It's Thursday Morning Rambling !!

That little 'puddle' of water in the field always gives me an idea just how wet the field will be when we take our walk. You'd be surprised how accurate it is. As the title says this morning I'll be rambling while you take a look of Stella's
FridayThurday morning walk.

It is what happens during a day of bad weather when I cannot get outside for some fresh oxygen. I'll be covering sports, news, scrambling brain cells thoughts and for those few that like to send me emails ... politics. You always show back up on Politics Day here on the blog.  :)

With it being fairly warm this morning I was a little surprised to see Stella not moving. I thought I felt a few drops of rain but my jacket sleeve didn't show anything. Would Stella decide not to walk?

As we slipped and slid over the wet leaves with a slick wet ground underneath I was back to internally listing what I wanted to blog about. I could tell that Stella was going to be in the eating deer scat mode this morning and I can't stop her nor can I watch ... so I hid inside my mind while we walked.

I was reminded yesterday that the DNC and the RNC are NOT government agencies but private 'clubs', with their own rules, policies and plans for 2020 election. The blog I read, which I cannot find the link because I don't want to dig back through my internet history from yesterday to copy it, feels that the DNC is pushing all of the democratic candidates out into official announcements TO GATHER DATA !!!

The serious candidates will announce sometime in April or May. I found that interesting because based on a poll on CNN yesterday (yes I watch both CNN and FOX but nothing else). It showed someone who has not even announced his candidacy, leads with 28% and Bernie coming in second at 20% ... all the others are nothing more than a rumor when it comes to popularity .... But that is where all of the 'funny stuff' is coming from.

I admit it is enjoyable to watch. I just saw this morning that an advisor for Biden suggests he choose Stacy Abrams as his Vice-President running mate. She would check the democratic box for "a woman of color" since it is most likely Harris' past is going to be ripped to shreds before the first democratic debate.

Some people have accused me as an idiot with 7th grade level education, possibly inbred, so maybe those readers can help me out on this next political dream .... Senator Gillibrand wants ALL ILLEGAL ALIENS (not from space) to get Social Security payments. WTF is that about? Currently Social Security should be flat broke by 2039 ... let's speed up the process and pass out the f****** checks as they cross the border !!!! Add in a "Welcome Aboard" packet too.

Out of all of the wild ideas the democratic candidates have proposed, including the 'dingbat AOC' Green New Deal or is it the New Green Deal ... I have never heard any way to pay for all the free money and free services they are going to give away. They don't care if you are a US LEGAL citizen or not ... EXCEPT TAX THE RICH ... TAX GOOGLE ... TAX AMAZON ... TAX FACEBOOK ... TAX f****** TAX .... tax the shit out of anyone successful, it's not their money, it's the democrats !!!!

So when I saw Andrew Yang last night on tv telling me and millions of others he want to give us a $1,000 per month spending money for FREE , I admit I was pretty damn excited. That buys a year supply of dog food for the hounds and a little left over for me to buy broccoli and sunflower seeds. WHO IS GOING TO PAY THAT $1 TRILLION PER YEAR ???

Well if you look at his website it has some pretty good ideas about who will foot the bill .... BUT ... hold on ... NONE of those points were on his tv interview last night when he said ... TAX Yahoo, TAX Google, TAX Microsoft, TAX Apple ... I'll look again at the link here to see if those companies are mentioned. They are not listed anywhere on his website. :)

Getting back to those illegals, I see they are now stealing the barbed wire off of the border wall down in Tijuana. Is that a tax write-off for the US government? Are they using it for their own protection on their properties? Recycling it? Selling it for pesos like copper wire?  LOL ... unbelievable.

This next bit of illegal immigrant or alien news ... I don't know if I should laugh my f****** ass off or puke .... Illegal alien arrested for having sex with A COW ????

Is that real or fake news???

Since I have gone back to checking in on the news either on tv or surfing the internet, it's good to see this next bit of info. It's not new. The CNN ratings or lack thereof are announced every quarter so their stockholders will have a nice 'warm and fuzzy' when they go to bed at night. I HAVE tuned into CNN at times and within minutes flip the channel because they have stopped being a news channel and are nothing but anti-Trump.

