Search Results for: fluorescent

They’re Coming For Your Cars, And Your Owls . . .

It seems that the government now wants to install speed limiters on all new cars.

National Transportation Safety Board Calls For Speed-Limiting Tech in Cars

Intelligent speed assistance technology, or ISA, uses a car’s GPS location compared with a database of posted speed limits and its onboard cameras to help ensure safe and legal speeds.

My Garmin GPS has a speed limit display on the screen from this database, and it’s often inaccurate, both showing a speed limit both above and before the actual limit shown on the street signs. So if you’re stopped for speeding, will the cop believe you when you tell him your car said it was OK?

Active systems include mechanisms that make it more difficult, but not impossible, to increase the speed of a vehicle above the posted speed limit and those that electronically limit the speed of the vehicle to fully prevent drivers from exceeding the speed limit.

And what about the speed differential between old cars with no limiter and new cars with one. Can you imagine how the owner of a brand-new Corvette feels tooling along at 65mph, while all the old cars are bombing past him at 80+ mph, like they do every day on I-45?

As the NTSB notes, some 12,330 people died in speeding-related crashes in 2021 alone, roughly a third of all traffic deaths in the U.S.

So maybe it might be worthwhile to see what causes the other 2/3 of the traffic deaths.

But wait, there’s more!

If you can’t speed limit older cars, just take them away from the owners and junk them.

The EU Wants to SEIZE Your Old Car to Meet Climate Goals

Coming soon to the US?

The EU has something called End-of-life vehicles directive, and they are looking to expand this to become so draconian that it reminds of something that would have happened in the Communist Soviet Union.

A new set of criteria will be established that will decide whether you will be allowed to keep your car. If your car does not meet the criteria, the EU will seize your car and scrap it.

One of the criteria is that if your car has missed it’s regular EU checkup for two years, then it is considered to be “waste” and they will scrap it.

If the cost of repairing your car exceeds the value of your car, then the EU will seize it and scrap it for you. Very nice of them…

There is an exception however for cars that are more than 30 years old. But they have to be original. Meaning that if you put a different engine in it than original and your car hasn’t been through an EU control check within the last two years, then they will scrap it!

Meaning that many older cars will be considered “waste” by the EU and they will SEIZE your car and scrap it for you – All under the excuse of recycling and meeting climate goals.

Again, coming soon to the US?

And now they want to kill owls to save owls.

U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service Killing One Type Of Owl To Save Another In Northern California

Killing one species to save another sounds like a drastic solution, but that’s exactly what the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is doing in California to protect the Spotted Owl from a predator that happens to be its distant cousin, the Barred Owl.

On the Hoopa Indian Reservation near the Oregon border, it’s owl country, but not the kind Mark Higley wants to see.

The tribe’s resident biologist is tracking an invasive species from the east called the barred owl. “Up to the ridge line we have been getting barred owl responses,” he said.

At first the birds were a novelty, but now they’re a huge problem because they are taking over the nesting territory of the native spotted owl, a threatened species. Spotted owl numbers have dropped as much as 80-percent in just the last 20 years.

It’s all part of an experiment recently approved by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The plan is to kill 3,600 barred owls over the next four years in California, Oregon and Washington.

Mark admits it’s not easy. “Oh its awful, I mean I am a biologist, the barred owl is a wonderful species, it’s a spectacular bird. The only reason I am doing this is that I feel it’s an invasive species,” he said.

So this fall he plans to be on the front lines again, killing one bird to save another.

So how spotted owls are going to be killed by accident, mistaken for barred owls up the trees.

Just remember –

It’s not nice to mess with Mother Nature.

Some animals are more equal than others.

“We had to kill the owls to save them”


Thought For The Day:

“No positive action occurs without an equal and opposite negative one.”
Newton’s little-known Law of Karma

And Now On To Today’s Retro-Blogs.™


January 8, 2011

Trojans and Tanks . . .

Today got off to a nice slow start for a change. I made coffee and we just sat around and enjoyed each other’s company, and life itself.

Our daughter Brandi called a little after 10:30 to let us know that Jan didn’t need to come and Landon-sit this afternoon. Bummer! But we’ll probably get together one way or the other tomorrow.

I left the rig about 12:45 headed over to Pearland to visit a client’s home and work on a couple of problems he’s having.

I got him straightened out on one thing but ended up bringing his wife’s computer home with me, since I wasn’t able to get it de-virifyed before I had to leave. It has a ‘susp_irp_mj_create’ trojan that I haven’t run into before so I need to do a little research.

I got back to the rig about 5pm after stopping at the Wendy’s in Dickinson for a supper of Spicy Chicken Sandwiches and Natural-Cut Fries. Hmm, hmm, good.

After that, I went out and dumped the waste tanks since Jan was worried that she wouldn’t have room to do another wash load unless I did. I had closed off the grey tank a couple of days ago because the black tank was getting full and I wanted to have plenty of flush water available

I talked to our son Chris a little after 6pm to set up everyone’s meeting for lunch tomorrow, at Texas Tea Room again. We really like this place.

Then I made myself some coffee (Jan doesn’t usually like coffee at night) and we watched some “Two and a Half Men” reruns before it was time for “Primeval” on BBCA, one of our favorite shows. I mean time travel, dinosaurs, intrigue…what more could you ask for?

