Poem

My father-in-law was a great guy, one of those folks who never met a stranger, but he told the worst jokes.  I was thinking of one of his favorites, and it led to this....
He tried to be the class clown
But he told the worst jokes in town
Really horrible ones,
Like “If your nose runs
And your feet smell, you’re built upside down.”

Premature Grief and Mourning

There are a couple variations of the quote, but Mark Twain is credited with saying "The reports of my death are an exaggeration."

which leads to today's topic.

Is it possible to grieve the loss of someone or something that is still around?

The answer is a definite yes!  

We proved it this past weekend.

Our dachshunds are getting old - they turned 14 this past summer, which is pushing the limits for their expected lifespan. In addition, Tinker had been steadily losing weight for the past four years.  She has remained active and otherwise healthy, but she has dropped from a maximum weight of just over ten pounds to seven and a quarter, and the vet has no idea why.  We've worried about that, but not too much since otherwise she has seemed happy and healthy.

Friday, all she wanted to do was sleep.  At first, we just assumed that she was as tired as we were after a whirlwind trip to Bertram for Thanksgiving, but Saturday she was worse.  She was lethargic, and when she did move she was weak and a little clumsy.  Sunday was just as bad, and Honey and I were afraid Tinker was on the way out.  Honey even asked me to get up first to let them out because she did not want to find her dead.

I called the vet when they opened on Monday and got the first available appointment.  By the time we got there, Tinker was better - a long way from 100%, but noticeably better.

Other than being slightly dehydrated, the vet could find nothing wrong with her. The crisis seems to have passed.  

We know that we will lose her sometime in the rapidly approaching future, but for now, we'll try to be grateful for the joy she has brought us over the years.

Nothing

Having a very quiet Saturday.  Still recovering from our Thanksgiving trip and not interested in doing much of anything else.

13 Hours

No post yesterday because we were kind of busy.  
We went to our daughter Cheryl's place for Thanksgiving.  
We don't actually eat at Cheryl's - we go the Gene's sister's house for dinner with all of his family. Years ago, his sister declared that we were family, too,  and were not only welcome, but expected.
Door to door is 217 miles and - with 75 mph speed limit most of the way - just under four hours on the road.  Four hours up there, about five hours eating and visiting, and four hours back makes for a long, but satisfying day.

Confusion

My paternal grandparents were William Andrew Couch and Ellie Northcutt Couch, but I always knew them as Mam-ma and Pop.
I can remember attending a family reunion when I was five or six, and being totally confused.  When strangers (cousins I had never met or even knew existed) talked about Uncle Andy and Ain't (Aunt) Ellie, it took me a full day to realize they were referring to my grandparents.

Pardon Me

Today is the day that a pair of Thanksgiving Turkeys receive their presidential pardon.  That's this year's pair in their room at Washington's Willard Hotel, where rooms run from $180 to $800 a night.
The turkeys hail from western Minnesota and were raised by National Turkey Federation Chairman Carl Wittenburg and his wife Sharlene, along with five young women from the Douglas County 4-H chapter.
If you've ever wondered what happens to the birds after they are pardoned, this year they are headed for Gobbler's Rest, an exhibit at Virginia Tech, where they are cared for by a team of students and veterinarians.  That doesn't guarantee a long and happy life - few of the previously pardoned birds have lasted more than a year.  As one expert put it, they were raised for the table, not longevity.

Either Way It's WET

Have you ever noticed how two words describing the same thing can have totally different connotations?

Today’s examples - Sprinkle and Drizzle. 

To me, Sprinkle engenders pleasant feelings. Warm and somehow maternal -  We sprinkle flowers to generate health and growth.

Drizzle, on the other hand is much more ominous, bringing much more negative feelings.  Nothing pleasant about drizzle – it sounds cold and unpleasant.

Of course, it’s drizzling today.  

O Tannenbaum

Okay, I know it's not even Thanksgiving yet, but...

Honey decided it was time to get a new fake tree for this Christmas. Our old one is so old that if it was real, it would probably be about 50 feet tall by now, and it has been a challenge to keep the box it came in together for years.