I am not saying everyone has to like Trump but give it a break. Almost two years in and we are seeing the same CNN reporters, analysts and guests bitching and moaning that Sleazeball Hillary didn't win the election ... LOL ... NO WONDER YOUR RATINGS ARE SHIT !!

I don't watch everything Fox either. At least on their news and business channel you can see news that is never reported on CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, MSNBC, MSN ...

The closing of the GM plant in Ohio has to have the democrats just jumping for joy. After all it's Trump's fault that people don't or didn't want to buy the Chevy Cruze. It's his fault that everyone wants to take out a MORTGAGE LOAN to pay for their new SUV or Pickup Truck. Just remember democrat readers, in less than 2 years that idiot Trump has brought in 500,000 new manufacturing jobs. The economy has improved in less than two years what Obama did to tear it down in his eight years.

Oh yes ... Obama is the reason the economy is so good now. It started before Trump was elected. Have you ever heard that? Well in a way they are right but they just have the period of time wrong. YES, during Obama's term the economy did improve but that was from a starting point in 2008 to 2012. It was on the downward slope a few years BEFORE the 2016 election.

The further back in the field we walked the wetter it got. I still have not figured out why land at a higher elevation is more saturated than the land behind my house that is approximately 47' lower. Remember though, I am not a smart blogger ... :)

In today's world of YouTube, and social media ... anything you film, or say, or post, or type is there FOREVER. For those famous people who have deleted their tweets or posts after they decided to be the meanest baddest f****er in the world because they are on a keyboard, was a bad idea ... well within a minute when I see something like that I can do a quick 'Shift, Command, #4 and then slide that x around the tweet or facebook post and it instantly saves to a photo on my hard drive ... FOREVER !!!!

I don't do that much and never tweet them out because I don't have a following in the millions, thousands or hundreds of people. I let the other big tweeters, social media posters do that for me. Even some news agencies will help me out.

My point is ... the closer we get to the Presidential Election in 2020 most of those if not all of those democratic candidates will be destroyed by past things they have said in the Senate, in a Town Hall meeting, tweeted as a teenager, yearbook photos from high school or paid informants, etc etc.

For example ... this morning they were showing Joe Biden speaking in the Senate about the Supreme Court in 1983 !!!!! ... 36 YEARS AGO !!!!

The democrats are in the process of spending $2M to get 200,000 new people registered to vote, I believe in Florida. They are trying to get illegals registered in California and Texas. They are trying their best to steal the 2020 election and will continue to push for non-citizens votes to count like they have done since the Reagan years in 1980's.

But the fact is ... people will vote once again for Trump because "He has delivered", even against a stacked Congress, people in his own party that are against him. If you think the polls are going to be accurate this time ... think of all of those millions of 'silent' voters that shocked the world when Trump was elected. They will remain silent this time too. They don't care about poles ... they're deplorable remember.

Even if you hate the guy, you have to admit he has passed some bills and did some things that are good. He has helped the people of all beliefs and colors, it just depends on which tv channel you watch. There are a few things I have never liked about him but I understand him and his ways. Like I stated in pasts posts ... I use to work for a boss/owner of a small family owned business, that acted just like he did. He did things or said things on purpose to get things done.

Just remember those that doubt or bitch and complain ... while you sit and stew, cry or moan about what is happening and how Congress is stopping Trump's wild ideas ... that wall is being built every day ... EVERY DAY and has been since he was elected. The wall building business is good !!! Especially if they have to replace the stuff that is being stolen.

Last week I mentioned that a 13 year contract for #$330 million dollars was utterly ridiculous and that comes from a baseball fan. Well for those that don't know, that contract was beat this week by the Los Angeles Angels. They didn't want their superstar to return home in two years when he is a free agent and signed Mike Trout to a 12 year contract for FOUR HUNDRED AND THIRTY
THOUSAND MILLION DOLLARS !!!

