Hounds Settle Into Spring

I wasn't sure any walks would be taken today when we woke up to a steady rain. Even Stella did not want to go outside the first time I opened the door to start our daily routine. It was nice to finally sleep with the windows open and hear the rain just outside the window. It looks like the farmer has a new low spot in his field near the back.

Just a little sign of how much it rained overnight. It was nothing major but it was a factor for Stella. When I grabbed the camera and said "come on, let's go", she didn't move from her sitting position next to the island. By the time I took the first photo of the field across the highway, she was at the door wanting to be let outside.

With a slight hesitation, she finally stepped outside and once she felt the wet grass, moved over to the river rock to follow the side of the house. You will see that she took a different route this morning ... what is strange, it is the same route whenever it has rained.

I was going to let her go where she wanted and I'd follow. I was just happy the rain had stopped long enough for us to get a walk in this morning. I had plans to go grocery shopping, that would take place right after we finished.

I am still locked into my 'diet', which is not really a diet but a way of eating long term. Like I have said before, it is not really much different from what I have done for the past five years. I have cut out dairy products though and can tell a difference as well as moderation on steak, pizza, or cheeseburgers. I've only had one of those three, a pizza, the past month.

Still I caught myself again Friday going back through all my notes, bookmarked websites and shopping lists to see which direction I want to go in my eating plans. I stayed with what I am doing with low fat, 30% protein and 55% carbs, while keepign around 1,550 calories per day.

Stella was on her own this morning and she wasn't waiting around for me. She was not eating deer scat, nor was she doing much exploring but steady continuous walking. It was almost like she was getting a workout in. With her winter coat shedding, I combed out three large metal brushes full of undercoat yesterday afternoon.  Heidi hardly sheds at all in comparison.

Stella's pink John Deere collar was getting too small so I went back to an older collar I had hanging inside a closet door. I think she might have worn this bright red one before. She doesn't like it when I take her collar off, she likes wearing one, where Heidi only wears her's when she goes to the vet.

Will Heidi show up outside today long enough for me to take some photos of her?

Just before we got to the first corner of the field, Stella moved over to our regular path, where I can walk and she can inspect the edge of the field and woods.

From the first corner all the way to the back, the path was this wet with a lot of standing water. You can bet your last dollar that it will be impossible to get Heidi on any kind of walk today and possibly for the next few days until the path dries out.

Besides thinking about my diet, I have also been thinking about deleting some of the blogs from my reading list. Those would be the ones I added to my list here a few months ago. You might remember them ... Frauds, Crooks and Criminals, Creeping Sharia, Kunstler's Blog, and The Market Ticker.

Yes, all of them keep you updated on what is going on behind the scenes, rarely reported by the mainstream media. Some of their news is quite alarming, a little scary and concerning. Others are just their opinions but the one consistent thing about all of them ... there isn't a damn thing I can do personally to stop what is going on, or control what is going on in the world today.

After a while I just get tired of reading about or listening to all the bullshit surrounding politics, illegal immigrants, muslims wanting their way of life to be in control as well as their sharia laws and the abuses of Medicaid and Medicare along with food stamps and welfare. Basically the generosity of this country has been and is being taken advantage of and that will not stop until someone gets some guts and does something about it.

Will all of this affect me and the hounds living here in bumb*** Egypt ? Most likely not. I compare it to the increase in crime, gang activity, drugs and the attempt at being a sanctuary city only 25 miles from me. I know it's there, but that is not here. We already have a meth problem in this area and have for years and that has not affected the hounds and I ... so ....

I think it's time to delete those blogs and set them aside with the deleted tv news in my house and continue to feel much better without bullshit running around my brain cells. I'd rather read books, work in the yard, do house projects and hang out with the hounds instead of hearing and analyzing the bullshit called tv news and the changing of the country. Maybe I can hide out away from it for the next 30 years and never have it affect me.

Speaking of book reading, yes I am still reading the book about Steve Jobs but I picked up a couple of new books at the library on Friday. Top Gun written by the founder of the Navy's Topgun flight program. You might remember the movie about it from the mid 1980's. Another book is interesting after reading only a few pages. It's called The Light Years by Chris Rush. Just after a couple of pages Sunday night I lost all interest in this book and stopped reading it. I picked up the book about Topgun and couldn't put it down.