Of course while we were watching TV I was also working on the computer I brought home. It took a couple of hours (mostly waiting for the virus programs to scan) but I finally got rid of that trojan (and several more). I’ve rescanned the machine 3 or 4 times with different programs and it keeps coming up clean, so I guess it’s fixed.


January 8, 2012

Bulbs and Buffets . . .

After our busy week, today was a take-it-easy, do-nothing day.

We did get up a little early to head out about 9:30 a few miles up TX146 to La Brisa for their great weekend breakfast buffet. They really make a mean omelet.

Then after a quick stop at Wal-Mart for a few things, including 4 F15T8 fluorescent bulbs to replace the ones in the kitchen, we were home for the day.

Getting home, I installed the 4 bulbs. These things have gotten expensive. Seems like the last time I bought some several years ago, they were around $4 a piece. Today they were $8.47 each.

$34 for light bulbs. Ouch.

Later, after Jan fell asleep on the sofa reading, I decided a nap sounded like a nice idea so I retired to the bedroom for a very pleasant two hours.

About 5pm Jan heated up our leftover King Food Chinese from the other night. Really good, as usual.

At 7pm we watched our friend Tony Booth on a Hee Haw rerun from 1973. Tony had a number of big hits in the 70’s, including “The Key’s in the Mailbox”, “Lonesome 7-7203”, and “Cinderella”, and he and his band won 4 ACM (Academy of Country Music) awards during that time period, including “Most Promising Male Vocalist” in 1971.

That was then.

Tony Booth 1973

This is now.

Tony Booth

Jan says he’s “aged very nicely”, and then just smiles. I’m not sure how to take that.

I’m gonna have to keep a closer eye on that girl.

We see Tony quite often at the Alvin Opry, when he’s not touring around the country with his band.

I know tomorrow will be busy. I’m just not sure with what yet.

I’ll let you know.


January 8, 2013

And The Rains Came . . .

or BUMMER!

The rain really hit about 6am this morning and it quickly became obvious that my caulking job yesterday didn’t fix the problem. It might have reduced it some but it’s hard to really tell.

I guess I’ll have to actually get up on the roof and see if it’s really leaking in up higher and running down under the roof. But I would think that I would see some indication of that inside the rig.

One thing that may complicate things is that our big awning is mounted along there and forms a trough that runs right below the roof seam. So the water may be backing up somewhere along there.

But it’s all got to wait until the rains pass on.

Yesterday, before the rains came, we had a large attendance at Jan’s feeders.

The many wild ducks, in this case male and female Mallards are new this year. Also new, although they don’t come to the feeder, are the White Ibis, Ibises, Ibi, whatever.

Anyway, there’s a lot of them and you can see them in the background in this photo.

Ducks and Ibisies

Here’s a closeup of one of the male Mallard ducks.

Green Headed Duck

Ibises

Ibis 1

While Jan got her veggie soup started I headed out for a few errands.

My first stop was at one client’s to do some work for another. I needed to make 36 copies of a catalog DVD, and one of my other clients has a 1 to 11 duplicator that looks like this.

Produplicator

You put in your master DVD in the top drive, put in up to 11 blanks, push the Start button, and off it goes. If you need more than 11 copies, you can put in the master, press the Load button, and it copies the master into RAM. Then you can place a blank disc in the top drive and make 12 copies at a time, as many as you need.

Then it was on to the next client to deliver his DVD’s. Done.

Finally heading home about 4pm, I stopped off at the feed store to pick up the deer corn which had come in.

Getting home, I opened the rig door to the wonderful smell of Jan’s delicious soup. YUMMM!


January 8, 2014

‘Raylan’ is Back . . .

One of our favorite shows is “Justified” on FX, and last night was the beginning of the 5th season. Raylan Givens, a Deputy US Marshall out of Eastern Kentucky, is a character created by famed writer Elmore Leonard, and brought to life by actor Timothy Olyphant. You’re never sure what will happen next,  but you can be sure the body count will be high,

With all the cold weather around the country, especially in areas that aren’t used to the low temps, I remember the time we spent in Fairbanks, AK in 2008 and how people reacted differently to the temps.

2008 was a cold summer in Fairbanks. We had 1 day in the 80’s – 81 on the 4th of July, 12 days in the 70’s, and the rest in the 50 and 60’s. When the temps were in the 50’s, you would have some people in parkas, and some people in shorts and T-shirts. Our granddaughter Piper who visited us in July couldn’t understand why she was bundled up in a heavy coat, and people were jet-skiing on the Chena River in their bathing suits.

I told her it’s all what you’re used to. This was summer to the Alaskans and they weren’t going to miss out. Jan was an Air Force brat living in both Fairbanks and Anchorage. She said in school that they used to play outside until it got cooler than 20 below zero. It’s all what you’re used to.

As a follow-up on that idea, here’s a chart to compare people’s reaction to low temps around the country.

60° F: Arizonans shiver uncontrollably;
People in Buffalo, NY are still sunbathing.

50° F: Californians try to turn on the heat;
People in Buffalo plant gardens.

