Heidi Joins Morning Walk

She 'kinda' joined the Thursday morning walk but no, she did not go with us in the field. What she did do was start barking nonstop as I got up from the desk to put on my hat, gloves and parka. I was pretty sure she didn't want to walk with us but wanted to go outside and wander around the yard while Stella and I took the walk.

Thursday morning had dark overcast skies but the temperature was warm enough I could unzip the top of my parka. Heidi took no time to sprint outside when I opened the door but she was headed to the front not to the field in back.

I asked her if she was going to walk with use and she had to think about it.

By the time I turned, Stella was already way ahead on the walk. This was much different than her normal pace. Was the Glucosamine supplements working even better after a few months?

To the left of me a sound so loud and strange stopped Stella in her tracks and made me focus the camera to the 200mm to see what was going on. It looked like the neighbor, down and across the highway from me, was having trees trimmed. The limbs might have been too close to his power lines. I found out a couple of summers ago that they will cut the tree limbs for free but I had to get rid of the limbs myself.

While I continued to walk and think ... Stella was in her own world, just as it should be when taking the morning walk. Once again Stella showed signs of improvement to her hips or rear legs. She was trotting away from me on the way to home. That is really good to see.

Again it was good to see Stella jogging a little faster than just a trot. Her new bag of GlycoFlex Plus arrives tomorrow from Chewy, monthly auto shipment.

As I got closer to home I saw Heidi over on the south edge of the property, a place that she visits a lot when she is roaming outside in the yard. When I yelled her name, she looked but couldn't tell where I was calling her name. She did start running toward the house. She knew that Stella and I were close to home.

Since they had breakfast so early in the morning of course they wanted lunch as soon as we walked in the house. They had to wait just so I could keep them in their normal food pattern. There is no reason for me to change their food schedule just because my sleeping habits are a little strange right now

I am also trying to decide if I will continue to follow the news just to make a comment here or there on the subjects. Honestly I don't want to follow any of the news. I want positive energy in my life, not the cesspool news from tv and online news. There is nothing I can do to change the news except ... turn it off and avoid all news feeds.

Also ... I don't want to talk politics or about certain politicians. It's a toxic environment which would make this blog toxic because my mouth becomes toxic when I watch, hear and read the news with those involved.

I will be open and transparent as I wanted and expressed a few days ago. It will be about me, and other stuff that does NOT include anything that deals with news.

It's all good here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.

I'm Borderline OCD

I make off the cuff comments sometimes about being OCD but I'm not. I thought I was for sure until I finished reading more information online about it today. The best example I can give to prove I am not OCD,  is my 'obsession' with an organized clean desk ... but my desk is not clean. LOL I will on occasion get the urge to clean every room in the house spotless but that doesn't mean I keep it that way. If I were OCD wouldn't I NEED to keep things spotless?? My mother was like that.


One picture of my computer desk would show that it is not clean but organized. It is not overwhelmed with stacks of papers and other things.  I still have the sorted photos in small stacks based on the hounds name, waiting to be scanned in a slow printer/scanner whenever I get the urge.


A few weeks ago I was looking at eBay to see what some old software was selling for plus some old VW maintenance manuals. I wanted to see if they were worth listing on eBay to sell. That small stack of software CD's and books are still there.


That is definitely not someone that has OCD.


What about my possible obsession with making spreadsheets for everything? These are the ones I keep updated:

• checkbook register w/auto payments all loaded for 2019
• monthly miles driven
• diet measurements
• income and expenses by category
• savings
• auto maintenance
• each hound has their own health log if sick or injured
• dental plan analysis
• grocery cost comparison with three stores
• internet data used
• personal health issues log
• best foods to eat sorted by research
• usernames and passwords
• daily electric kilowatt usage  (why?)

That looks a little excessive to me. You too??


When I thought about all the spreadsheets I do, I was positive that would make me 100% OCD ... but there is a fine line to determine that and I am straddling the fence.


The determining question on OCD is:  Am I doing those spreadsheets because I want to or do I need to?