He will be 40 years old when that contract is up.

Yet, it kept him from going to the Philadelphia Phillies to join the $330M man Bryce Harper, who had been illegally, and publicly, recruiting Mike Trout to join him.

Those kind of contracts never work out ... Alex Rodriguez and the Texas Rangers were the first to open the door on that type of contract many years ago ... 10 years for ONLY $250 million.

Stella had to shake a little to get the cobwebs out of her ears.

A few weeks ago when I was losing data thorough some kind of leak, or whatever, I changed from Google Chrome to Safari. I never liked Safari as a browser on my iMac that much because it was slow. Plus the bookmark tabs were not in separate tabs with color, nor even separated. They have done some updates that proved valuable.

It is much faster and has all the built-in security features as well as automatically blocking advertisements and keeps from videos on sports or news websites from playing automatically. I have never stuck this long with Safari as my default browser on my iMac.

This diet stuff doesn't seem to be over with me ... I continue to read information and think about what I am doing. Yet I am a little surprised that I don't feel hungry like I have in the past when trying a plant-based diet. Before I was hungry all the time. I've been overloading myself with fresh fruit and fresh raw veggies. I eat those as much as I want.

I gave my cooked chicken breast to Heidi and Sadie, no bones of course. They loved it and Stella must have set an all-time record for the longest drool ever seen. I swear it almost went from her jowls to the floor. (where's that drool rag?) Sorry but I couldn't take a photo of it, some things are best not seen .... like the illegal immigrant and the cow.

My life will slow down now for the next four days. The NCAA tournament really starts today at 12:15pm and the last game will not start until 9:57pm my time. I'll use DishNetwork's feature with four screens on my tv at once to keep an eye on the four games being played at the same time. For the first time in 30 years or more, I'll not have even a dollar bet on these games or the brackets. I will not be one of the 8 million viewers betting over 45 BILLION dollars these next three weeks.

I will still be blogging though. Stella and I will still get in our two walks per day as long as it is not raining. We hope Heidi will continue her explosive aerobics every other day and join us.

Where did those thoughts on my diet go ... you know just a few sentences back?

The blue skies are trying their best to break through.

I started RE-reading all the information I had on Keto and Paleo. Do they plug arteries? Do they cause heart attacks? Fat or no fat? Which one to try? Fad or not a fad? What is the best diet? Vegan, Plant Based, Keto, Paleo, Dash, or Mediterranean ???

See what I mean? I've read so much over the past week I have paralyzed myself and still wonder which direction to go. Yet in the short time since my change I can see a slight difference and feel a slight difference. I wonder how much water weight I will lose by no longer putting good old salt on my food? Just in the last two days I have radically reduced the grams of fat and protein in my diet. I believe low FAT percentages is the key to good heart health.

I had forgotten that Paleo says NO DAIRY and but a lot of fruits. Keto says FAT, and Dairy are good but not many fruits. I honestly do not know how Keto followers stay below 20 grams of carbs every day. Amazing.

My desert last night was 1c of Silk Almond Milk Unsweetened, with frozen blueberries, raspberries and blackberries ... I tossed in a handful of fresh spinach. Good stuff.

It was just two days ago after I spent a short time cutting saplings down, shoveling wet gravel and climbing around the bank along the driveway ... that I was going insane for my first Dairy Queen medium size cone with plain vanilla, for 2019. As I fought through that craving, Stella was drooling as she was looking at me. She must have known I was thinking of a Dairy Queen trip ... or did I say something out loud?

Honestly I still don't know how strict I will be with this diet change. No matter what I will always track my food on Cronometer so I can see the nutrients breakdown. I will say with the change a lot of those bars in red (not good) are now green (good) but one thing that was surprising since I stopped using salt ... the amount of sodium in the fresh food I have eaten. It might have been the brown rice and lentils I added last night ... but throughout the day of eating meatless meals and no salt ... ~1,800 mg of sodium showed up.

That is below the recommended limit of 2,000 mg and way below the 3,000 I use to get daily.

