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.
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.