Well almost immediately I would answer "I want to" but then when I think about what would I do if I lost all of them, deleted, totally gone .... would I want to rebuild all of them or feel like I need to rebuild all of them because I had to have them?


Looking at that question I feel myself teetering, trying to balance myself from falling on the other side of the fence into the field of OCD.


I begin to see that I MAY not be doing all of this data entry because I want to but because I need to. The thought of stopping the checkbook register and the income & expenses by category makes me anxious. Instantly telling myself "no way, I'll never stop those."


A friend tells me that until I do stop them, I am not totally free.


The others listed I could stop doing them, have stopped doing them but came back to them. Understand that not all of these are updated daily. Nor does it take a lot of time for a couple of entries IF they happen.


For some of them the data is not logged in until something happens, like personal or hound health issues and new online research on food, dog food or whatever.


Sometimes I think I keep doing any kind of spreadsheet because it keeps me kinda attached to the job I retired from, where I lived on financial spreadsheets. It's not that I need that to feel good or anything because I love being retired and would do it again the same way same time frame. It just makes me wonder why I have such a strong attachment to spreadsheets.


There are those I use to update all the time but they have been retired and filed in my documents folder on the computer. Things like analysis for dog food, trading cars, buying or selling my house, moving west ... I also had a spreadsheet that gave me a good view of my finances if I were to retire.


In fact that specific spreadsheet told me it was a great move to retire and I could financially afford it.


So really there is a fine line between being OCD. Just because I keep a clean car with nothing laying around inside of it does not mean I am OCD. It's just that I like having a clean car. Now if I were to clean that car daily .... then I would be OCD.


I might be organized (all DVDs, CD, are alphabetized) and downsized, but my life has a 'lived in' look to it. I mean I wear my jeans more than two days in a row. Whereas growing up my mom washed my jeans daily and had them back in my room before I opened my eyes.


I always wondered what she thought of that stuff she would pull out of my pockets before washing them, that did not include car keys?  Ha Ha


I want to look more into why my my brain is so scattered. Is it a getting older thing or have I been this way for years but never had the time to notice.


This post might be one of the few I have written publicly in seven years of blogging where I stuck to the same subject as the title.


What do you think of a post with no pictures?


Any thoughts or experiences with OCD?

My First Basset Hound - Harry

In 1987 I decided that it was time to buy my first basset hound. I always wanted one after seeing a basset hound on the show Columbo with Peter Falk many years before. When I saw that ad posted on the bulletin board in the lunch room at work I called immediately. Mark had a small number of pups to choose from.

Why did I pick Harry?  He was off by himself in the square pen padded with blankets on one half and newspapers on the other half. He didn't need his littermates, he was independent, a free thinker. Soon I would find out what that meant.  Ha Ha

He was a loyal companion and very adaptable with change. To him change just brought him a new adventure At the time I was living a few miles from Coupeville WA ... in the area of Ft. Ebey SP. Little did I know that he was a "wanderer". I can honestly say there was not a person he met that didn't like him. Many wanted him. Everybody loved Harry.

A few years later we took a break from Whidbey Island moving to Boise Idaho, we were not there too long at all. The boss of a friend called me offering me a job in Keystone Colorado, salary and a ski pass. Who could pass up a chance to live near 6 ski areas during ski season? Before Harry even got to know his Boise neighbors we were loading the U-Haul truck, putting the car on a trailer and heading to Dillon Colorado. He loved riding in any car or truck, even if I wasn't the driver or passenger. He'd go for a ride with anyone.

It didn't take to long for him to figure out if he wanted to stay warm in that small cabin south of Breckenridge Colorado, that wood stove would be his best friend. Only one time did he make a mistake of a lifetime.

While sleeping he rolled over on his back from one side to the other catching his rear paw under that metal lip on the front of the wood stove. Hotter than hell would be an understatement. Needless to say the sound from Harry scared the crap out of me as I sprinted his direction, with a sound I had never heard from any breed of dog.

He also figured out that the warm waterbed (remember those? Ha Ha) that  I used to sleep was THE best play to sleep. He was notorious for crawling up on the bed, lowering his nose under the down blanket and moving into his sleeping position.