40° F: Californian’s Italian sports cars won’t start;
People in Buffalo drive with the windows down.

32° F: Distilled water freezes;
Lake Erie water gets thicker.

20° F: Floridians don coats, thermal underwear, gloves and wool hats;
People in Buffalo throw on a light jacket.

15° F: People in Buffalo have the last cookout before it gets cold.

0° F: All the people in Phoenix die.
Buffalonians close the windows.

10° below: Californians fly away to Mexico .
zero             The Girl Scouts in Buffalo are selling cookies door to door.

25° below: Hollywood disintegrates;
zero            People in Buffalo get out their winter coats.

40° below: Washington, DC runs out of hot air;
zero            People in Buffalo let the dogs sleep indoors.

100° below: Santa Claus abandons the North Pole.
zero              Buffalonians get frustrated because they can’t start the car.

460° below: All atomic motion stops (absolute zero);
zero               People in Buffalo start saying, “Cold enough for ya?”

500° below: Hell freezes over.
zero               The Bills win the Super Bowl.


January 8, 2015

Gone, Gone, Gone . . .

Well, it made it down to 25 degrees this morning, and didn’t get back above freezing until almost 11am. Since this was expected, I didn’t even hook up water when we got here yesterday. But since it’s supposed to stay in the mid-30’s at night for the next week or so, I did connect us up this afternoon

I’ve got a lot of stuff I want to do outside around the rig, but the weather is either cold or rainy, or cold AND rainy, so that’s kind of on hold. I want to get up on the roof again and get the rest of the drilling mud off, now that I know that vinegar will cut it.

And I also want to try out the new toy that I bought myself for Christmas. When we stayed with Chris and Charles Yust for a few days on their lot at the Livingston Escapees Park, I borrowed Charles’ pressure washer trying to get drill mud off. And although it didn’t help with that, I really liked the unit for washing and waxing the rig. So I bought me one.

Karcher Pressure Washer2

It’s a Karcher K2.360, 1600 psi, with a built-in detergent tank and a lot of accessories. And even better it was really marked down at Wal-Mart right before Christmas

One of the other things I want to do outside is repair the AC in our truck, now that I know what’s wrong with it. It’s not like we need it right now, but with Texas weather you never can tell. I’ve seen it in the 20’s one day and in the 80’s a few days later.

Last up, thanks to our son Chris, and all his hard work, we are finally storeroomless, or the first time in 20 years. As I mentioned before, we rented a 10’ x 25’ storeroom in August of 1994 to store household furniture for a few months while we remodeled the house. And it just never went away, because it was just too convenient to stick stuff out of the way there.

But finally it’s gone,  gone, gone.

Thanks again, Chis.


January 8, 2016

A Walk in Two Parts . . .

Jan and I headed out for our walk about 11:30, but after the top loop, about 3/4 of a mile, Jan wanted to stop for a while. Her back was bothering her from all her cleaning yesterday, so we stopped and sat outside with our coffee and breakfast bread for about 30 minutes. Then we did the bottom loop for an additional 1/2 mile for our usual total of about 1.25 miles.

So I guess tomorrow or Sunday we’ll make the jump to 1.5 miles

Later in the afternoon I took a look at my door problem. While we were on the gate, one of the wind gusts caught the door and slammed it back. After that it was much more difficult to close and lock the door.

At the time I figured that the main door hinges had been torqued or bent, but when I really got into it, I discovered that the real problem was with the screen door and its hinges, and not the main door.

When I got a closer look, I found that the top hinge was cracked and this was throwing the door out of whack.

Cracked Screen Door Hinge_thumb[2]

So it looks like I’ll need to order new hinges for the screen door, since I don’t think this one can be repaired. Even though only the top one appears to be cracked, I’ll replace them both so they’ll match.

Shouldn’t be too difficult to remove the door and replace the hinges, but like a car door, it may take a little fiddling to get it aligned.

A little before 4pm, Jan and I headed up to Ellinger to meet up with a bunch of RV’ers for the Friday night BBQ Buffet. This place is a must-eat at least once during every stay here at Colorado River Thousand Trails. And this time we had 14 RV’ers, including a newbie couple that just bought their camper a week or so ago.

Peter's BBQ Dinner Group_thumb[1]

Starting at the back left, it’s Roy and Nancy (didn’t get their last name) Dennis and Rita Spriggs , Janice and Dave Evans, Jim & Claudia Horak, Rick & Janice Binns, my Jan, and Ed and Debi Hurlburt.

As usual when you get a bunch of RV’ers together, we did about as much talking as we did eating.  Well, maybe almost as much. Everyone talks about where they’ve been, what they’ve done, and where they’re going next. We had a great time with these old and new friends, and are looking forward to doing it again.

Getting back home, Jan and I got back into binge-watching our DVR’d TV shows, all from the time while we were on the gate. We only lack a couple of episodes of Once Upon  A Time, and then next will probably be Marvel: Agents of Shield.

Tomorrow’s up in the air, but will hopefully include celebrating our winning the $800+ Million PowerBall Lottery.


January 8, 2017

21°

Well, last night was even colder than the night before. The forecast was for 25° but here at the rig it got down to 21°

In fact when I went out to hook us back up to shore water this afternoon, I still had a couple of big chunks of ice from where the rig end of the hose had drained.

