What A Weird Monday

The field of yellow will not be here for long. Those yellow weeds might last a couple of weeks but no longer than a month before they are plowed under and something is planted in their place. Those two fields have different owners, and different plans.


I had a pretty good idea just how strange my Monday was going to be when I went to bed before 11pm, or was it before 10:30pm? After a night full of the most bizarre dreams I finally conceited defeat and was up brewing two cups of coffee by 5:15am ... yes AM.

There isn't a lot to do that time of morning. I've been a 'night person' my whole life so it may just be my biased opinion that nothing can be done in the dark at 5:30am. Of course with this rude awakening, the hounds were totally confused. They played along though with the normal routine a couple of hours early. They were fine with the idea of getting to eat ... that does not matter what time of day or night it is, they all love to eat.

A little after 6:15am the dark skies filled up with the sound of every bird outside. The bird conversations were so loud and distinct, the sounds of people driving by to get to work early to start their week was almost completely subdued.

Still, I can't say I was enjoying being up that time of day no matter how good the coffee tasted. I was sure my Monday was going to be one strange day. With nothing planned that made it equally dangerous, but that is the life of a retiree at times.

April 11th was my 3rd year anniversary for retirement and I still love the freedom that I have. I miss the money the job paid me but I miss nothing else. The freedom of time is worth more than than any amount of money.

By 7:30am Sadie was ready for the first walk of the day but it wasn't going to happen. She came back inside drenched from the heavy morning dew a little after 6am and I could tell from the window that the field was too wet for the first walk of the day.

After my two cups of coffee, getting caught up on my online reading and deleting my section of complaining on yesterday's blog post ... I put not only my computer in 'sleep' mode ... but also myself. With a restless night of weirdness traveling through my brain last in the form of dreams, falling back to sleep at 8am was too easy. The hounds all followed the command "go to sleep".

We didn't regain consciousness until 12:45pm. Yes, that is way past the lunch time for the hounds and too late for the majority of the population nationwide ... yet when retired it's not a problem ... you have to remain flexible when nothing is planned for the day.

All of us had lunch and headed out for the first walk of the day. I wanted to make a little extra effort with the camera today by concentrating a little on holding the camera steady, tucking my arms under the camera like a tripod, holding my breathing while gently squeezing the shutter ... all with hopes of a sharp focused picture.

Sadie was thrilled to be out in the field. Stella was still hungry and was looking for natural protein for the first half of the walk. The last half of the walk all she did was drag her paws one slow step at a time all the way back to the house. Sadie did nothing but track scent from start to finish.

Heidi?? Well it's not 70° and was back on the sleeping bag sleeping before I could tie my shoes.

Nothing on the horizon but it seemed to Sadie that deer were near. It would have been past the 'no fly zone' into the woods. I was hoping she wasn't going to take off sprinting from her position of nose in the air. Still she had found something strong enough in the air to peak her interest.

Stella didn't care about scents today. She was back in the spot where the bushes are mashed down and covered by deer scent ... and scat.

I finally got them herded in the same direction while I tried to decipher what I remembered about those strange dreams. Some of it was familiar from past dreams where the neighborhood is the same and practically every hound that I have ever owned shows up. The problem is they are all running loose. Some are with other dogs, some are in the streets and I cannot get them all collected by the time I wake up wondering what is going on.

Most will find this next one funny. I do now but didn't at 4am. In the dream I am writing a blog post with no pictures, no paragraphs and no punctuation. The screen I am writing the post on is automatically scrolling non-stop, where I have to type faster to keep up with the screen and keep my sentences together.

About the time all my words become one big blur from typing so fast ... I woke up, again wondering what was going on and happy to see I was still in a dark bedroom and not in front of a computer.

Since I am well rested now for the day, there will be no more siestas for me. The hounds are a different story as all of them are sleeping with Sadie and Stella snoring. A change of schedule never seems to bother them, once again showing just how more flexible dogs are compared to people.

The field of grass is growing fast. Luckily this owner lets the field grow naturally. The previous owner would bring in loaders of turkey fertilizer and spread it over the field every few years. Needless to say during those times, ALL daily walks were cancelled until further notice. My old basset Harry found enjoyment in rolling in it. I tried to keep him confined to the yard as much as possible but his expertise was getting out and away.

The highlight of the afternoon was Sadie trying to block Stella from the water bowl. There is never any growling or barking involved. Sadie will stand or sit near the large bowl of water and will quietly let Stella know she is not to come anywhere near it. That is when I stand between the bowl and Sadie so Stella can get some water. It doesn't happen all of the time.

