped weird like Wyoming or Colorado, whadda buncha squares.

Smart Potatoes for Dumb People

I saw this potato product packaged in a pair of pairs while groc shopping. 

So called "Smart POTATOES" on the right, a sack of similar potatoes on the left.

The Smart POTATOES are hand selected and then cleaned in a special manner. Then they are shrink wrapped. I wonder what's wrong with the way I wash my potatoes? And I hand pick mine as well, from the stack of availables in the store.

The Smart POTATOES cost 50 percent more than the regular potatoes that appear the same to me. Plus: Smart POTATOES are only sold in groups of eXactly four. HAH! I bought just THREE potatoes today, eXactly the number I wanted. And if I would have needed five, well, you see where I'm going with that. $$$

I'm Being eXtremely Festive

BOO!!! We decorated our house for Halloween using all natural recyclable fibre and a volunteer worker using his own design: I let a spider continue creating a web from the porch light.

I am doing my part on the inside of the house by vacuuming and doing the dishes. Maybe some laundry as well.

Maybe.

I will let The Wifey buy and distribute the candy.

But first there must be breakfast.

Oh, it's 11:31 ..... AM

But first there must be lunch.

I saw that one of my friends was making a German Chocolate cake and it sounded like she was going to give away pieces of cake for Halloween. Maybe that is something people do in Oklahoma, I'm not sure. So now I plan to make another GC cake as well, but there is no way I am giving it away to Halloween trick-r-treaters. Well, come to think of it, I did give a rather large piece to a friend a couple cakes ago. But that was to cheer her up after having some trouble with the law. And no, there was no hacksaw blade inside the cake to help her escape from jail, she was already out by that point.

Now, where was I? Oh, now I remember ...

But first there must be lunch.

I am thinking grilled chicken sandwich with bacon, side of onion rings, and of course, Dr Pepper.

- - - - -

Mid Afternoon Update:

Oopz - vacuum cleaners and cell phone chargerz are incompatible.

CePhCh: Dead

VacCle: In Emergency Surgery

Later ...

The Dyson did not die too soon!!!

Bonus: I know what I should do for Halloween: Offer all the lil peasant children of The Village a choice between CanDy ..OR.. PoeTry !!! Thiz iz going to be the bezt Hallowee never!

WHERE?!?!? WHO?!?!? .... (Evening time approaches and Wheel of Fortune is playing) .... I am dying from laughter! The clue for Wheel of Fortune just now was 'Fictional Place' and I heard a small piece of Halloween background ghosty noise and I saw the apostrophe towards the end of the first word and I said Dracula's Castle before anyone even had spun the wheel or guessed a letter! I normally don't play quite that well. Tamie just smiled. The dog was happy.

Two Cup Cakes Equals One Pint Cake?

So my niece arrives with her two children for trick or treating, but they are bearing gifts as well.

We each get a cupcake, Tamie's has a pumpkin flag using a toothpick for a flag pole, while my flag has a spider.

My CuCa goes "safely" [high] on the kitchen countertop. Tamie's CuCa goes missing.

"I sat it right here by my livingroom chair", she says.

I search the floor carefully, and find the broken pieces of a toothpick. Cooper found HIS [low] pumpkin flagged cupcake. Cooper says, "Thank you Abby & Zack"

SO ... I finish adding the cupcake story to this blogpost, but the editor is not a WYSIWYG editor when using an iPad, so I always have to proof the blog post in it's live condition, especially when doing tricky things with HTML formating. After I read the latest update I just happen to read below to the ad Google has picked out: Spleen Tumors in Dogs - and I suddenly wonder, "Can dogs get tumors from splinters?"

Finally ... I saw an ad on my Facebooq page for "fangear", and I had no idea what it was OR why OR how it was associated with Mark Twain, especially while I was in the con-fused period of splitting the word incorrectly as "fang" + "ear", deeply confused as to what a "Mark Twain Fang Ear" could possibly be, but then I thought, it is Halloween. I next thought, well, there was that guy who wrote a story about Abe Lincoln being a vampire hunter, so maybe .....