Ice in Water Bay

But by Tuesday the high’s supposed to by 81°. A 60 degree swing in two days, so just a typical Texas winter.

When we left for lunch about 1pm we noticed that our neighbors on the left of us were gone. They were here last night so I guess they left sometime this morning. Certainly were quiet about it, anyway.

Don’t know if they moved on, or got a gate somewhere else. The first part of December we were offered a 3 week gate in West, Texas paying $160 a day with $100 in travel money.

Only problem was that it was a 24/7 gate without a shack. Since we had dropped off all of our outside stuff, canopy, tarps, etc. at Brandi’s at Thanksgiving, so we’re really not set up for a gate like that anymore. But if it had had a shack we might have been tempted.

Since Sunday is Barth’s Turkey & Dressing/Fried Chicken Day, that was lunch for today.

Barth's Turkey & Dressing 3

Then it was on down to the HEB for gas and a car wash. But the car wash was still shut down after last night’s freeze so we’ll try again another day, probably tomorrow.

We had planned to head down to Beeville this afternoon for the 4pm showing of Passengers, but the tryptophan intervened and naps ensued. So maybe tomorrow.

In fact we’ve got Amazon orders coming in tomorrow, and we need to make a Wal-Mart run so we may lump it all together with the trip to Beeville for the movie and then dinner.

When we were at Wal-Mart a few days ago we picked up a new bed/scratching pad for Karma.

Petstages Perch

We had the original one since the Mister days, so it lasted 3 or 4 years. But it finally broke in two, cracked at the joint. It’s made from corrugated cardboard and comes with a packet of catnip to sprinkle in the little pockets.

Karma really likes it and spends a lot of time either scratching on it or just lying on it.


January 8, 2018

Pet Parade . . .

After being out all last week due to Jan’s illness it was actually good to be back at work today.

Of course I had a lot of stuff to catch up on, but the big problem was that right after I got in we found that the webserver email system had crashed completely. This means that no one gets a confirmation email for their order. Nor can we send out any emails on the company account.

I did finally get it limping back to life, but this problem has just reinforced my determination to get the Zen Cart shopping cart off this server and up on Godaddy. That way I can also set up the email there too and not have to worry about all this again.

It didn’t help things that workers were in and out of my office replacing the sheetrock ceiling that was damaged during Harvey, either.

Over the years we’ve come across a lot of RV’ers who travel with unusual pats – Ferrets, Nubian Pygmy Goats, Monkeys, Iguanas, large tortoises, a pot-belly pig, parrots and cockatoos, and even six large St. Bernard show dogs in a small camper. Watching them all come out was like watching a clown car.

And the Full-Time RV-traveling nurse I met at the hospital fits right into this. She and her husband travel with TWO ferrets and a Sugar Glider.

Sugar Glider 1

A Sugar Glider, like a flying squirrel, can glide from one side of the room (or coach) to the other.

Sugar Glider 2

But while flying squirrels are rodents, sugar gliders are actually marsupials like a kangaroo.

When I was a kid I had a pet flying squirrel that I raised from a baby. it was perfectly tame, and whenever I would walk out on the large screen-in porch where he usually stayed, he would swoop down and land on my shoulder waiting for a peanut or a piece of carrot. I could even take him outside and he never tried to get away. He would just ride around in my shirt pocket with his head poking up looking around.
I had him for 5 or 6 years until I gave him to a friend when we moved to South America.

And what was the name of my pet flying squirrel, you might ask?

Well, Rocky, of course.


January 8, 2020

Still Not Impressed . . .

We made another run at making chicken drumettes in our new Ninja Foodie Grill, and they were just as delicious as before. We really like this unit, and going to be trying some new recipes, including doing entire meals in the tray.

As I mentioned Jan had kept her old toaster oven in case she didn’t like the Ninja, or didn’t think that it would replace the oven, but I think she’s about decided it can go.

Once again, I’m not impressed.

Jan was prescribed an ointment by her dermatologist, so I thought I’d again compare GoodRx, SingleCare, and WalMart’s regular price, which in this case was $65.26.

SingleCare at WalMart was a little cheaper, at $60.97, with Kroger cheaper still, at $54.14.

Screenshot_SingleCare

But once again, GoodRx was the runaway winner, at $31.55 for WalMart, and $32.16 at Kroger.

Screenshot_GoodRx

As I said, I guess that’s what happens when you have to pay Martin Sheen and Charlie Sheen to be your spokesmen.

Earlier I had thought I might be able to crawl under the rig tomorrow and take another shot at fixing my oil leak by pulling the filter and adapter head and replacing the gasket once again. But it’s looking like a 50% chance of rain. so I’ll hold off for now. But the Saturday/Sunday timeframe looks good so far.

We’ll see.

As far as the rest of tomorrow, we plan on brunch at Snooze and then some shopping, and a trip by the storage room to drop off the Christmas decorations. And there’ll probably be a stop by the office as well.


January 8, 2022

Bigfoot Lives . . .