It was nice enough to sit outside cooler temps and overcast skies. Heidi had passed out on the large chair in the living room, the ottoman was not needed in her case. Stella headed one direction and Sadie in another, to check out the field.

I can confirm there is something wrong with my Tamron 55mm-200mm zoom lens. I tried focusing on Sadie while she was in the field with the Single-point AF setting ... it would try to but never did focus on Sadie nor the surrounding grass/flowers.

These next two pictures were taken with the Auto-area AF setting. I did not call either hound while they took their time wandering. I had my weekly flyer in the mail from Saturdays' delivery and looked through that along with the Menards and Orscheln's sales ads while the hounds looked around.

They both came back to the yard on their own.

Stella was waiting for the sunshine or waiting on that southwestern wind but neither showed up. While Sadie tried to make an escape into the woods on the opposite side of the yard, behind the burn pile, Stella remained in deep thought.

When the hounds walked back to the house that was the sign it was time to go in. They were both back to sleep after a strenuous afternoon.

I have a little rambling below today but no complaining.

Evidently my dream of blogging must have happened due to amount of time I've thought of blogging the past few days. I was already to write a post about my thoughts on blogging until I saw today a post I wrote just last November about the same topic. It is listed on the right sidebar under "Past Year Favorite Posts".

At times the mental fight whether to continue a blog is the same as the times where words do not come easy to post. It's really hard to put your finger on what keeps bloggers blogging year after year. Why do some keep going, some disappear without an announcement and others let you know they are leaving?

I have tried cutting back at times but when I start writing the urge is a daily thing. I have found it very hard the longer the blog goes of skipping many days between posts. Yet, when I first started this blog in 2011, I wrote less than a 100 posts per year and with few pictures if any at all.

The other thing I find interesting is just one word in a blog post title can double the amount of visitors just like that. Yesterday's fire starter was the word "complaining", it doubled my number of visitors.

Readers like drama, or stories and pictures of traveling and even hearing about Stella destroying my house during a period of separation anxiety. Comparing 'action' like that to our daily routine 95% of the time makes me wonder at times if the blog is on it's last legs.

I see that Exede has received my returned equipment so I should be off the hook for any further billing by them. I love setting up the automatic payments from my accounts but hate trying to get them stopped when the account is paid in full.

I tried starting a couple of new books over the weekend without much success. I have no urge to read, no urge to work on that 'to do' list today. I think I have pretty much written this day off.

Thanks for the emails and blog comments after my venting section yesterday. The bottom line is, the increases do not amount to that much money but I hate being "nickel and dime".

It has been almost too quiet here in 'the tropics' today but nice.

Thunderstorms & Complaining

There is some "rambling" included in this post, after all of the images. I'll warn you, there is some complaining involved. Probably more complaining than rambling but sometimes it's good to vent.


With 6 out of the next 9 days having a 50% chance or better of rain, as it became dark inside my house this morning at 8am it did not surprise me. Sadie stood by my desk chair just a few minutes prior with her daily morning request ... to take a walk.

Radar showed all of the storms were going to be just north of us. We were barely touching the southern edge of the front following the I-70 corridor. I thought I'd take a chance and see if we could fit in a walk as soon as possible, like right then.

After Sadie and I got pretty far ahead, Stella had not even left the yard. That picture above was shot with a 200mm zoom and obviously she had her own plans today ... they didn't include Sadie nor I.

What makes it kind of interesting with Stella and weather like today, she came with a warning in August 2015 ... "she is terrified of storms". She didn't not show that in any of the thunderstorms we have had since her arrival. She does not even pace nervously around the house then the thunder is rolling and loud. Still, with her reputation, days like today I am always on the lookout with her to make sure she is going to be okay.

I think the sky was giving one of it's better light shows today. The clouds were barely moving and followed the pattern that I had seen on the Intellicast radar before leaving ... all moving in a northeasterly direction.

Of course anytime we are on a walk ... nothing bothers Sadie. Nothing ever has the 8 years and 10 months that she has been living. Even as a 12 week old puppy she put her nose to the ground, then followed Winston everywhere he went in the field. She walks for one reason only ... track scents.

It was not a surprise as my 200mm lens focused and caught Stella walking due north while Sadie and I were on the normal path heading northeast. With the possibility of rain I wasn't sure I wanted to give her the freedom to roam anywhere. I headed her direction for her safety and my sanity.