Sheldon's Song for Canines

Sheldon Cooper of "The Big Bang Theory" teleBision show on CBS has a kitty song. I re-worded it for puppies. (Dedicated to Candra's dog Bonzai)


Soft Puppy,

Warm Puppy,

Little ball of wolf

Happy Puppy,

Sleepy Puppy,

Ruff ruff ruff

Two-day's Short Thoughts, Some Scary

Tamie: "Have you had your cheese this evening?"

Cooper: wags tail, "no-ar"

I crack up laughing as Tamie gets out of her chair.

Tamie: "Well let's get you a piece of cheese!"

- - - - -

I figured out the perfect Halloween disguise: a Dyson vacuum cleaner. When they offer the bowl of goodies - ))))))))))))-> in my bag!

- - - - -

Uh-Oh, puppy is chasing something in his dreams again. Squirrel? Cat? Bird?

S Q U I R R E L !!!

- - - - -

OWS: "Tents are a form of speech"? Well, maybe they are confused with past tense, present tense, & future tense.

- - - - -

I interview myself quite often, and most of the time I get the answers correct. Its the questions I get wrong. You're probably thinking right now, is he talking about talking to himself? And you are probably going to be surprised when I say no and yes.

One of my blog friends asked if I had transcripts of my interviews with myself.

My Response: Transcripts? Hmmm, probably buried eXtensively throughout my blog with a very light coat of top soil.

- - - - -

Just made the best German Chocolate Cake ever!!! I added 4 eggs instead of the 3 the recipe called for. Mmm...

- - - - -

I saw a news report that a New York couple were trying to obtain the trademark for "Occupy Wall Street", with an obvious attempt to make money from it. There will always be poor people and rich people, and poor people trying to become rich people by taking even more of the poor peoples money for cute OWS hats and bumper stickers.

- - - - -

There were big major drug bust and money laundering arrests in my city today after a year long investigation. At least 4 members of a family that have several local businesses, with the news channel last night mentioning so many grams of methamphetamines and 5 kilograms of cocaine. The flooring company down the street from our business is just part of the empire under investigation.

My sister-in-law asked my wife, "what are we going to do now?". We have already paid for our floor to be laid in the new nail section of our store and the job has only been partially completed. We are waiting on equipment and plumbing before we can even do the flooring. Interesting situation.

The currently incarcerated flooring shop owner has done many floor jobs for us over the past twenty some years at our residence and business buildings. The next to the most recent job back around March of this year was a small room for our sun tanning room for our business. When my wife and I were leaving town that day she asked me, "I bet you can't guess how much [owner's name] charged us for the floor today". She told me the figure and I was flabbergasted.

I am a very fair and honest person. I immediately called him on my cell phone and demanded to know why he had charged me so little, was he sure that he got the bid correct for the size of room and the amount of labor (?!?!?) His response was jovial - he had probably never had this particular (argumentative) conversation with a customer before. He said that he would charge more on the next job.

Based on another report of a drug bust in Florida this week, that 5 kilograms of cocaine has a street value of approximately $200,000 dollars. I am not sure what the quantity of the methamphetamines were. And to think I was worried about a flooring job bid.


Link to news story: Channel 4 Coverage

Remember, innocent until proven guilty.

Blog of Not

Now I am wondering if the fine people at Blogger are paying attention when they pick their "Blog of Note" for a day. Their most recent choice is En Tequila Es Verdad appears to have moved about a MONTH ago, September 30th to be eXact.

So that should be a hint on how you too can become a B-o-N:  M o v e ... .. .

I Will Gladly Solve All The World's Problems for a Small Fee

I try to help my friends understand their technical, scientific and mathema-tickle difficulties by using confusing answers with the primary purpose of cheering up their day.

One of my friends posted this quote: "Pursue money at the expense of happiness and later in life you can buy yourself a beautiful house to sit in when you're depressed" -Simon Sinek

My Response: Be sure to spend some extra money on a dog so he/she can be depressed too. Misery loves Limited Liability Corporations. Oops, I meant 'company'.