Jan and I had lunch at Spring Creek BBQ, our first visit in a while. Ribs and Brisket as delicious as always. Then it was next door to WalMart for a few things, though we were dodging the incoming thunderstorms during our in and out.

Amazon continues to amaze me, in both good and bad ways.

Since they opened their new warehouse right down the road in La Marque, more and more of our orders come the same day, between 5pm and 10pm, or the next morning, between 4am and 8am. But then sometimes they go off the rails.

On Thursday I ordered a new coffee bean grinder for us. We had a small one a few years back, but finally it burned out. We didn’t replace it since we were getting our beans ground at HEB where we bought them, specifically the Lola Savannah Texas Pecan with real pecan pieces.

HEB Lola Savannah Texas Pecan Coffee

But then early last year the pecan pieces disappeared from the HEB clear bags. At first I thought it might be CoVid-related, but when I called the company, which is here in Houston, they said that HEB had requested the removal.

Turns that HEB was worried about the pecans going through their grinders might affect people with nut allergies who use them afterward.

But the coffee was still good.

We did find that we could get the beans with the pecan pieces from Amazon, or directly from the company, but it was more expensive, and still needed to be ground. But recently our hand was forced.

It seems that HEB has stopped carrying Lola Savannah, or at least none of our 4 local HEB’s have it in stock any longer. So I decided to check Amazon again and found they had 2# bags for $27.50, only a couple of dollars a bag more than HEB’s price.

So Thursday I ordered us a new coffee grinder, a heavy-duty Cuisinart that will do half a pound of beans at a time,

Cuisinart Coffee Bean Grinder

Cuisinart DBM-8 Supreme Grind Automatic Burr Mill

and a 2# bag of the coffee, both of which were supposed to be here today.

But then yesterday the delivery date on the coffee changed from Saturday to January 15 – March 1. Not what I wanted to hear.

This morning our Cuisinart was delivered, as well as two packages for the people in Site #13. So what, the Prime driver couldn’t drive 6 more spaces? So when we left for lunch we dropped them off.

This is the 2nd time this has happened, though this is the first time with Amazon.

Then still wondering about the coffee delivery date change, I went back to the original order listing and found that if I ordered right now, it would now come between 5pm and 10pm tonight.

So I ordered it again, and then canceled the first order. And about 8pm tonight it showed up at our door. But I still don’t know what happened to the original order.

I also recently ordered some new Skechers shoes that were delivered yesterday, but will have to be returned since they’re too small.

The problem is that I inherited my father’s feet.

Nominally I wear an 8-3/4 EEEE. Yes, that’s 4 E’s in a row.

Or as my father described them, “Snowshoe Feet”. However they’re also really good for barefoot waterskiing too.

Obviously, shoes that actually fit are few and far between. I can sometimes find something close at the Red Wing shoe stores, though there’s not a lot of choice in styles, pretty much ‘ugly’ and ‘more ugly’.

So I usually make do with the widest width I can get, in something like a 9-1/2 to 10-1/2. Now the ones I just ordered were a 9-1/2 in an Extra Wide. But in this case a 9-1/2 wasn’t long enough and an Extra Wide wasn’t wide enough. So back they go to Amazon.

And Amazon made it really easy this time. I don’t even have to box them up. Just dropped them off at a UPS store, show them the QR code Amazon gave me, and I’m done.

Nice.

And I’ve got a new larger, wider pair on the way.


January 8, 2023

They’re Dead To Her . . .

First off, the Jeep’s engine has been repaired and is running fine.

But . . .   (Somehow you just knew there was a ‘But’ coming, didn’t you?)

there’s a wiring problem, probably a bad ground, that’s causing a Check Engine light due to wildly fluctuating oil pressure, going from 0 to 120 psi and then back to 0. However the actual pressure measured at the engine is fine, and pressure reading coming out of the oil pressure sensor is also fine, though they replaced the sensor just to be sure.

The problem seems to be between the sensor and the computer. Hopefully they’ll track it down soon. But our Old Faithful Dodge Dakota is still working fine.

Tomorrow I’ve got my possible Lumbar Fusion evaluation to see what’s what with my lower back, comparing my recent MRI/X-Rays with the ones taken a year ago. So I’ll know more tomorrow.

Lunch today was to assuage Jan’s hunger for Turkey & Dressing, but of course, not at Cracker Barrel.

As Jan says, they’re dead to her.

So today’s lunch was at Kelley’s Country Cooking, the one over in Alvin. Because unlike CB, Sunday is a Turkey & Dressing day at Kelley’s, just one of the Daily Specials.

Kelley's Alvin Menu

As planned, Jan got the Turkey & Cornbread Dressing, along with more Dressing, Mashed Potatoes, and Green Beans,

Kelley's Turkey and Dressing

while I got their enormous Country Fried Chicken Breast,

Kelley's Country Fried Chicken Bresst

along with Cornbread Dressing, Mashed Potatoes, and Green Beans.

Note that Chicken Breast actually hangs over the edge of the plate.

And everything was delicious.

Jan’s found her CB replacement.

Jumping back to yesterday . . .

We got to Brandi’s about 11 so I could do some updates on Landon’s Ender 3 Pro 3D printer. While for lunch Brandi set out a Charcuterie Board with some delicious tidbits.