It wasn't the woods nor the neighbor's drainage ditch that interested her, it was that one spot she visited the other day. Before I could say "over here", Sadie took off around me and sprinted her direction to get her to head our direction.

Those pictures of Sadie sprinting toward her turned out to be too blurred to be posted here. Something started on yesterday afternoon's walk where my 'single point' view setting did not seem to really focus on the hounds. The camera beeped it was focused and ready but the pictures didn't show that. I found that to be the same again today with some of my pictures.

She took her time walking toward us but about the time I finished taking a picture inside the banks of the gully, Stella rubbed my calf as she walked past me. She will walk over you or step on you if you are in her way.

You can see the sky back toward the house was getting lighter, with a feel of rain heading northeast. We continued to follow the path but I was sure I felt a drop of rain from somewhere. Nothing showed on my camera nor my shoes but it was there just for an instant.

With the winds picking up and that feeling it could start lightly raining at anytime, all three of us turned and headed back to the house. Sadie didn't hesitate and took the lead with an urgency to get home. Stella walked as close to me as possible in a pace that was between a fast walk and a trot.

The hounds could feel rain in the air.

As I write this sentence I hear the wet pavement as cars drive by the house. All outdoor activity will be on hold and weather will determine if and when we walk again, mow the yard again or wash the Z4. My activity last week was based on the forecast for the next ten days. So it's to the next thing on my list to do inside the house.

Early Friday evening we had a visitor across the highway. Probably some kind of fertilizer to be applied before the rains came. With the wide reach of the sprayer it was not going to take him very many laps to get the small field finished.

I was happy to see that dust from the field keep drifting west since I had a recently washed black car parked in my carport.

Once he finished his short trip, he folded everything back up and head down the highway. I don't know where their farm is nor how far away it might be.

I wanted to get my lawn mowed Saturday before possible rain on Sunday. Then I wanted to get if finished before the 1pm start time of the Cincinnati Reds game. I figured with everything I did the past 3-4 days I could waste a sunny afternoon watching baseball. That didn't last long though.

I cannot watch a lot of baseball when a professional pitcher can't throw strikes or even somewhere near the plate. So by the 2nd inning I had turned off the tv and headed back outside. Let see ... no sticks to pick up out of the yard, gutters are cleaned, yard mowed and the driveway bank cleared .... I had only one thing to do but didn't feel like it ... wash the Z4. A siesta sounded like the better option.

By 5:30pm we were all recovered from a long nap and headed out for a walk. You can tell in the picture above how the 'single point' focus did not turn out focused even after the camera told me it was with it's beep.

It is interesting to see the change in Stella's coat this year. She came with a color and coat like Sadie, what they called a red but more like a light tan. But her tail was showing something from her parents with a half tail of coarse 'black and tan' bloodhound in her.

That 'black and tan' started taking over her body this winter, even with a feeling of more coarse than soft and fine hair.

Sadie's parents were like that. Her dad was a 'red', same color as Sadie and her mom was a laidback 'black and tan'. The breeder told me a few months after I bought Sadie that she was getting feedback from new owners where the females in the litter were acting like their obnoxious dad and the male puppies were laidback and relaxed like their mom.

As I stepped into the kitchen/hall area, Heidi came sprinting from the living room couch. I could tell she was wanting to take a walk. She was even barking to go outside and it was going to be more than just dumping her tanks. Barking to go outside is not normal for her.

Stella hung back, Heidi wasn't much faster and Sadie was already way out in front. I could tell from the start it was going to be challenging to keep all three hounds in the same general direction and somewhat together.

Another of those pictures where the camera beeped telling me it was in focus, then finding out later when I downloaded it into my computer it was blurred.

I'll try to take some pictures of her paws with my iPhone camera today but her paws are full of grown hair, normal thickness. All on 4 paws where a vet two years ago told me that hair most likely would never return to her legs and paws that showed bare skin. All of that hair on her front legs is at normal levels of thickness.

Heidi held her own on the path has Stella tried to walk over her or at least close enough to move her out of the way. There is 7 acres of field to walk in and both of them have to walk on the same path inches from each other.

I kept walking my pace. I needed to keep Sadie in our general area and not in the 'no fly zone'. She had been on a scent for most of the walk but I was spending all of my time moving Stella and Heidi.

It's hard to see her but Heidi has that look on her face as if we were leaving her. It is taken at 50mm zoom which is suppose to be the same view as your eyes.