With the NCAA Basketball tournament finishing up, there hasn't been a lot of time to read. Plus major league baseball has started so that fills in the gaps during the week nights. I do not sit and watch the baseball game's every pitch but will have it on in the background and will tune in if something exciting is happening. A lot of times I can read with the sound turned off and the games on.

Today will be one of those days. Reading, game on, windows open, with the hounds sleeping.

Stella took her time this morning but by the time I stopped my Apple Watch "outdoor walking" tracker ... we had walked our normal 16 minutes and for .53 of a mile.

Not only does my watch tell me when to get off my ass and out of my desk chair to stand up and walk around, but Stella does a great job getting me outside for a little exercise. She is not as demanding as Sadie was, but there are times when Stella will come to get me if she is in the mood to take the walk.

There was no sniffing around the trees this morning. She never stopped one time to check on anything ... she kept on walking, right around the corner of the house and straight to the door. She must have known I had to go buy some food.

All I will say about my shopping trip is ... stupidity was at its finest this morning. I was glad to get back in my car and get home without an accident due to someone else's fault. I swear I really wonder what people are thinking sometimes ...

Still ... it's another fine day here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.

Snow Storm ?

We were warned last night on the local news that the hounds and I were to expect around 3" of snow today. Not only did they tell us the amount and the probability of it happening but stressed that most of the snow would happen south of I-70. That's us. In that case Stella planned to get an early start on the walk this morning before the snow would start.

With a slight wind out of the NW I could tell it was a lot colder than the 31° my weather app was telling me. In fact after a few minutes I was beginning to think I had not worn the right coat. My face was feeling like I should have put on the down parka instead of my lightweight down jacket. None of that bothered Stella though, she was into her routine of dumping her tanks early and then catching up with me.

We were out the door this morning like old times, a few minutes past 8am. With another
7 days to go before we move the clocks forward we will have daylight at 8am until then. What was I thinking ???  LOL Of course it will be bright daylight at 7am (EARLIER) because we are moving the clocks FORWARD !!!

I have a 192 movies recorded on my DVR, another couple of hundred DVD's setting on my shelf and still could not find a movie that interested me enough to watch last night. 250 channels offered on my DishNetwork package and I probably don't watch more than 7 or 8 of them. Instead, I sat for hours reading the book about Steve Jobs, then went to bed with anticipation of a lot of snow when I woke up.

About the time we made the first time I could feel it spitting a little snow. I could see some very small crystals landing on my jacket sleeve and the air is always colder once that turn is made. Stella was into tracking again today and not a lot of verbal herding was needed. I let her go on her own.

I know this is a weird angle for a picture but I was trying to get a picture of the difference in her coat, on top of her spine. My very first bloodhound Max use to do the same thing with his winter coat, where it is a little curly compared to the rest of her coat.

I think she noticed it was snowing a little harder ... she started walking faster with her head up, like she wanted to get home.

Not quite a trot but close. Was she getting colder? She trotted nonstop all the way to the backyard.

By the end of the walk it wasn't snowing that hard.

Of course with a light snow outside and temperatures that are cold enough to make my face and fingers feel frozen by the time we returned, there was no way Heidi was going to wake up to see what was going one.

Maybe that will be my plan for today. Watch the snow fly and take pictures every hour to show the progression. Of course 3" is nothing compared to what the northern states and the east coast got this weekend. No worries though, it is supposed to be back in the 50's by this weekend.

As you see I wanted an old style design for the blog. Basically I wanted a sidebar back on the right hand side on the homepage and the post page so you could see other links to check out without having to scroll to the bottom of the page. Plus I was in the mood for a different blog style. Luckily I was able to use all that data searching with my free data period before 8am. Stella woke me up again at 5am, not wanting out but wanting breakfast. When I finally woke up she was standing by the bed whining.

I already can feel that a siesta will be part of my plan of the day, later this afternoon.

It's only a light snow so far this morning in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.

Weirdness & Snow

Here is another way of showing you just how fast the weather can change here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana. Bright and sunny yesterday but cold, it was not a day in April like it looked. Then this morning Stella and I started our walk under the largest snow flakes I had seen in a while. They say we might get an inch of snow by noon. So what about the floods? They will continue to move and eventually recede out of the fields ... maybe.