A Washington state friend living in England posted a picture of a plaque on an exterior wall in London England that read:

English Heritage
Jacob
VON HOGFLUME
1864-1909
Inventor of time travel

lived here
in 2189

My Response: I remember you posting this 5 years from now for the first time.

A friend posted a picture of a skeleton dressed in female clothing and a wig sitting on a park bench with legs crossed with a leash in her hand going down to a small skeleton that is supposed to be a dog. The caption for the picture is:

"Waiting for the Perfect Man"

My Response: Ah, to do that to a tiny little horse, how sad. You would have thought the horse could have ate the grass and stayed alive. Maybe it was a thirst thing, I don't see a trough of water. That must have been a very large woman compared to the size of the horse. No wonder she never found the right man if she was not willing to date someone shorter than herself. At least we now have a logical eXplanation.

A friend wrote that there was apparently a loose ferret in her apartment complex, and wondered if she needed to close the door on her balcony,

My Response: That's a good idea. That way the ferret who is hiding in your closet won't be able to escape. Like the old saying, "A ferret in the closet is worth two otters on the balcony".

My friend wanted to know what to wear to a Tea Party rally.

My Response: The English have tea often, so I would guess anything English looking, or if you want to look great, go for the Great Britain style. But there seems to be a lot of angst or ire associated with Tea Party-ers, so you could dress Ire-ish. I wouldn't go to the eXtreme end of the scale though, avoid The Leprechan Look.

.... I will add more helpful eXplanations and advice to this blog post in the future. I wonder when some "small fees" are going to start happening, I'm getting hungry.

Link to PREVIOUS ADVICE

Horse Equivalency

If I had four horses and or horse-equivalencies, I would name them Paul, John, George and Ring.

Then I could do a statistical study determining how many people accidentally say Ringo by mistake. I would correct them, of course.

A horse-equivalency (H-E) is a mule, donkey, burro, camel, llama or alpaca. Not to be confused with a horse power equivalency which is 746 watts.

What's really sad is that I have wasted brain space that had already had the 746 conversion factor memorized. When I learned it earlier in the summer while studying HVAC. I thought it might come in handy someday. Today was the day, hoo-ray.

I have never been a fan of horses since I was a small child frightened by them at my grandparents place. But now I am enjoying getting to read about them and their owner in New Mexico. My best friend also has a huge number of animals on her place as well outside of my location here in Borger. I think her large H-E's are mules, not sure. Horses seem about as intelligent as a dog. I just got started reading a blog called "The Seven Miles South of Nowhere Ranch" about a lady and her animals in New Mexico. It is a wonderful story and photographic journey. (Stories)

Link to The Seven Miles South of Nowhere Ranch

Head Bored Sound Board

My circular tubular metal ornate pipe "headboard" from Sears makes an interesting percussion instrument, but only cause I am alone momentarily.

I am sure The Wifey would not approve if she would have to actually be in the room at the same time. The dog also makes an interesting percussion instrument as well. He really enjoys those sessions. Well, what do you know, my clip-on metal lamp is about an octave higher than the headboard.

I wrote the first part of this piece without visually eXamining the headboard (it is dark in here eXcept the glow of my iPad), so it was a few accidental moments later that I got a slightly different tone and looked to see that there were - of course - a few different sections to the headboard. So when I actually get enough motivation to fully investigate, I will map out the sections of my new percussion instrument. Without looking, I think I know that it is symmetrical about a central vertical axis.

A friend remarked that I needed a hobby OR a drumset

My Response: Trust me, I already have abazillion hobbies and interests. I really need a Yamaha grand piano.

On an educational note: Yea! I learned how to install a GFCI wall plug today! (It is slightly more complicated than a normal old fashioned wall plug)

The wife responded to the original percussion topic by way of Facebooq, even though she is only approximately twenty three feet away from me.