I waited and called her name. She didn't sprint like she use to but she did come running. Once again, the camera beeps telling me the 'single point' focus is locked in but the downloaded picture says otherwise.

The pictures are blurred but too good not the post on the blog.

Once she turned left on the final turn, where the whole path angles downhill all the way to the house, Heidi was out front of us and the one wondering what was taking so much time.

The winds were still blowing strong from the southwest, like they had all day. With all of the windows open, no papers laying out in the open were safe. Stella turned into a puppy for a few minutes as I caught her chewing up some of my new Medicare Supplement Insurance junk mail that had blown from the kitchen island/shop work bench to the floor and had not made it to the recycling bin yet.

I almost forgot ... but Stella still needed to show me in the end that she was still on her schedule as she veered off the path for something while Sadie, Heidi and I walked into the house.

I am not expecting any negative results but I will find out this week how the new HughesNet Gen5 signal works in thunderstorms. I rarely lost internet signal with Exede during storms. Plus anymore, I rarely lose my Directv signal ... at least nothing like it was 15  years ago.

The downloading speeds are still in the high 40'sMbps with the new internet system. One thing I have noticed different is when I upload pictures into my blogs on Blogger but not on the one on Wordpress ... fast upload speed of 3-7Mbps but the images do not load that fast and every one of them starts as their original size (very large) before the smaller version is loaded. It was much faster with the Exede system and slower speeds.

I noticed on Box Canyon Blog that Mark had changed his home page where the 7 most recent posts were in an abbreviated form with only one image and a "read more" link. I would like to do that to my blog but I have not found any way to change the settings to do that. Using the help found on Google so far has not worked.

Can someone help me on this?  Is that option based on a Blogger setting or is it the type of template (theme) he is using?

Yet, there are some readers that like to scroll through all of the photos at once instead of opening each post individually. (me) Then there are some that would like the blog to load faster using less data and the abbreviated versions would accomplish that.

I still like using Flickr and Google Photos as my online backup. One complaint I have with Google Photos, it will change the order of the photos once they are uploaded. It doesn't matter if I set them to list 'oldest first' or 'newest first', Google photos will sort them as they want. Flickr is still a sharper and better quality picture, between the two.

Why do I dread going under the house to check on things and climbing up into the attic portion of the roof to check on things? I've done both many times over the 19-20 years I have lived here but still dread my annual trips to those areas of the house.

I am still staying away from any source of news, tv or online. A great decision and unless a headline sneaks into my sports based Facebook, Twitter feeds or sports sites I visit, I have no clue what is going in in the world. As long as I don't feel the ground vibrating I figure the hounds and I are good. It feels great to get away from all of that 'noise'. I can't remember the last time I heard any news outside of sports.

After 3-1/2 months I am on pace to put only 1,585 miles on my Z4 this calendar year. Some people would say if you are not going to drive it then sell it. I like having it for those times I want to take a nice drive through the country side with the top down.

I know that I am the only driver in the house but after careful analysis and looking in my past history of vehicle ownership, I need up to 4 different vehicles. I don't think I could ever get by with just one car and even with the two cars I have now, there are two other vehicles I'd like to have parked outside.

I am glad I did not use any Scott's Turf Builder and Fertilizer for the yard or weed killer this year. The yard is growing fast enough for a weekly mow and the grass is taking over the weeds. All the mole hills have disappeared since the the spring rains arrived. The yard looks better than it did a month ago.

As for weed killer on the driveway and bank. I was close to buying and using some potent chemical based weed killer but did not want to take the chance of that stuff touching the paws or noses of my hounds. I know they say it's safe after 24-48 hours for pets but something tells me that is not accurate. So my technique of using my nylon string on the weed eater and cutting them as close to the ground as possible seems to control them.

This is where the complaining started and went on and on. The more I thought about it and the more I read it ... the more I didn't like it ... so I deleted all of the complaining the morning after.

Of course those that are subscribed by email or get an email notice with the blog post included will see all of my complaining, so far I have not heard back from those few that do.

Most if not all the blog readers have seen it, so I guess this deletion is because I didn't want it to be part of the record in the future. 

I might have to do a blog post about keywords in blog post titles because that word "complaining" DOUBLED my normal number of blog visitors. Many were first time visitors and had never seen the blog before.

My "rambling" posts alway draw a bigger crowd it seems.

So anyway, that is where the complaints went, right to the dumpster, where they should be.