I still think it's not a bad thing to have some fresh caught halibut or salmon with a meal. Or an occasional Saturday morning 'pig out' with a stack of pancakes, with real butter, peanut butter and maple syrup. What about a pizza if I were to change from ordering a large to a small?? What about having a nice New York Strip steak once or twice per month??

Does it even matter?? I honestly believe no matter what I do or eat ... I'll be checking out of Hotel California (Eagles song) when the time is right. I have had just too many close calls with death over the years to think otherwise. How many??? My friends have told me I have more lives than a cat. I just think I have one underpaid overworked guardian angel.

It was over an hour ago, around 10:20am when Heidi started barking, which got Stella to start howling .... THEY WANTED LUNCH !!!! Before 11am ??? Sorry but that is NOT going to happen. I say that now because it's 12:04 pm and Stella just quietly walked into the room and snuck up next to my chair .... ah there it is ... the signal it's time for their lunch ...

She nudged my arm with her nose ...

So with that I am going to end this rambling, and feed the hounds then move into the next phase of the day.

I don't think there is anything better than a cleaned, spotless kitchen.

For those Anti-Trumpers that always show up when I ramble about politics ... I want to assure you that your emails sent to me bypass my junk folder and go right to my inbox so I don't miss a word you send me. I enjoy your bullshit ... it is laughable at best. How do you show up all of a sudden? Are you notified by the Tags on my blog?

How???

It has felt like Friday all day today and I just see it's Thursday as I glanced up at the right corner of my monitor. I turned in my 32 gallon of recycled material. All mixed up as allowed. They sort it all out in Indianapolis from what the local recycling center told me a few years ago. I wonder how much is really recycled and how much they put in their landfills???

I can't stop thinking about that extra $1,000 per month Andrew Yang wants to give me ... I could do a lot of damage for the economy with that. OR .... I could play more craps at the French Lick Casino, the hometown of Larry Bird, Boston Celtic fame.

What would Stella do with an extra $1,000 per month, or Heidi???

I ALMOST FORGOT !!!  One more story.

Since it felt like a Friday, on my way back from the recycling center I turned on the radio up loud for some good old rock and roll. I remembered that yesterday was the first day of spring but that did not make any of my memory cells come to the forefront of my brain. This morning was a different story ... it was a song that threw me back to the first day of spring in the early 80's ... Carlsbad California ... right on the beach living on Carlsbad Blvd.

The song was Billy Idol's "White Wedding" and the time was our annual first day of spring bash. It started with a few friends and went only for a couple of days. Each year it became more popular, bigger and longer. Where we started with cases of beer with our first party  by the time I moved to Whidbey Island, WA, the last party I attended it was many KEGS of beer ... delivered by Carlsbad Liquors when we called for more.

It built up to more than a few days ... nonstop partying around the clock. While sitting in the front yard looking at the Pacific Ocean across the street, the crowds filled not only that part of the yard but the large patio area in back. That was surrounded by two other small apartments. Eventually my friends built a cabana, installed electric for the blenders and plenty of room for multiple kegs of beer.

Basically ... a bar.

Isn't it funny how just one song can make a memory clear as day ... even when I can't remember what the day of the week it is???  LOL

It's warmer, overcast and "feels like a Friday" here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.

The Blog Is Backing Away From Chaos

With a new week starting with another change in weather, different internet browsers tried, and thoughts racing through my brain cells along with a delay in our morning schedule ... why not make some blogging changes also? No, not the design but the focus.
As you can see the weather yesterday was borderline freezing and neither hound wanted any part of it. At no time yesterday afternoon did they spend any time wandering and exploring in the yard. In fact by the time Stella and I headed out for a late afternoon walk, she was led by the retractable leash and our pace was swift. In out ... walk finished.

After a terrible night of sleep, getting in my normal 6 or so hours, I woke up dazed and confused. It seemed later than my watch was showing, I didn't feel good and Stella was standing by the bed whining ... in that tone where I know she needs to get outside. She's a good house dog, as is Heidi.