We found one on line at Hobby Lobby that was an ideal size to sit on the window box in the living room.  It comes with pre-wired lights and little pine cones, and the box it comes in is much smaller and easy to handle.  I don't know if we will leave it up - it is pretty early - but I put it together just to be sure it had all its parts and that everything works.

Saturday

Saturdays are for relaxing - even if you haven't done anything all week.

Br'er Rabbit

Here at the old Boggy Thicket we have dozens of birds, hundreds of squirrels and at least one rabbit.  
After seeing no rabbits at all for several years, we spotted this one a few weeks ago, and I actually got a picture yesterday morning. It seems to live in the middle of our largest azalea bed, and comes out to graze in the early mornings and just before dusk.

The Paulette Test

I was sad to learn last week that a girl I dated in high school had died.  Considering my age, and the number of girls I dated - junior high to college -  she probably wasn't the first, but she is the first I have heard about.

Paulette was a sweet girl, very shapely if slightly overweight - the term zaftig comes to mind - and when I first moved to Alvin several of my friends encouraged me to ask her out.  I didn't, and I later learned that, because we both wore braces at the time, they were betting that we would get hung up which they thought would be hilarious.

We did have one date, and how it came about was unusual to say the least. 

Joyce, the girl I was dating at the time, and Paulette were best friends.  Joyce had delivered a patriotic speech at the American Legion that won her an expense-paid trip to the United Nations in New York.  She suggested that Paulette and I should go out while she was away.

I was prepared for a very Platonic date - a movie at the local drive in and maybe a stop by the Dairy Queen before I took her home, but by the time I got parked and had the speaker hung in the window, Paulette was all over me! Things did not get totally out of control, but it did get pretty steamy for a while.

Later I wondered if this had been some kind of test, and whether or not I had passed.

Oh, for what it's worth, our braces never did hang up.

Big Chill

No, this doesn't have anything to do with the movie, although I would gladly watch it again today.
This is about the weather.  
We had the first freeze of the season overnight, and yesterday there were snow flurries at the weather station at IAH, making it the earliest snowfall in Houston history.
We are enjoying experiencing weather we don't normally get until January - really makes you hate Global Warming.

Hot Spot

November 11th got me to thinking about my time in the military, and brought to mind a true story I thought I would share today.

I came out of basic training with a MOS of 71R20. broadcast information specialist, and was assigned to Ft Hood as the radio-TV voice of the 2nd Armored Division.  Among my duties, I was responsible for recording radio and TV "Home-towners" - interviews that would be sent to the soldier's home town stations for broadcast.  

I also did quite a few interviews with soldiers returning from Viet Nam for publication the Armored Sentinel, the base newspaper. It was one of these that almost cost me my security clearance and my job - in fact, I was told that I might potentially end up in Leavenworth!

The subject of the interview was a sergeant who had served in Nam as a photographer on a helicopter.  He was operating a highly sophisticated infrared camera as they flew over the jungles searching for Viet Cong hideouts.  When the camera detected a hot spot they would mark its location and report back to base.

I typed up the story and submitted it downstairs to the sergeant major who ran the Armored Sentinel office.  The next day, I got a visit from two men in civilian clothes who identified themselves as members of the Army Security Agency.  They told me my story would never be published because it described equipment and tactics that were highly classified.  

I was able to show them a year-old story in Popular Mechanics that described the camera and how it worked.  They said that didn't matter, and they had no control what got published by civilians.  Then they asked,  " Did Sergeant Xxxx use the term 'hot spot' when he told you about his job?"

"No, I don't think he did."

"Well that term is also classified.  If you didn't get it from him, where did you get it?"

I stared at him for a moment, then replied "What the hell else would you call it."

The story never made it into the paper, but the ASA guys went away and I was able to keep doing my job.  

Easy Rider

Honey and I were both members of a very small percentage of our generation who had never seen Easy Rider.

Produced by  Peter Fonda and directed by Dennis Hopper, it has often been described as the definitive movie about the late 60s counter-culture.  It gets great reviews - five stars on Turner Classic Movies, and 92% on Rotten Tomatoes - so when I saw it was playing on TV, we recorded it.

A cold, wet weekend seemed the perfect time to watch it, so we did - at least we tried.  We only made it through the first half hour or so.  We probably wouldn't have watched that long except that we thought we were supposed to enjoy it, so we had to be missing something.