While in Colorado he proved that people were not the only living creatures that had big dreams. I'll let this photo explain it better than I ever could.

By the end of ski season that included too many close calls with Harry falling through the high levels of snow on our daily walks plus hit by a porcupine only once, we decided that Whidbey Island was where we wanted to live and moved back to Oak Harbor Washington.


We found a rental that we could not pass up. It was a little small but not bad for me and two basset hounds. At the end of Jones Rd. was a fantastic view and Hope Island so close you could almost touch it. We lived in the bottom unit. The owners lived in their house on top, spending their winters in California. We basically had the whole place to ourselves.

Harry thought the view from the couch wasn't bad either.

By this time he had a running mate but Barney was a little more in control. A homebody if you will. He didn't wander nor did he follow when Harry would take off to who knows where. Barney was the one that would come and get me with that look "Harry's gone."

While I was at work my landlord that lived in the house above us, told me Barney and Harry were very quiet dogs that didn't do much more than this all day long. Harry thought if he was going to explore late at night without telling me, then he needed his rest.

Harry was the type of basset hound that might wander off for long periods of time but he would always come back on his own, no matter how long or how many miles he covered. There were many times I'd let him out late at night for that last pee trip and he would leave. I couldn't find him either on foot nor in a car. He was gone !!!  A regular occurrence.

Two examples.

I get a call about 2am on night letting me know that Harry was at his house, someone that I did not know. He found my phone number on the dog tag Harry wore. The interesting thing was, this guy was calling from three miles away!!! He laughed at the end of the call.

"My wife and I don't have a dog but we heard a dog barking non-stop and it sounded like it was coming from our patio. So as I pulled the patio curtain back and here is Harry (he didn't know his name). I opened the door and without hesitation Harry walked in like he lived here, walked over close the wood stove, laid down and went to sleep."

Yes ... true story.

The second example is a little more local and didn't take more than an hour. He would always go to the door to go outside and his last trip was usually around 11pm. I started noticing that every time he would come back that winter he smelled like smoke. Like campfire smoke or even a fireplace smoke ... could it be??? Surely not.

That spring there was a construction crew on the property doing some work. As Harry, Barney and I walked out for our early Saturday morning walk on the Ala Spit a few hundred feet away, this young guy goes "Hey, there's Harry." We exchanged stories, he knew he was my dog but Harry felt like his .... those winter nights that Harry would come back smelling like smoke ???

Well he would end up down Jones Rd a little ways at this guys house, go on the deck to their patio door, bark non-stop until they let him inside then he would take a short nap by their fireplace. When he was ready he would walk over to their patio door, they would let him out and he would return home a little after 1am.

He still like spending time looking out over the water. Luckily he did not figure out the crab pots were within a 100', he liked fresh seafood, bones and all in some cases. Salmon especially.

I had one those times where I will make an off the wall decision like I have spoke about recently. Well don't ask me why but for some strange, very strange reason I decide I did not want to rent anymore, wanted to live closer to town and ended up buying a condo in the middle of Oak Harbor Washington. Basset Hounds and all.  (terrible decision)

He decided the best place to sleep was not in the bedroom on a pile of Mexican blankets that he loved but behind the row of books, under the tv in the living room.

In December 1994 we moved to Bloomington Indiana. Soon after Harry had lined up a modeling job through a neighbor. Fine Light Advertising paid him beer money for a photo session in town. He loved every minute under the bright lights with the sounds of cameras clicking nonstop for that perfect picture. People pampered him all afternoon making sure his hair and collar looked just right.

Harry learned that type of work fast. He wasn't going to work for peanuts, he had demands. He wanted a break every hour so he could go outside and pee, or walk around the backyard while the camera crew were inside laughing so hard they couldn't stand up straight. They all loved Harry.

A couple of years later we moved to the house we reside in today. The field looks about the same. The yard looked a little rough compared to what it looks like today. You could not tell the borderline between the field and yard.

The yard and tall grass didn't bother Harry though, he had a whole new planet to roam. He was easy to find out there by the white tip of his wagging tail.