The Wifey: You had better not be beating on my bed!! do you hear me!! lol

My Response: I was already beating on the headboard, did you hear me? NO! (My response to her was also non-verbal by way of Facebooq)


Hmmm ... These are the current ads on my Facebooq page:

-) Fun Adult Footed Pajamas
-) Blank Labels for Laserjet printers
-) Fun Chemist T-Shirts!
-) Win A Trip! (to Taos, NM)

I'm eXamining the list very carefooooly, and I'm surprised that Facebooq knows me so well, able to read ALL the thoughts of my pseudo-schizophrenic mindset. You think about blank labels at least 5 hours a day like I do, too, right? Right?

23/6

My latest insomniacal invention: instead using the numeric phrase "24/7" or "24/7/365" to indicate "all the time availability", I will begin using 23/6 and 23/6/364.

The former way of doing things was too demanding and eXhausting.

Also, if its the very last minute of any hour I would appreciate it if you would wait until the next minute (i.e. next hour) before disturbing me.

Your cooperation in the new improved realm is greatly appreciated. You may now go back to sleep.

Thanks.

- - - - -

I just found this quote: 

If there are no dogs in heaven, then when I die I want to go where they went.

Will Rogers

A friend responded: AMEN!

My Response: I wonder if the canine version of "amen" is "adogs" ?

The location answers are possibly:

a) Alaska - that's where Will Rogers fatal plane crash was

b) Oklahoma - that's where he is buried

c) Any other state claiming to be "God's Country"

Are We Big Or Small? Druids Without Fluids

You can tell you are (probably) from a small town when a tree dies and it makes the headlines in the local newspaper.

PASTE from news source:
The Lake Meredith National Recreations Area’s well-known “Big Tree” has fallen. Due to the years of vandalism and repeated fires, the cottonwood tree was severely damaged, hollow, and unstable.
END of paste

I liked the use of the word "repeated": repeated fires

Arson? Camping? Firewood?

I have lived in this area more than three decades and never heard of this famous tree. [Update: my wife has lived here twenty years longer than me and had never heard of this tree either.]

We live in a part of the world that is not known for trees, getting about twenty inches of rain per year. This tree lived near the largest reservoir of the area but which finds itself dying as well. Note: Average year. But this last year was a scorching tree killing year. It picked a good year to go.

I plan to revive my plans to start another blog dedicated to the pursuit of finding the ugliest tree in Texas. It will be a contest. I had started it over in MySpace just about the time I stopped using their service on a regular basis. I think I had one good entry.

So this answers the ancient philosophical question: If a tree falls in a National Recreational Area and there's no one there to hear it, does it make a noise?

Answer: Yes, later in a newspaper where its black and white and read all over. And still later when it induces the big sound of chain saws and the small sound of crackling in a fireplace.

Small town, big tree.

Walk Your Pie Off Stall Street

I am starting a new movement called "WALK YOUR PIE OFF STALL STREET". 

Its an eXercise program fitness rebellion group thing to help people who eat too much dessert to begin to get more active by hitting the street and moving more. 

Hopefully its goes global so people can look less globe-u-lar. 

And actually do something useful for people.

And sell more athletic shoes. 

I have lotza wonderful shoes for sale. 

Come buy a pair. 

Or two. 

Or four. 

Or more.

(Sorry, I made everything in Italics font so it would make the letters look like they were in motion, leaning forward)

A Wreck of Commendations

What's really cool is to read someone's story about a trip down memory lane, but they are using someone else's memories OR even better, memories that have never really eXisted before in the entire span of human eXistence eXcept inside, deep deep inside, the confines of a mental institution.

If you like some of the bizarre things I write, then you might enjoy the works of Leighton Kelly at dayone2012.tumblr.com - go to the story "USING ALL THE PARTS" dated Oct. 18th 2011

- - - - -

While groc shopping just now I heard on the intercom, 

"Jennifer, pick up line number [something]"

This prompted me to invent a new game called, 'See How Many Interesting New Ways You Can Pronounce Jennifer'.

I think I'm up to about twelve.

- - - - -

I think it's amazing that they grow lettuce on icebergs.

- - - - -

Nomore Qaddafi ?