Backing up to the start of the walk this morning. Remember that Stella prefers to keep her paws dry if at all possible. She is not a fan of walking through water puddles and a path that has water rising to above ground with each step I was taking. So she walked along the edge of that wet path to stay out of the water. All through the walk she sidestepped the path or headed to the heavy grass to walk through, all her thoughts were keeping her feet dry.

The small screen on the back of my Canon G9 X was showing a light sprinkling of rain. It looks like those sprinkles are supposed to be going non-stop for the next three days. Just enough to dampen my coat and Stella's. Again I kept wondering where is all this water going to go.

Too wet for her ...

I want you to know that the late start of the day, the bad dreams, or the lack of excitement that it was Monday played no part in my change in direction for the blog. It's not really a change in direction but a step back ... backing away from all the chaos and noise in today's world. We all know what it's like. We all have different opinions on what to do, what's the cause or possible solutions. I don't need to drag you through that crap on this blog.

I know personally I follow blogs to get away from all the crap I see on tv news or see online. I DO read a few blogs that do a much more professional job commenting on today's political environment or news events here in the USA ... so I'll let THEM be the ones to do it ... I don't want to.

Just like Stella stepping away from the very wet and heavy saturated path I am going to step away from the daily comments about what is screwed up in this world. I am going back to being boring to some readers. I am going back to seeing my blog traffic decrease around 66% because I am not talking about chaos or politics.

Why should I care about how many readers I have when I am not into e-commerce or affiliate marking with embedded links all over my blog? Crisis, chaos, or bad news brings much more blog traffic just like slowed traffic passing a bad car accident. I just don't want to go and this blog, to go in that direction.

So the "Other Stuff" on the blog title is going back to the relaxed lifestyle here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana, owned and directed by two hounds and any excitement they generate in their daily life. Like the old blog I'll go back to posting photos from my house projects or house maintenance I will be doing in better and warmer weather.

For the fans of my "rambling" and going off track on occasion, posting my thoughts about anything in general ... I will keep doing that but like the 'old blog', I'll not touch the subjects of politics or religion. Readers that want that type of commentary will have to go somewhere else after today

When 9/11 happened they did tell us from that day forward our world would change. It has all over the globe but maybe not so much here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana where we are tucked in the middle of corn and soybean fields. About the only changes we have seen here the last 18 years since 9/11 are local business closing forever and leaving empty buildings, or the major repair work on the US Highway in front of the house.

Winston loved sitting out on the SW corner of the carport during that time and watching the road crew tear out the highway asphalt down to the bare dirt. He was really interested when they installed new rebar and then poured new asphalt a little bit further into our yard to widen the shoulder of the road.

The only other thing that has changed around here of any importance ... was me retiring in April 2014 and becoming a full-time professional doorman for the hounds. The could come and go as they pleased as they requested I let them out and back inside a million times per day. With only two hounds now instead of four, I am down to around 500,000 times per day instead of a million.  :)

9/11 did change my personal enjoyment of flying. I went from loving to fly to "I'll never fly again, screw this" .... when I retired from work, I didn't have to fly again unless I wanted to ... and I haven't.

What I did not realize at the time was that all the wars overseas would push people out of their home countries, and in some cases head to the USA from all directions. I didn't realize the effect it would have along the border south of California, a border that I use to cross every day sometimes as I would head downtown Tijuana to 'the book' to bet on any horse race track in America. Or the times friends and I would cross that same San Diego border to spend the weekend at the Rosarita Beach Hotel in Rosarita Beach or go further south for a beer at Husong's in Ensenada, Baja Mx.

We've had little change here in this small town based on all of that movement of people looking for a better life than what they had. Even in this small rural redneck town we have had a little diversity in our population. An Iranian family owns the Subway, an Indian family now owns the 'infamous' gas/mini mart, a Chinese family owns a great small restaurant downtown providing me with that buffet I blogged about in December.

We even have illegals from Mexico that work at the Mexican restaurant with some of the best food I have ever eaten, from Southern California to Ensenada Baja California. We have never seen or experienced terrorist activity yet the huge government facility nearby goes into severe lockdown at times based on what is happening in the world.