It's pictures like these where I can answer my own question?  "Is the field and yard eroding or has it always looked like that?" Actually it has not changed much in 20 years and my house is not being swallowed up by moving land, like I imagine sometimes. That's an old Prime Star satellite dish you see there. They were bought out soon after I moved by some company in 1999 by the name of DirecTv.

Of course living in the country expanded Harry's explorations tenfold. I cannot tell you everywhere he went and I'd have to go rescue him. With my location I wanted it all to stop with the highway so close to us. Thankfully in the years he lived here he never had any close close calls getting hit by a car. He would cross that highway at all hours of the day or night if he was in the wandering mode.

I guess the one highlight of his roaming ... this time he found something he could do when it was hot in the summer. He would head north in the field, walk behind my neighbor's house where Sadie and Stella use to roam, then over to the neighbor north of them. He preferred to lay on the top step of their swimming pool since he found out that laying down on the second step the water was too deep for him to sleep under the sun.

The first time the neighbor called me, she was laughing so hard she could barely tell me that Harry was at their house in case I was looking for him.

His official AKC Name on his "papers" was Harry Gonso of Indiana … the starting QB of the 1967 IU team that went to the only Rose Bowl in school's history, January 1968. I sat in front of the real Harry Gonso at an IU basketball game once but didn't have the heart to tell him there was a nationwide famous basset hound named after him.

He liked all dogs big or small and all people, especially if they were willing to let him have a couple of sips of their beer. Healthy minerals you know.

My Return To TV News

Isn't technology great? We can see beheadings, homeless war refugees, citizens versus cops, fraternity lunch mobs, and government shut downs in hi-def."

I guess I will start this morning by passing out a couple of warnings. This post could get political and I'm in a grumpy mood at 5:19am. It could also be a long post, maybe not. I'll include only two photos in this early morning rant just to keep within the design pattern of my blog's front page.

So you wanted transparency ... you'll see transparency this morning from the depths of an overactive brain. Don't blame me.

I am not totally sure I am grumpy. Probably am. I got up AGAIN before 5am, did the same routine as always, dogs out coffee on. They eat, I read the internet, check email etc. They go back to sleep in the dark bedroom while I walk back in my dimly lit kitchen (on purpose) to pour a cup of coffee. As I am about the grab the pot handle I barely notice that the coffee level is not quite to my mark "6", which gives me two twelve ounce cups of coffee.

I feel my pulse rise ... maybe my pulse has a news hangover.

Instead of turning on the regular kitchen lights that are bright I grab my small camping flashlight on the shelf, you know the one, the one I use to track Stella in the dark when she is outside to take her last pee break of the day.

There is nothing like walking the dark backyard late at night or early morning after midnight, sometimes in the field, in freezing weather wearing a down jacket, shorts (yes) and cheap large Chinese rubber sandals, telling Stella "HURRY UP!!! or Where in the F*** are you????).

So I lean over so I can slide that light from the flashlight between the bottom of the bucket that holds the the coffee grounds and the top of my coffee pot only to see a stream of coffee so small it might take all day to make coffee. This does not make me happy. That stream of coffee, so small, also reminds me I may or may not have a prostate problem.

So we have the slow making coffee and a news hangover after trying to follow one of my "campaign" promises a few days ago. Remember? I told you that I might make a comment or two about what's going on in the news. Since I had not tuned into any kind of news besides my sports addiction since October 28, this was a major step for me. Don't they say the first step of recovery is admit you have a problem.

I do ... a big problem with the news and everything else going on including sports.

It's like telling a recovered heroin junkie "here take some of this". It didn't take an hour? 30 minutes? Who knows because I possibly had blacked out from anger. I had given into the popular majority and made a promise I wasn't sure I wanted to keep but here I was.

I stood in shock as I was looking at my 55" tv screen with CNN, FoxNews, MSNBC, CNBC and maybe others. Geeeezzzzuuuuuussssss H. Christ !!!!!!

What am I doing?