We finally just admitted that the movie was crap, deleted it and watched something else.

I'm not sure what that says about us, but, whatever it is, I can live with it.

Veterans Day Quote

I never thought much of Lyndon Johnson, but I had a quote of his posted on my wall at Ft. Hood in 1967....

War is always the same. It is young men dying in the fullness of their promise. It is trying to kill a man that you do not even know well enough to hate. Therefore, to know war is to know that there is still madness in the world.

Lyndon B. Johnson

STOLEN

Sort of a slow day, so I stole this from the web....

Ranch Wagon

Chevy had success with their very popular Nomad, a two door (three if you count the back) station wagon, and for the 1957 model year, Ford introduced their version - what they called the Del Rio Ranch Wagon.

It's what my mother was driving when we moved to Liverpool, and I have a lot of fond memories of that car.

Ours was buckskin tan and white, and the interior featured fake leather upholstery decorated with brands.  It sounds cheesy, but it actually looked pretty cool. 

I hadn't thought about it in years until I saw yesterday that the Hot Rod folks had picked a 57 Del Rio Ranch Wagon as 2018's Street Rod of the Year.  Street Rod

Results

The votes have been counted and I'm pretty sure there is nobody at all who is totally satisfied with the results.

• Democrats gained control of the House
• Republicans increased their majority in the Senate

Ted Cruz held on to his senate seat, but Dems are already talking about Beto for President in 2020.

In what was, to me, the biggest surprise of the night, Harris County Judge Ed Emmett lost to 27 year old political newcomer Lina Hidalgo.  Latest totals have her winning by 49 to 48%, with the remaining votes going to Libertarian Ed Gatlin.

I don't think I ever saw a political ad for Hidalgo, and only one or two for Emmett, so I didn't know anything about her.  She is a naturalized citizen who was born in Colombia, and raised in Peru and Mexico.  She holds degrees from Stanford and Harvard, and was endorsed by several unions and by left-wing groups like the Working Families Party. 

Election Day

Election day has finally arrived.  I'm cautiously optimistic about the results here in my area, but the polls have been all over the place, so it is probably going to be a long night waiting for results.

One thing that ought to make everyone happy is that we will no longer be bombarded by obnoxious and intentionally misleading political ads in TV.  

Unfortunately, they will just be replaced by all the ads for Medicare supplement insurance. Thank goodness for DVR or I would not be able to watch television for at least another month. 

Fair Warning

Yeah, it's been one of those days....

With a Capital H

Today is Honey's birthday, and I came across this card I really like,  I just wish the H was capitalized....

Fall Back

Tonight is the night we set our clocks back an hour as we begin our annual excursion into (or as Honey pointed out - more accurately back out of) Daylight Saving Time. 
I've noticed that there are not as many complaints as usual this year - maybe because we are in the middle of such a contentious election.  In any case, it's going to happen whether you like the idea or not.

Political Spin

I am proud to say that I have friends whose views go all across the political spectrum.  

Granted, those whose politics most closely resemble mine are generally easier to get along with, but I've learned that there are some really interesting, clever and well-intentioned folks whose political opinions are (to my way of thinking) just flat-out wrong.

An awful lot of political opinion depends on how you were raised, your economic situation, religious beliefs etc.  What I call where you're coming from.

Here's a great illustration of how your point of view affects your opinion.  The dancer on the right spins clockwise while the one on the left spins counter-clockwise.  The one in the middle turns left or right depending on which of her partners you are looking at.

Politics is often like that, and sometimes just as hard to determine what is right.

Another Halloween Gone

Yesterday's weather predictions were accurate for once.  The weather for Halloween night was every bit as bad as the forecasters had warned.

We didn't have a single trick-or-treater  yesterday- haven't seen one since last Saturday's hayride, but that is par for the course.  I don't think we have had a goblin, a princess or a super-hero knock on our door on Halloween for at least ten years.

That leads to a quandary.  We always buy enough candy to have some left over "just in case" and it always gets left over.  

My A1-C has been normal for years, but, as a former diabetic, I don't have any business eating a whole lot of candy, and  Honey's idea of splurging on candy would be eating one of those miniature sized Snickers that come in those big Halloween bags. The result is that we will probably have candy in the cupboard well into 2019.