The problem is there is more rain on the way this afternoon and all night tonight. It's times like these that I am glad we live high on a hill. After all that  really is an 'official' floodplain just across the highway. Of course the site I bookmarked a long time ago, where I could find any floodplain by location, I can't find.

I was going to walk again Saturday afternoon, let Heidi spend more time outside, and blog again but right after these photos were taken the "weirdness" hit me like a ton of bricks. My whole life I have had cold in my eyes when I get them. I had that feeling you might recognize ... it feels like you have a cold coming on but don't want to acknowledge it, hoping it will go away. Yet, you know that what you are feeling is cold symptoms.

It didn't go away at first. I tried to read but my right eye was full of tears and kept running. My sinuses were running full steam ahead. Stella was howling and whining each time I sneezed. It certainly felt like a head cold was coming on. I had not be around people for days, almost a week, so where did I get the germs from?

I did my old stand by when I'm desperate and need relief ... I took my small jar of Vick's Vapor Rub and put that on each side of my nose and under my right eye. That stuff works wonders in times of cold symptoms. Plan B was going to be a hot cup of tea but I wanted to see if the Vick's would work first. Since I was even having a hard time watching the basketball games on tv ... I headed to bed. Maybe a short siesta with a lot of Vick's Vapor Rub would knock out the cold that was trying to overtake my eyes.

A couple of hours later as reality came back into focus ... letting the hounds outside, I noticed that feeling of cold activity around my right eye and my sinuses was gone!! Could it be true? I'd find out within the next few hours it was true. Plus Sunday morning confirmed I did not have a cold nor did I have one attempting to take over my life for the next 5-7 days.

I rarely get sick but when I do, it's not a favorite activity and I can't remember if I blog during those times or not. I'd have to look at my old blog to see what happened last winter when I was really sick for about four days

If you are not a sports fan than this next bit of commentary will not mean much but if you are, what do you think of another 'pro' football league? Their first game was last night and they will play once per week until the end of April. By that time MLB will have finished the first month of their 2019 season.

I looked up the league's website early last night and read about what it was all about. Years ago they tried the XFL but for me there were too many gimmicks and I didn't watch after a few minutes of their first game. Last night I watched the whole game and enjoyed it.

I like the three major rule differences than the NFL although the owner, the coaches and players are all NFL based in some way. Even the announcers were the same as I would see on CBS every Sunday this past NFL season.

For football addicts like me, the new AAF is fantastic. For the players, coaches, or referees that have dreams of playing in or getting back to the NFL, the league is a great idea. So what were the three rules that were different from the NFL besides HOW FAST THE GAME WAS PLAYED ????

No kickoffs ... for safety reasons based on NFL stats. Teams started at their 25 yard line, where they would start in the NFL if a fair catch was signaled.

No extra point kicks ... every point after the TD had to be a two point conversion, there were not any successful in the game I watched.

A shorter play clock ... 35 seconds between plays instead or 40 minutes. OR ... the 15 minute halftime. THE BIGGEST CHANGE .... those damn commercials. This AAF League had no more than two and most of the time only one commercial before getting back to the action. They reached their goal of having the game over in less than three hours instead of the NFL games that come close to 4 and are always longer than 3-1/2 hours.

Anyway, the concept is good. Their 5-10 year goals are good. All the players are paid the exact same salary and not by position or fame. Season tickets are only $75 league wide. You can't even buy a good seat in the NFL games at that price.

They do NOT plan nor want to be a replacement to the NFL like many other old disolved leagues tried. They want to be the NFL minor league system, like MLB has. It's all good and I'll tune in again today and tonight at 4pm and 8pm Eastern to watch more AAF League football.

Once again Stella fooled me. She was "path oriented" this morning. She veered, snooped and sniffed a little but not a lot. I think she was enjoying the snow flakes as she walked. Where Sadie would jump and try to eat snow flakes, Stella showed no signs of doing that. She 'pranced' on the path with the snow in her eyes.

With today's forecast of a mixture of rain/snow that will keep me off the roads. The Mini Countryman is very good in the snow but I have no 'need' to go anywhere and why put the salt/sand base under and on the sides of my car. I just heard another snow plow go by laying down that exact mixture on the highway to get their ice melting base set up.