Brandi Charcuterie Board

Of course, according to Facebook, Charcuterie is French for ‘I just touched all your food’. But I noticed that Brandi was wearing gloves as she laid it out.

And it was fantastic!

Then it was back to work.

First I installed a new glass print bed, which took only a couple of minutes since I just had to remove the old one and clip the new one into place.

Next up I replaced the filament stepper motor, the filament drive, and installed a knob to make it easier to load in new filament, giving me this.

Ender 3 Pro New Filament Stepper Motor

So first up was to print Jan a Flamingo.

It started out like this, laying out the base pattern.

Ender 3 Pro Flamingo Beginning Print

Which when done, and cut apart, looked like this.

Ender 3 Pro Flamingo End Print

And when snapped together, came out looking like this.

Ender 3 Pro Flamingo Final

And as you can see the neck is flexible.

We’ll probably do this again next Saturday since I’ve got some upgrades in mind.

 

 

 

Christmas Eve Eve . . .

We were on our way about 12:30 with our first stop for lunch at King Food up in Webster. Normally the whole family would be eating here on Christmas Eve, but we’ll all be up in Katy at Brandi’s tomorrow, so we had to get our KF fix in.

As I’ve mentioned here recently we’ve been eating here for over 45 years, and doing Christmas Eve dinners there for over 30 years.

So we couldn’t let Christmas pass without a visit, and we’ll probably try to all get together here in the next few weeks.

Next up was WalMart for some last-minute stuff, and it wasn’t as bad as you might expect for Christmas Eve Eve. It did help that they had 5, count’em 5, checkout lanes open instead of the normal 2.

Then after getting gas, and making a P.O. stop for the latest batch of Christmas Cards, it was back to the rig a little before 4.

Then post-nap, we started baking up the Cream Cheese Sausage Balls that Jan had prepared yesterday.

Normally we use the convection oven in our microwave, but this time we’re using our Ninja Foodi Flip Air Fryer

And it did a great job.

So we’ve got about 5 dozen for the get-together tomorrow. And they will go fast.

Tomorrow we’re heading out about 8:30 with a stop along the way at the Katy Trader Joe’s for a few things before we get to Brandi’s about 10am. Piper and Derek got there yesterday, and Chris and Linda are getting there tonight. So we’ll have the entire gang.

Can’t wait.


Thought For The Day:

Rereading Gibbon’s “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire” scares the Hell out of me right now.

Bread And Circuses, anyone?

And it makes Barry McGuire’s 1965 “Eve Of Destruction” sound downright prophetic.

The Eastern world, it is explodin’
Violence flarin’, bullets loadin’

You’re old enough to kill but not for votin’
You don’t believe in war, but what’s that gun you’re totin’?
And even the Jordan river has bodies floatin’

But you tell me
Over and over and over again, my friend
How you don’t believe
We’re on the eve of destruction

And Now On To Today’s Retro-Blogs.™


December 23, 2010

Turkey and Blizzard . . .

When I die I want to come back as a cat.

Emma and Moose

Mister Asleep 2

About 3 pm Jan and I headed up to Brandi’s to pick up some mail and check on the house while they’re gone.

Then we drove down to Cracker Barrel so Jan could get a take-out Turkey Dinner. We’re going to be eating out for Christmas dinner, but Jan wants to have some leftovers for after. So we figured this was the best way to do it, since she loves Cracker Barrel’s Turkey & Dressing.

Then it was on to Radio Shack and Wal-Mart for some last-minute ‘stuff’.

Then it was time for ‘lupper’ at Sonic Drive-in with a Tex-Mex Foot Long Quarter Pound Coney. You can’t go wrong with chili, cheese, onions, jalapenos, Frito Corn Chips, and chipotle sauce.

Next it was a little further down the road to Dairy Queen for Jan’s favorite “Pumpkin Pie Blizzard.” It’s going away after Christmas so she wanted to have one at least once this year.

We finally got home a little after 6pm after a short but busy afternoon.


December 23, 2011

They Grow Big Chickens Here In Texas . . . .

Jan was up early this morning making her renowned Sausage Balls to hand out to friends and family. Then we had coffee and sat back and just enjoyed the view out the front of the coach.

About 1pm we headed out for an afternoon of errands and cookie visits. Our first two stops were actually here in the park before we headed up to Brandi’s. Along the way we detoured by the storeroom to pick up Landon’s Rocking Horse so we won’t have to do it tomorrow.

Landon's Horsey

We bought this for him several months ago when we were up in Elkhart, IN. It’s not just a plain rocking horse, because if you squeeze his ears, he makes galloping noises and then neighs and whinnies. Landon’ll love it.

Stopping at Brandi’s I picked up my new Garmin Nuvi 1490LMT GPS. Of course I had to unbox it and turn it on right there. I got to play with it while we drove around the rest of the afternoon, and so far, I’m impressed.

Leaving Brandi’s, we dropped off a plate of cookies at Bob & Beth Young’s before heading over to Lowe’s to return some Christmas lights and pick up a Surfoam plane.

After that it was several quick client visits to check on things and wish them a Merry Christmas.