- - - - -

I forced my wife to watch four episodes of "Guy On A Buffalo" on YouTube. They are short, only a couple minutes long and wonderfully silly. A special thanks to Smedette at http://smedette.wordpress.com/

I had my wife watch episode number one last, and she complained slightly, "you mean I'm watching the first one LAST?!?!?" And I responded, "honey, you'll see, it doesn't really matter what order you watch them".

At this point you might be asking yourself, "What did all those sections have in common?" 

Answer: Buffalo

The first section was a story about buffalo, previous life.

The second and third sections happened while I was groc shopping last night, and I bought a one pound package of ground buffalo.

The fourth section, um, Qaddafi buffaloed (synonym for 'fooled') a whole country into thinking he should be their ruler for way too long, and of course, he didn't know when to stop the party.

The fifth section is, of course, the buffalo movie

Which Came First: The Chicken Or The Actress?

I was reading someone's profile earlier and noticed that they had listed "Nobody's Fool" as one of their favorite movies. I thought, wow, I love that movie and I've studied it in great depth, so I should be sure that I have it listed on my favorites as well. It has so many stars, Paul Newman, Bruce Willis, Melanie Griffith, and Jessica Tandy, plus a wonderful script and cinematography set in a New York winter.

So I checked my Blogger profile, and sure enough it was already there. So I decided to try Blogger's random question generator to see if there was anything new. The very first question was so bizarre and ran-dumb:

What was the stage name of your favorite actress before she was born.

That is the question that Google's blogger system gave me ... And ... I ... Am ... Thinking that their person who wrote that question should be fired. Fired? Yes, fired out of the largest cannon on earth for writing something so, so, ... so insanely unanswerable.

I had this vision of pregnant mothers wandering around a theatre talking to their unborn children, asking their abdomen, "So what should your stage name be, Sweetie?" And if they had the gender wrong and it was really a baby BOY in there, well, I could see how that could spin way out of control in his future on the playground at recess in the 3rd Grade.

It is after 1 AM in my time zone, so maybe I'm missing something. Is it a reincarnation question?!?!?

So, here is my 1:26 AM scientifically correct answer: Egg (They didn't say how far back in time to go, so I am going for the unfertilized egg time zone)

I Thought It Was Meat

The first word "I" in the title of this blog post is not me. The title is from a line in a story I heard today from a customer at our business.

The third word "It" from the title is a pronoun, but in this case a very strange package, with aluminum foil on the outside.

A minimum wage cleaner who works for a motel was asked to clean out a room that had a guest suddenly leave. He works for an oil company and went to another job site. But he didn't properly check out of the motel, so his belongings were gathered up by the cleaner. The hotel manager/owner told the cleaner that she could have anything left of value in the refrigerator and throw the rest away. So she did.

The manager walks in during the clean-up and notices an aluminum foil package at the very top of the trash can contents. He asks, "where did this come from?"

The cleaner says, "It was in the freezer, I figured that it was a piece of meat."

The manager opens up the suspiciously shaped package. It has 30 items in it. Each item is a 100 dollar bill.

$ 3 0 0 0 - - - yes, 3 followed by 3 zeros

-In the trash can-

The bills were checked for integrity. They were not counterfeit.

He keeps the money. The cleaner is shocked. She was hoping that he would split the money with her. He told her that she threw it away. Finders keepers, losers weepers - as we would say as children.

He plans to hold the belongings in storage for a month, so if you happen to be reading this and you suddenly remember that you left my city for another job site and forgot your $3000 in your hotel room refrigerator, can I have a finders fee?

The International Dateplanes of Unluck

I think I just figured out something: when it's the 13th of the month and a Thursday in my part of the world, then its Friday on the other side (going west) of the International Dateline, so would that make the International Dateline an unlucky place to be? Its the 13th on one side, and Friday on the other. Since the International Dateline passes mainly through the ocean, this would affect mainly fish and whales, but only the ones who are superstitious and have calendars.

When I thought about the three dimensional aspects of the International DateLINE extending into the ocean depths, I realized it isn't really just a line, it's a PLANE surface that extends from the middle of the earth outward. So its really the International Dateplane. Then I envisioned the shape of the current dateline on a globe and realized that it isn't straight, so the International Dateplane"S" would really consist of multiple planes.