That is about all the rambling for today. The birds are chirping and I can hear it raining lightly but steady outside. It will be a day of playing Mahjong on the laptop, reading books with a baseball game on in the background and hopefully a lot less complaining.

The pace is furious here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.

The Hounds Approve The Final Phase Of Bank Clearing

After the hounds did some early morning stretching, we took off for the morning walk about an hour earlier than usual. I needed to be at UPS by the time they opened at 10am to drop off the package to return to Exede. The grounds were wetter than normal, hiking boots were soaked by the time we got back.

I did not catch her on camera but Stella did a little running to catch up at the start of the walk. After she did catch up with us, it was nothing but her slow walking after that.

I am assuming it was deer scent that made the bloodhounds so interested this morning. I have seen a lot of deer grouped together in this same spot around sundown in the past. They are usually heading back into the woods by the time I get my camera ready to take a picture.

It was to the point I was beginning to wonder if they were going to leave this one spot. Stella was determined to stay but I kept calling her because I needed her to follow us on the walk since I was a little tight for time this morning.

That long narrow path they are following is used by the deer. Those same type of paths are scattered in different parts of the field always leading to a wooded area.

The last time I checked as I made the final turn home, both hounds were behind me. Once Sadie passed me and Stella wasn't with her I turned to see what she was doing. She was testing me to see if I was paying attention to her. Stella was headed at a 45° angle away from us and pretty far behind us.

That never bothered Sadie.

Stella wasn't stubborn this time. As soon as I yelled "over here", she turned and trotted slowly back to the path I was on. It was a slow walk home from there. I think she was just checking to see if she would get away without me noticing.

Right after we got back from the walk I loaded the Exede box in the small Z4 trunk, lead the hounds to the bedroom where they stay while I am gone, and took off for UPS 25 miles away. I would be taking a great sports car road, two lanes with a lot of curves and hills. Mentally I was prepared for one slow vehicle to back all of us up at 45 mph.

Yet with the top down and 70° it was a great drive.

By the time I made it back from the 50 mile round trip, Heidi was barking wanting her lunch time kibble. Stella was soon to follow with her bloodhound howling. I thought it might be too early but it was close to 4 hours since they had their breakfast.

Once lunch was finished it was time to start the final Phase 3 of the bank clearing project. Under the watchful eye of Stella, I pulled out the needed tools for today's job.

It was a little cloudy but radar showed there wasn't a chance of rain anywhere. The plan today was to cut the few remaining stems or saplings that I missed two days ago. A lot of times the brush is too thick for me to get to all of them so I always go back to cut the stragglers after I burn the first time.

I always rake any loose limbs or thick vines down to the bottom of the bank and burn as much of them as I can. I knew that all would not burn but enough of it would. Sadie was more than happy to supervise from the top of the hill.

As you can see the builders of the house in 1975 spread a pretty good amount of rock along that bank. I added the rip rap last month to an area for added support.

By now I had cut all that was left standing and raked what was remaining to the bottom of the hill. It was was time to see what was going to burn. It's ugly right now but it was have new growth in a month and all of this will be covered up with green ragweed most likely.

I did not get as much burned as I was hoping for so I'll leave it stacked where it is and try later this summer or wait until next fall when there is not such a fire hazard.

It has been suggested to me many times to have someone lay rip rap on the whole bank. I agree with them it would look fantastic and at the same time help in preventing sole erosion.

It would take close to $10,000 to lay rip rap on the bank that is 150' or longer. At the same time all of those people with the suggestion don't seem to be offering any of their cash to pay for the job either ... LOL


After letting the vines set for the winter a lot of them still are not dried out enough to burn. I have carried away most of the green limbs to my burn pile prior to setting any fires.

By the time I took my last step into the driveway after climbing the bank, Sadie was wondering what was next on the 'to do' list for the day.

I had enough energy left to wash one car but not two. The Mini Countryman needed washing more than the Z4. After it was washed and all the car washing equipment had been put away, I walked in the house finished for the day.

I was shocked to see it was only 1:30pm after all the stuff I did today.

It was tempting for a siesta, especially with three sleeping hounds scattered throughout the house but I decided to brew up a fresh 3qt container of ice tea, grill come chicken for my salad and see what the afternoon would bring.

With enough energy expended for the day, I doubt there will be much more to blog about today. So I'll post this in the middle of the afternoon ... with plans of mowing the yard and washing the Z4 tomorrow before the rains come on Sunday.

That's all for today from 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.