I won't go into a lot of detail because you have all seen it, heard it or read it. The news in general. There is so much stuff to pick, choose to comment on and literally all of it in my eyes is total bullshit. It amazes me how so many intelligent people can be so f****** stupid.

All I got from my short time viewing the news was SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN SPIN .... should I keep going? I felt myself getting a little lightheaded. Reminding me of my days of too much tequila, standing in the same spot of the living room with the stereo turned up to concert level sound with Metallica .... before passing out. Then at work the next day bright and cheery.

It's no better online. CNN, FoxNews, Breitbart, TheGuardian ... blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.

All that crap that infested my corrupted brain cells did one thing ... can you believe it????? ONE THING POSITIVE !!!!

After turning off the tv and telling Heidi who had witnessed everything from the couch, "NEVER again". I would have told Stella the same but she slept through all of it and has no time for stress in her life ... food and sleep is all she wants.

I sat at my kitchen table with my MacBook Air lid closed. Looking out my large kitchen window across the highway, at the harvested corn and soybean fields .... thinking if the crap they call news even affects my daily living experience? Am I hurt in anyway?

I think you can see here blogging about RVs at first, then the Hounds later, that it is a pretty simple easy lifestyle that the hounds and I live. The only stress here is when the toilet overflows with clear clean water because that damn rubber flap doesn't settle right in the tank after flushing the toilet.

Does all that news YOU made me watch and read, so I could comment on it, make one bit of difference to me?? Does it???

I did NOT get on my knees but I did thank my lucky stars for the life I have, my hounds and the good health I experience.

Yes, like John Mellencamp sang many years ago, "Small Town" ... that is where I am from although different from where I live now. My parents grew up here. My great aunt built the house I live in today .... back to the news. (Sometimes I have to grab my brain like a mother does to her child in the grocery store saying "get back here")

Before the 2016 Presidential election I never paid attention one iota about politics. In their own way there isn't one politician that isn't corrupt, in some way. All the way back to George Washington. Did you realize that George was the first president of many to have sex with a woman besides their wife in the White House??? Did you?

History will tell you that George being a short man, and small in physical structure, had sex in a White House closet. Yep ... do some history research. I've never googled it, I read about it in the fall of 1970 in Ballentine Hall at Indiana University sometime before noon during a history class I had signed up for. I heard it and I wasn't stoned either.

Now whether that closet was a walk-in closet was not stated.

Anyway ... back the USA Cesspool I call the news.  (Coffee is tasting great by the way)

I understand the desire for people from the south of us willing to die, give up their children and leave their families to cross borders from Texas to California. I really do. It's just not the reasons for economic, gangs, violent neighborhoods in Central America ... it's lack of money, lack of jobs, lack of water to grow crops for food, it's lack of HOPE ... on and on. It's happening all over the world, not just in America.

I understand all of that. How terrible that is for anyone with a family, even single?

So why don't they stop and settle in beautiful Mexico? I mean people from Canada, and the USA drive across their borders every fall to spend the winter in beautiful country from the beaches to the mountains. Why don't they settle there?

Why not settle down in a country that speaks the same language and an easier way to adapt to the country's society, plus closer to their family in Central America or even in Mexico??? Am I confused??? Or will you call me a racist like people get called on Twitter? My old friends from the past that were black, brown and oriental would laugh out loud at that accusation.

To shut off this immigration commentary so I can move to other stuff, here is what bothers me about illegal immigration.

Let just say that the news is not fake. Let's just say.

From what I have read in the past on online news articles before October 28th ... illegal immigrants from Mexico are taught where to apply and how to fill out the paperwork for financial assistance, food assistance, and housing once they cross our border. Our country is 20 TRILLION DOLLARS IN DEBT !! so stop whining about the national debt.

An article I read less than 6 months ago in the LA Times reported that some of these illegal immigrants that do not work, don't want to work and don't have to work because they are pulling in approximately $3,500 per month in welfare payments and that does not include $500-$800 per month in f****** food stamps. Even quoted participants laughed and bragged how easy it was to get money here ... then send it back where it was needed ... to their families south of the border.