On the way home we stopped at Kelly’s Country Kitchen in League City for supper. Jan wanted Turkey and Dressing a few days early, and also one of their giant biscuits to have for breakfast tomorrow morning.

But as it turns out, they don’t have Turkey and Dressing on Friday, and they only have the giant biscuits for breakfast. Bummer for Jan.

So Jan ended up with the largest Country Fried Chicken Breast I’ve ever seen. Jan ate all she could, and still had enough for 2 or 3 more meals. They grow’em big here in Texas.

Kelly's Chicken Breast

Getting home Jan started wrapping presents for tomorrow night’s get-together.

Our normal Christmas Eve family tradition is to have a family dinner at King Food and then go to someone’s house to open presents. This year we’re going to add going to church with Brandi, Lowell, and Landon at Crosspoint Community Church up in Katy, along with lunch with Brandi’s BFF Shawna and her family.

A busy day.


December 23, 2012

Sunflowers and Stew Kits . . .

Jan and I were up very early this morning, but it was for a good reason. We were meeting Lowell, Brandi, Landon, and Aunt Sherry at the Sunflower Bakery & Café for breakfast down in Galveston about 8:30am.

On our way, leaving the park area, we took down the signs we had posted after finding the lost dog last Thursday.

Found Dog Poster

Since we never got a call from anyone, we’re even more convinced he was dumped. But he’s got a good home now.

Just not our home.

We had our usual great breakfast at Sunflower, but what was funny was watching Landon flirt with a cute blonde hostess. He would stare at her with a big smile on his face, and then when she would smile back at him, he would quickly look away or put his head down below the table edge.

Landon at Sunflower Cafe 2

He would then peek back over the edge to see if she was still looking at him. And he did the same thing with the same hostess when we were here two weeks ago. He’s gonna be a real heartthrob.

Leaving the café we all drove down to the Seawall to let Landon run around on the beach.

Galveston Seawall

Landon at the Seawall 1

Landon at the Seawall 2

I think Brandi and Lowell’s real reason for this was to just let him run around and tire himself out.

Finally saying our goodbyes, we headed up to the Kroger’s on SR96 to get some groceries.

While perusing the meat department I came across a Beef Stew Kit.

Really. A Beef Stew Kit?

Some Assembly Required?

Is it a kit because you still have to cut up the veggies?

Tyson Beef Stew Kit

And it was $13.95!

For a couple of bucks of veggies, and 3# of stew meat. Sorry, but this is just ridiculous.

Are people really this lazy that they can’t spend 5 minutes in the produce section?

The bright note in our Kroger’s stop was getting gas there. Their new method of giving you gas points for your purchases meant that I got $1.30 per gallon off my fill-up.

Which meant that I only paid $1.67 per gallon.

Nice!


December 23, 2013

Santa and Miss Claus . . .

First up, here’s Landon’s visit with Santa this year. Lowell said that he marched right up, sat down in Santa’s lap, and told him that he wanted a Hug Me Elmo and Stuffies (the stuffed animals with hidden pockets). This is one kid who knows where his presents come from and is not afraid of Santa.

Maybe it helps that his PaPa kinda looks like Santa.

Landon Christmas 2013

Our day started this morning with lunch at Jan’s new favorite place, Twin Peaks. She had her usual Chicken Ranch Sandwich, while I upgraded from a cup of the Venison Chili to a full bowl. I had the cup last time and it was really good.

Twin Peaks Venison Chili2

I decided to stay in the Appetizer part of the menu and also got an order of Average Joes. These are mini jalapeno-cheese brats slathered in spicy mustard and garnished with onions and fresh jalapenos. Very, very tasty.

Twin Peaks Average Joes

I’ll definitely have both again. But next time I’ll just have the cup of chili again. The bowl, along with the Average Joes, meant I was too full for the Bread Pudding dessert. And that’s just sad.

And of course, it wouldn’t be right to not have a picture of Miss Claus, our waitress Lauren.

Lauren Bell at Twin Peaks

We asked for Lauren again this time because she took such good care of us last time. We had to wait about 10 minutes for her to have an open table, but it was worth it. She even remembered what Jan ordered last time and how she wanted it fixed.

And she’s cute to boot.

This sign in Twin Peaks confuses a lot of people apparently. When they ask where the restrooms are, they’re pointed in this direction. But then they just stand there and look at the sign.

But then they finally sound it out, smile, and go in.

Twin Peaks 2P

But then they’re confused again.

Because one door says: Sit2P

and the other one says: Stand2P

There’s just no helping some people.


Leaving Twin Peaks we went right down the road to one of my favorite places, Fry’s Electronics. My purported reason was to look for a new laptop for a client, but somehow I only left the store with a new helicopter.

Invert X Helicopter

I just had to have this one because it will fly inverted as well as right-side up.

Santa came early this year.


December 23, 2014

Wiring and Re-Wiring . . .

Luckily the forecasted rain bypassed us this morning, so after coffee and a sampling of some of Jan’s freshly made sausage balls, I went next door to Randy’s so we could finish up his electrical repair and rewiring.

But first I wanted to see how his batteries were doing after being discharged down to about 6 volts. We turned off the shore power and checked the voltages, and everything looked pretty good. Then I turned on the inverter and then the TV and the refrigerator, and voltage only dropped about a 10th of a volt, and didn’t budge after another 10 minutes or so. So far, so good.