So that's the end of my talking and blogging on this blog about what is going on in the world and what I like or don't like in today's society. I am going to try my hardest to crawl back into my hole here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana and let the world decide what it wants to do. That doesn't mean I will not remain vigilant and aware but I will just not blog about it. I don't need the bullshit in my life, just like I no longer needed that from a job.

While the sopping wet sound came from every one of my steps on the path this morning and Stella in her own little world ignoring me when I said "come on" ... I thought about these past 18 years since 9/11 and wondered what would it be like today if the US would just stay out of other countries business and way of life.

Let them live they way they want to and all of those trillions of dollars spent on wars, could have been spent on a new rail system, new bridges, better health care and support for those in need right here in the USA. How many people could be led off the streets into a tiny home or an apartment with those trillions of dollars?

It's a complicated story on how far do we go as a country to help others in need outside of our borders but at the same time there has always been way too much focus on changing their governments to a democracy when they don't want that kind of government or our lifestyle. Why would they? Let them sort out their own problems.

After all, if I reverse the situation and ask myself if I would like a foreign country coming here in 'the tropics' telling me and the hounds we HAVE TO change to their way of life ... the hounds and I would basically tell them to get out of the neighborhood and leave us alone ... maybe not in that kind of nice tone.

So really Stella has it all figured out, as does Heidi .... stay calm, unattached, live in your own little world but keep an eye out for trouble or deer in the field. but be sure to get enough sleep time during hours and hours of sports on tv ... not the noise of the news. All we can control is what we do right here ... that's fine with the hounds and fine with me.

Many new readers don't know about the time I spent a week taking photos and blogging about me pulling every weed out of my gravel driveway and bank, while crawling around on my hands and knees back in August 2015. To read those exciting blog posts, dripping with drama and in a way chaos, you can click here, then scroll down through the different blog posts that are listed in order of the progress.

What I meant to say when I mentioned that ... was to show how weird blogging traffic is ... those four days of blogging about pulling weeds were some of the all-time busiest blog traffic days since it started in October 2011. The number of daily visitors were close to what I was getting just last week talking about politics and chaos in society !!!!

Isn't a story or link like that much better than a link about the refugees problems or the other faction of people trying to take over our country?

So I am going to get back to that type of blogging ... the boring daily life of the hounds and I then let the 'experts' write about the chaos going on.

The hounds, and life as it is in small town rural America with a an opinion from that angle, every once in a while. There is so much more to blog about besides chaos in society whether in our country or their's. Stella and Heidi doesn't care ... neither do I.

Stella spent the whole morning walk looking for something to make it a little more exciting. There wasn't a scent anywhere along the way for her to lock into, so her focus was just to keep her paws as dry as possible and enjoy the warmer temps, sprinkles and all, as she strolled through the field.

She gave the scents one last chance to show themselves but decided the best thing to do was to head back to the house and start her morning siesta that leads to lunch. In the meantime I am going to take the books on politics and government back to the library.

Then pull a couple of books off my self that I bought years ago but never read .. one about Willie Mays and the other about Mickey Mantle. Baseball season is just 43 days away and that is much better than paying attention to who announces they are going to run for President.

The free offer of Showtime over the weekend produced nothing as far as TV watching. It only confirmed why I don't pay the extra $10-$13 per month to get Showtime or HBO all the time. I had more fun watching the new AAF football league which brought in 2.9 million viewers opening night on Saturday, on CBS. It was reported those AAF games had a larger audience than ABC's NBA game that night with LeBron James.

See, I am not the only football addict in America.

I look forward to the 'new' way of blogging and back to the old stuff. I mean what could be more exciting than a good photo of Heidi sleeping through all the chaos not caring what happens. After all, it will not have any affect on her sleeping time or the two times to eat.

The hounds have the correct solution on how to live ... I just have to pay more attention to their suggestions.

It's wet but a bright overcast this morning in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana ... it's all good.