What about medical insurance? They don't have any and don't need any ... the good old USA government, that no one likes, will take care of them.

So I answered my question why don't they just don't stop in beautiful Mexico and I am serious when I say "beautiful Mexico" ... the land is beautiful and the families and people are the kindest. I'll blog later about my days of going to Baja every two weeks and later becoming friends with a few families I met at the horse racing book in downtown Tijuana. (1979) In fact for a year I went to Tijuana every day from Carlsbad CA to the "foreign book" on Avenida Revolucion to bet horse races in the USA while working for a horse racing handicapper. (Great funny job before computers)

They don't want to stop in Mexico because that isn't where they get free money, to get housing, and to eat. Plus many already have family in the USA so I can understand they have other motives.

I'm a racist?

I wouldn't say that. I mean had a "white trailer trash" living next to me for 5-6 years that knew how to play the system and played it like a professional. His live-in 'wife' using her maiden name, made above average salary working. How else can you get disability payments every month with a bad back declaration and then spend all day and night working on cars that you drag race. Anyone want to help changing that engine, it's heavy? Not needed, he did it bad back and all by himself. "Honey did the disability check come in yet?"

So yes, you don't have to be an illegal immigrant to work the system for free money.

I forget the number I saw the other day for the decrease in Food Stamp precipitants since Trump took office .... 3 million?? 300 thousand??? That's what happens when short term memory is on the blink, you can't remember a simple number 48 hours ago.

Good for him though, now if they would just work on that disability payment plan problem. I hate all cheating ranging from taxes, food stamps and disability payments and it doesn't matter what color of skin they have.

So now what?  Let see .... hmmmm

Oh, I just caught this morning's headlines or the sub links on CNN news ... Californian wants to tax 'texting' to raise money so they can support all their new illegal citizens with iPhones and Samsung smart phones ... their choice. Does that mean they will will have to change all of the amnesty forms filled at the border with a little box  they need to check for Apple or Android phones??

I would say it but I can't say the word "fuck" too many times here.

You know that you can use that word 14 different ways in the English language? I'll not count the ways. I was hesitant in typing it but you wanted transparency on my blog ... you got it. Sometimes while watching ballgames on TV ... ALONE ... the referees think that word is their first name. Oh well, so what if I am a 'sick puppy' ... it's my dry sense of humor.

Even where I live in "BumF*** Egypt" ... otherwise known as Small Town USA, we have illegal immigrants living downtown. In fact in 1997 this house I live in may have had a few. My dad owned the house then and rented it out to the owners of the new, at that time, Mexican restaurant.

Of course the owners were not renting it for their families but what looked like their whole kitchen staff, based on the repairs and painting I did before moving in my furniture and three hounds, Harry, Maggie and Maxwell.

They still work in that same restaurant under different ownership. I never read about crime from them ... oh a couple of drunk divers that have killed innocent citizens in this county turned out to be here illegally but that could happen to "white trailer trash" or in a high powered lawyer in Indianapolis just as well ... so it's just not an illegal immigrant thing ... it's a drunk driving thing.

That is pretty much my feelings on illegal immigration. I like legal immigration, not illegals who feel they are entitled to free support from the rich USA who just happens to be 20 f****** TRILLION DOLLARS IN DEBT. Who are now saying as of yesterday, the USA Government owes them money at the border ... Ha, what a joke.

Feel free to leave your honest thoughts in the comment section. I'll read them all. I WILL NOT ARGUE and I WILL respect your opinion. Besides, I am sure I can learn something on this issue from other people. I guess subconsciously I am looking for more knowledge about this immigration issue.

You may have done some early morning math this morning ... let see he is 66 years old, in 2016 he would have been 64 minus the 21 years it took to vote LEGALLY .... why was he not interested in what went on in politics for 43 years and then all of the sudden gets interested, inflamed during the campaigns, angry on Facebook angry on Twitter, and shouting at long time friends over the phone ???

Two words and I could add one more like "f*******" before the two words here:

Hillary Clinton

I don't give a shit if her opponent in November 2016 was always wearing red, carried a pitchfork and the MEDIA called him/her "the devil" .... I WOULD HAVE voted for him or her.