The fish would probably only spend brief periods of time passing through the date planes, so that would minimize their unluckiness. If they are caught in a fisherman's net though, its a really unlucky day for them.

Yester-moment Interrupted Leading To a Mild Case of Fear-ritation

This is strange: I just had a dream and in the dream I had an epiphany. We (?) made something that everyone liked, ...no..., loved, yes, they loved it, whatever it is. But I don't remember what it was. It made people smile. I would have published this a few (?) minutes quicker, but I actually fell asleep AGAIN halfway through writing this. So I woke up to words about a dream, [words in an unfinished Facebook status update] and I thought, wait, that didn't just happen.

* - the (?) means "I don't know". The first one, "We", I don't remember who the other people are, and secondly, the "few" minutes that I fell asleep, no idea how many that few was.

I have had absolutely no problem staying awake to finish writing the rest of this, even though I am yawning like crazy. I think it is because I am yawning so often and so wide (is that the right term, to yawn widely?) that I am not falling asleep. Yes, the yawns are wide enough to be ear and jaw painful! Also I noticed that I don't appear to be proofreading this very much so it isn't up to my abnormal level of (hah) perfection (bigger hah). Its really hard to fall asleep with a combination of mild headache, yawning, typing, and the fear that, oh, no, maybe I won't go back to sleep for the rest of the night simply because all this gigantic word mess-message is taking place. Fear isn't quite the right term but its close. Fear, Irritation, ... Fear-ritation. Yes, there's a new word for ya'!!!

I s'ppose that a Fear-ritation is at least an order of magnitude better than a Fear Infection.

Update 2011.10.11 05:08 - Oh, sorry, it is now a couple hours later and I just realized that I forgot to give you the definition of the other new word I created in the blog post title, "yester-moment". Just like the word yesterday means the day before today, the word yester-moment means the semi-well defined moment that happened (to you, your private little mental world) right before the current moment. A day is 24 hours long eXactly, but your moment is flexible, your baby, your boundaries. As far as I can currently imagine, there is no tomorrow moment structure possible, I am just totally unable to wrap my early morning mind around that concept, where would the future time fence be?

Update 2011.10.13 04:47 - What is really nose-i-ating is when I fell asleep writing this into my iPad that I have propped up vertically on a pillow in my bed and then it comes crashing down on my face smashing my nose. There is a gentle balance, and I even have the iPad leaning slightly away from me. The iPad will usually stay in place fairly well UNTIL it is jostled by a spouse getting into bed. The firm flat nightstand is much more reliable, but I forget..

essencenesssense

I just created a new word: essencenesssense - now all I need to do is come up with a definition for the word, then I can use it in an essencenesssense sentence.

[Well, I guess I have already just now used it in a sentence.]

If you hear someone use the word in a very serious manner, just respond, "I sense a tense essencenesssense sentence".

Think.

T h i n k.

Think.

T h i n k.

Think.

Definition: the ability to feel eXtreme subtlenessties

I think one of the things I love about this word is that every single letter in it resembles the letter C, alone, in some combination, reversed angle pair to make an S, rotated to make an n. All the near symmetry!

- - - - -

Earlier today sometime when it was dark I had a dream about a caveman inventing calculus. He used a lot of rocks, mud and tree branches.

None of the other cavemen or cavewomen or cavechildren or cavedogs appreciated his efforts. They just thought he was making a mess of their stack of firewood. This second part was not part of my dream, but simply something else I thought might have happened. Don't worry, it's okay to use three or's in the same sentence if you are talking about cavepeople and or cavepets, because I'm pretty sure they did. The modern day people I know that seem to closely resemble cavepeople do it all the time.

This suddenly reminded me of the day in 8th grade when I discovered/learned that you could draw molecular diagrams using letters to represent atoms and lines to represent chemical bonds. Structure!!! It was a magical moment for me. Structure, the universe had tiny distinct structures. I made a huge mess on the chaulkboard that day drawing molecules. It seems like I got some negative feedback from someone, I don't remember that detail, but I didn't care. The moment was a watershed.