As we walked back into the yard, the highway already was covered with this light snow mixture but it looked slick.

I'll let the photos tell the story of our walk this morning. Or I could ramble between them I guess.

The dingbat AOC's advisor has already been caught lying online about the Green New Deal. They were trying to backtrack what the deal actually said and attempted to put up a revised version showing economic support instead of tearing it apart. I am still amazed that is what we are looking at for the Democratic agenda prior to the next election.

I have an open mind on presidential candidates and always have but I'll tell you, as each one announces their candidacy I just shake my head and wonder "is that the best you can come up with?"

Will society ever get back to normal or what I think of as normal ... or do we just bury our heads in the sand with hopes it will get better or go away, like my head cold?

Trump haters have to hate this headline this morning:  "The AOC-ization of the democrats boots Trump in 2020." I couldn't agree more. Will they give Howard Schultz a chance? Will Bernie's followers make it happen this time? Will Hillary crawl out of her vodka bottle soon enough to declare she is running again? Can you tell me a legitimate Democratic candidate for 2020 .... give me some names.

That light glove has kept my hands warm all winter, even when the temps dropped to the low teens. Last year I have worn ski gloves when it got that cold but with ski gloves on I cannot use the smaller Canon G9 X but can use the Nikon D3200.

While Stella sat and scratched in the same place she does every morning on the walk, I got as far in front of her as I could, hoping I could catch her running. She almost started running hard to catch me but stopped as fast as she started.

I just had that strange numbness feeling across my left collarbone happen again. The same feeling as if you would hit your crazy bone near your elbow. Then it goes away, never lasting too long. Glancing at my Apple Watch during those times, my pulse is 58 bpm. I think all I need is a good chiropractic neck adjustment.

This was about as close as I could get to show you just how a bloodhound tracks scent on the ground. She does not make the sound with her jowls like Sadie and Bertha did but she keeps her nose as close to the ground as possible while she walks.

I saw no deer tracks this morning of any kind.

With having clear eyes and sinuses this morning I will be able to get a little reading in today. The book titled The Deep State is a really good book. It does NOT lean toward a Trump supporter type of book but has opened the vaults showing just how corrupt the government is as a whole. Many things I've read I already knew. It confirms Obama's administration was the most corrupt in history, beating Nixon.

I am thinking of lighting my burn pile on fire this winter instead of waiting until spring. I normally do it in the fall but this year my second 50' water hose had a hole in it so I could not extend the hose system long enough to reach the burn pile to use as a safety measure. This time of year there might be less of a chance of the fire spreading into the woods with the ground covered by dead leaves.

I see where AT&T is trying to move in front of the 5G movement with false advertising. Sprint is now suing them for that exact thing. I was told by a phone sales store rep in December that my iPhone 8+ will not work with 5G capability. I've read a little about it but no matter what I am not going to upgrade my phone just for 5G capability.

(Heidi's up and awake)

With all that the Apple Watch does, and does well, in my short 5 weeks of using it I would get rid of my iPhone if I did not need it to work with the Watch for updates and my wifi connection. With the Canon G9 X taking the same high quality photos in low light like the iPhone does, I rarely take photos with the phone anymore.

I plan on keeping the 8+ until Apple no longer supports it with iOS updates years from now ... but ... never say never.  :)

It was just announced online that "border talks have broken down" with just a few days to go before Congress passes a signed bill to the President. Why is that not a surprise? Congress is about as worthless as a soup sandwich. For so many intelligent men and women, elected by the people ... most are dumbasses with political agendas.

The word 'compromise' is not in either party's dictionary.

When I heard it was snowing in the Seattle area the other day I was reminded of my first or second November living on Whidbey Island. Normally they might get an inch or two of snow annually, sometimes never, sometimes just a dusting. But that one November day it started snowing and didn't stop until 24 hours later, ending up with 27" on the ground.

The Island Country transportation department did not have one snow plow to clear the roads. They never needed one. So to my friends out in Seattle ... enjoy it ... drive safe ... and head for the ski slopes at Stevens Pass and have fun ... call in sick to work and keep skiing. Based on personal experience you will survive doing that. :)

Well my train of thought is gone .. typical crap.

The snow has stopped, the highway is clear, it's a quiet Sunday and another great winter day here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.