That's all I'll say this morning about politics .... otherwise you would be looking at an hour or more reading time, 100,000,000 words, and possibly news that Steve had some cardiac problems while writing on his blog. He was found leaning back in his desk chair with his mouth wide open in a screaming position clutching his chest.

Now that would have been something you could call fake news.

I will say I am a little familiar with President Donald Trump. No, I've never met him nor do I want to. He has his own mental issues, don't we all? I never watched his TV show and I didn't need to read much about him during the campaigns either.

So how am I familiar with him?

From 1995 - 1997 I worked for a small family owned business ran by two brothers. Mysteriously they had pulled up stakes in Chicago and moved to Bloomington Indiana of all places. IU grads?? No. Family around??? No. Sports fans???? No. Every question I asked due to my background check on them was answered with "No". They seemed to have followed "The Donald's" plan of tying things up in court with lawsuits if they didn't agree or didn't pay the bills. They later declared the company was bankrupt, took their money and ran.

Kevin must have read the book that Trump wrote because I swear to god on a stack of bibles a mile high or space station high ... Kevin was a spittin' image of Donald J. Trump in his attitude. I never jumped through so many hoops they called a job. There were days I loved working for him and their days where I coulda ... shouda .. uhhhh, we won't go there. That would lead us to the fight on gun control and how did someone so demented mentally get a gun.

You get the picture though don't you?

You know ... hounds and sports are so much easier and nicer to write about.

After a few days in the news muck or quicksand plus I can see nothing has changed since October 28th, my last viewership. It WON'T change either. Personally I don' think it will ever change. Society has fallen off the cliff and hasn't hit bottom yet. I cannot fathom what the next century will look like or lets say from the years 2030 onward, who knows from now on?

There are days I hope I am not around to live it.

I was told a few months ago by a friend whom I made the mistake of sending him a draft of the first post for my brand new blog I had set up. He didn't reply immediately because he doesn't live on the internet like I do because he has a family and a life.

He did say this though after reading it:  "Don't do it. What I read here could put you behind bars" ... I immediately thought of all the bars I had attended during college, California, Breckenridge CO, Hussongs in Ensenada, even Whidbey Island.

I told the hounds when I read his text ... "Stella, I don't think he is talking about drinking bars". She raised her head from the floor, acknowledged I had spoken to her ... then went back to sleep.

Again ... you've heard it before from me ... toward the end of a long post ....

I've lost my train of thought again !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Why?

Where are those bullet points icon under this new Wordpress system? I want to list a few news highlights that have caught my attention before my second cup of coffee? I'll do them manually I guess.

• Over 95% DACA applications, renewals for illegal aliens approved by Trump. (Really?????) Who woulda thunk it?
• Google CEO Sundar Pichai told "5 Whoppers" to Congress
• Huawei is a "Front Group' for the Chinese Communist Govt.
• China is 'building communism' in America with Technology, Finance
• How God led rock superstar from demons and $23 million
• ObamaCare continues to fail

As you can see I FOUND the icon to add bulleted comments.

Well it's a small sample but geeeeezzzzzuuuussss, what's fake and what isn't? Really how can you tell? Which news agency tells the truth? Who can I depend on as I wade back through shit that is knee deep and the hip waders I bought at Cabela's don't work as good as they were advertised?

There are a few people I will mention that I cannot talk about, now ... possibly never.

• Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
• Robert Mueller
• Maxine Waters
• Purdue University
• F****** Hillary Clinton

I must admit that after typing only 2,974 words I'm exhausted.

I've lost my train of thought. Who knows maybe this will be more than enough transparency that the general public loves.

Just remember I am not an expert in any of this crap. My expertise is in basset hounds, bloodhounds, craps tables, a little computer, and sports.

I kept my promise to you about writing more open and as one comment said ... transparent.

If I continue to watch the news --- WHERE I REALLY DON'T WANT TO ---- I will have to pull my stamp out of the box in my closet labeled "Work Info"

 No worries .... it's all good in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.