Stella Feels The Warmth

Just because the weather has changed for the time being doesn't mean that Heidi changes her daily routine. That will not happen until the temps hit the 70° mark a couple of months from now, most likely. The sound of "mid 30's" seems like a heat wave and a welcomed change even with a 70% chance of a ran/snow mix later this afternoon.

Stella and I stepped outside earlier than we had in months, before 8am. That is just how nice the morning felt. I could hear all kinds of birds as I walked from the carport to the field.

Stella could feel the difference compared to the last two or three morning and I could tell how excited she was. She turned to see if I was as excited as her and if I was going on the walk or was I just going to stand around watching her.

She was so shocked with the change in temperatures that she had to sit and enjoy it before she did anything else. I was already a few steps in the field before she moved. There was nothing for her to really look at, she was just taking in all that warm air at 28°, filtering through her nose. I thought it felt much warmer than that but three different weather apps were telling me the same temps.

Whereas the ground was extremely soft and muddy at times during our Wednesday afternoon walk it was nice to feel it hard as a rock this morning. I had overdressed by putting on my North Face snow boots that I use for rain or extremely wet fields.

Google Chrome users, I assume you got the notice from Google yesterday to update "right this minute". If not, you need to update your browser now!! To check to see if you have the latest update they are saying the version of Google Chrome you need to have is 72.3626.121

Here is a link to show you the process and why the urgency. I had been using that browser a few weeks ago because the latest version of Firefox had been crashing on me a few times every day. For some reason I went back to Safari a week to ten days ago. It was faster than normal, I knew I had security and it had the built-in "disable auto-play".

I found out this morning when I opened Chrome to see what version I had, that I had updated it the first of March with the version listed above and possibly in time to prevent any damage to my computer. A year or so ago I decided to "un" Google myself and moved all of my email from gmail to new iCloud accounts that I could get through Apple mail.

This link will show you some options to get away from Google products and still have the same kind of programs, apps or features. Since Apple had about all of those types of features many years ago, that synchronized between devices, Blogger was really the only thing I could not escape from. Thus for my one public blog and my two private blogs on Blogger, I had to keep my gmail address to access those. I don't send nor receive any email through those gmail accounts.

I know it's almost impossible to transfer a Blogger blog to WordPress due to the different platforms used. Yet Blogger will accept a transfer file from WordPress with no issues. If I could figure out a way to transfer my large Blogger blog to WordPress I'd do that in an instant.

You may have seen my earlier post this morning when I said I was no longer watching news on TV nor reading any online news sites. I still haven't but came very close to turning on the TV after our morning walk this morning. Why ??  It's a habit and one that I will need to work on for the next ten days to break.

I thought about my decision of tuning out the news while I was on the walk this morning. The question "what now" popped in my head. More along the lines of what do I blog about now, not really what do I do now in my daily routines. My life doesn't need the news but statistics show blog readers love posts on news or politics, whether they agree with you or not.

Still, my blog doesn't need the chaos and I will be more than willing to accept a lower number of visitors and a few less angry emails in my inbox by staying away from the news and then blogging about it.

I have mentioned before I have never been a 'prime time' tv watcher. I still have some shows I watch on a regular basis, usually after I tape them on the DVD so I can fast forward through the commercials. Most of these shows are not on the network channels but are on the History or National Geographic channels. The show Project Blue Book is quite interesting and is based on a true story. UFOs and Russian Spies in the 1950's is what it is based on.

I still like watching Building Off The Grid. I am always amazed what people come up with in the design of their house or cabin and what they plan to use for energy, plus food source. Homestead Rescue is another that is interesting but the amazing thing in that show is how many people are trying to live off the grid that have no business doing it ... because they did not do any research before they moved and are now asking for help. Sometimes they have put themselves in a life threatning situation.

I like Hometown, down in Laurel Mississippi. I visited there in the summer of 1969 and left Biloxi about a week before their hurricane, just after the moon landing. So I was curious enough the other day to check out online information for the town of Laurel. I'd gain about 10° on average year round in temperatures. I even looked at their history of tornadoes. The stats were very similar to where I live now but I expected that Laurel MS would have a lot more tornadoes than I have here.

Getting back to that habit of turning on the tv right after our morning walk, eating habits are another hard thing to break as I am finding out this week. I was so good last week and saw amazing results after six days of being disciplined. This week I've not only eaten more carbs every day but I added those two level tsp of sugar for each cup of coffee I have. Two cups per day, four teaspoons of sugar per day or 16g of carbs just for the sugar.

All small numbers. All within the allowances of typical medical diet suggestions. Yet I can feel a difference. My stomach feels bigger than last week. Not bloated just bigger. I also feel like I have gained the weight back that I lost those first six days. (5lbs)

As far as my diet goes, I am allowing myself 50g of carbs per day. That is more than Keto's diet plan but what the owner of Paleo suggested.  Before this week I was staying below that limit, felt better, not as hungry, more energy. This week I have more urges to eat, have taken a daily afternoon siesta and feel heavier.

I also came close to going to CNN, FoxNews, Breitbart and The Guardian while I was waiting for the photos to load into WordPress from my computer. (It's warmer ... Stella's restless and wandering around inside the house) That will be another hard thing to fight through. What do they say, ten to fourteen days to break a habit or start a new one?

With the book on Steve Jobs being such a detailed slow read I was glancing through my bookshelves this morning looking for something else to read. Maybe something a little 'lighter'. I don't mind reading some books a second or third time but I also have books on my shelf that I bought years ago but never read. There has to be one that can pique my interest enough to read.

Sometimes Stella will get tangled in the wild vines that have very sharp thorns. Before I can walk over and pull those off of her, she will just tear through them. The vine you see in front of her got stuck on her neck and she just tore through it without any kind of injury. I couldn't walk over there fast enough.

The back edge of the field had a lot of deer scent I guess. She spent more time along that back edge than she did on the walk itself.

I just received my email notice from the USPS telling me what mail they are delivering today. I have noticed since they started that service based on when I signed up for the notifications, I stopped getting mail for my neighbors in my mailbox. Still 99.9% of the mail delivered is tossed into the recycling bin after I block out my name and mailing address.

I also just got a text from my friend that lives in the Chicago suburbs. She escaped from her freezing weather to her mother's winter home in Florida on Tuesday. She is lauging as she is telling me today her weather the rest of the week will be in the 70's and 80's. Here I've been thinking how nice the 30's feel and am excited about the 50's.  LOL

Stella thought she could disappear on me but the camera found her.

I glance in the direction she is looking thinking there might be some deer to see. I saw nothing along the horizon, from one end of the north woods to the other. She must have smelled them or heard them moving through the woods.

Yes, you just witnessed a little running this morning. See, warm weather does make her feel better. I have been filling up my 'junk mail' folder lately with emails about cannabis oil. They have found one of my iCloud accounts. I don't remember signing up for anything new lately using those accounts. Apple mail automatically filters email like that so I don't have to bother with it.

The reason she is not veering off to the right like she normally does, there are a couple of mole hills of dirt exposed and before I could get to the yard she was already trying to eat the top of the frozen dirt pile like we would eat an ice cream cone. Frozen dirt !!!!

She looked for more all the way to the carport. She knows she can always eat a little frozen dirt before I can get her to stop.

That box and those cables running into the house are now antiques I guess. It's my AT&T landline telephone box and the phone lines running from that box under the house to two different locations where phones use to be located. I remember the year I bought the Sony wireless phone, 900Mhz with the built-in answering machine. It could set on a table or be mounted on the wall. Top of the line electronics.

Ah yes ... landline phones.   :)

As you can see, it was a pretty lazy afternoon here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana. I guess the excitement of the day was the feeling I had for a very short time that I might be checking out that fall detection feature on my Apple Watch. I was sitting at the computer starting this blog post when I started feeling really dizzy. I seriously thought I was going to pass out. During the time I was was a little dizzy I glanced at my watch for my pulse at the time and it was only 58bpm. I did the watch's EKG test just to see if anything showed up and things were normal.

Once I realized I had not eaten any breakfast, I had some small amounts of different food by the tablespoon, hoping to get some fast absorption to where I would feel better. While I sat on the couch for a while to see what was going to happen with me, I decided the best idea was lay down, after all we were all up at 5:05am this morning.

By the time I woke up the afternoon was almost over and that sure did look like snow falling as I glanced out the window. Taking the afternoon walk was not an option for a couple of reasons. For one, in the that is Stella in the first picture sleeping on the couch taken right after I woke up. That is Heidi yawning as I walked back in the bedroom to get my shoes. I could see they had no plans of going outside for anything.

The snow fall wasn't heavy, in fact you can barely see it against the background of the trees. We are suppose to have a mix of rain and snow for the rest of the night, stopping around midnight with a possible 1" to 2" of snow on the ground when it is finished.

While I was standing outside taking those pictures of the snow, I could hear the sounds of wet pavement as cars were passing on the highway. These stones barely show there is the same amount of rain as there is snow, both very very light.

I have a fridge full of good food and I can't think of anything I am hungry for. In fact as I looked around for other options of food to eat, nothing looked good to me. I am still feeling slightly nauseous, that cannot be a good thing. I have a sneaky suspicion it was the Oikos Greek yogurt I had that has made me feel this way. I've had a hard time digesting any brand of yogurt lately.

After being up a short time the hounds have confirmed to me they are not going outside for anything. Stella woke up long enough to check out that it was me walking around the house, then went back to the couch to sleep. Heidi never left the bedroom and is back to sleep. I need to find a book to read.

Although I slept most of the afternoon away I have to admit it's been quieter than normal here today with me not reading any of the news sites nor tuning into the news channels on tv. I've looked at sports news on the computer and I did watch a show on tv that was taped last night ... but no news. No 'noise' running around my brain, no mumbling to myself and wondering what is going on in today's world.

Luckily I have an IU game to watch at 8pm, a couple of new book possibilities and plenty of time to figure out what to eat.

It's been almost too quiet today here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.