Next I had him start up the coach to see how his engine batteries were doing. The first thing I noticed was that he just put the key in, turned it on and started the engine. No waiting for the ‘Wait To Start” light to go out. In fact the ‘Wait To Start” light never went out, even after the engine was running.

Randy said that PPL (finally found out that’s where he bought the coach from) told him it didn’t work right, but it wasn’t important and not to worry about it. He said the engine runs just fine and he’s had no problems with it.

Suggested that he might want to wait 15 – 20 seconds before cranking up anyway and that he should have it checked at some point. I suspect that a sensor is not returning the correct code to the computer that shuts the light off.

Oh well. Just another problem.

Now it was on to the rewiring. Or maybe I should say the re-rewiring, since the problem seems to have been caused by the rewiring that the solar guy did.

The other day, in trying to get the power converter working, I moved the end of the short red wire shown in the orange box from one side of the isolator, indicated by the orange arrow, over to the output side of the power converter. That meant that the power converter was now feeding the house batteries as it should.

Randy's Rewiring 1

But I was bothered by the fact that the hole in the wire lug was not big enough to fit down over the stud of the power converter fuse block. I was able to jam it on there so that it was working, but it wouldn’t stay on when the coach was moved. Circuitwise the wire should go there, so why didn’t it fit?

Then the other night I was thinking about it and realized that maybe the solar guy had removed the wire completely, and then put it back on backwards And when I took the wire off today and reversed the ends, it fit perfectly. Yay!

Next, I disconnected the wire that the solar guy had used to connect the engine batteries and the house batteries together, and rerouted it up the isolator terminal where it needed to go. And it too fit perfectly.

So now I had the power converter feeding into the house batteries as it should, and the engine battery and house battery banks connected together through the isolator as it should.

The only real question is the isolator circuit. I physically tested the isolator and it works, but I don’t know If the signal that controls the isolator is working, i.e. is it switching over to keep the engine batteries charged when it’s supposed to. So I told Randy to keep an eye on his engine battery voltage to be sure it’s working.

Wrapping up,  the last thing that needed to be done was to move the output of the solar system from the engine batteries to the house batteries. That’s the smaller red wire with the black lump in it.

Randy's Monaco 1

The black lump is an inline splice, so all I needed to do was to remove the short wire from the splice and connect a longer one with a lug on the end to reach into the next compartment and connect to the house battery banks. I had the right wire to do it, but no lugs of the right size so I told Randy to go into Columbus and check out the AutoZone for some.

In the meantime it was time for Jan and I to walk across the circle to have dinner with Janice and Dave Evans. They had invited us over for a Grilled Chicken and Sausage Dinner, and boy, was it good. Especially the Roasted Veggies that went with it.

We always have a great time with Janice and Dave, and this time is no exception, but unfortunately this will be our only chance to get together for now. We’re headed to Conroe tomorrow, and they’re heading on to San Antonio in a few days. But I am sure we’ll connect back up soon. We always do.

Getting back to our rig a little after 6 I found that Randy had gotten the lugs so I went back over, crimped the new lug on the wire, connected it into the splice, and hooked it up to the house battery bank.

And after checking out all the voltages, the inverter, and everything else we could think of,  we declared it a job done. Whether it was ‘well’ done or not, will remain to be seen. I’ll keep you updated.

Tomorrow we’ll pull out of our site, get propane for the first time since September 18, 2011, then get diesel at Colorado County Oil for $2.58 a gallon (YAY!) and then make the two-hour run back over to the Lake Conroe Thousand Trails. And as soon as we’re parked and hooked up, we’ll head down to Clear Lake for our annual Christmas Eve Family Dinner at the King Food, something we’ve done every year for about 30 years.

Then it’s back up to Brandi’s to spend the night so we can be there with Landon on Christmas morning. And then of course Brandi’s big friends and family Christmas Party that afternoon.

No wonder everyone’s exhausted after the holidays.


December 23, 2015

Cooking for Christmas . . .

We walked again this morning, but for variety, we took a slightly different route this time. It was supposed to be about 1.05 miles, a little longer than yesterday’s 1.01 miles.

But for some reason Runkeeper said it was only 0.96 miles, not really a lot of difference, I guess.

Getting back to the rig, Jan and I sat outside in the shade with our coffee and cranberry nut bread. A little later, our neighbor in the Discovery behind us came out to walk her big Boxer, Joshua, a real sweetheart.

Tracy and her husband Greg (nice name!) are thinking about going full-time, so we talked for a while. Hopefully we’ll be able to talk more after Christmas.

Later in the afternoon, Jan got into baking mode, first getting her Cranberry Christmas Cake mixed and in the oven. Then she started in on her much-in-demand Sausage Balls. In fact so much in demand, she has to make six dozen so everyone gets some to take home.

You can check out both of these recipes, as well a number of others, here on Jan’s Favorite Recipes page.

About 6pm Wal-Mart said our prescriptions were ready, so I headed over that way. My first stop though was at Lowe’s to pick up the #14 x 2” screws that I will use to mount Jan’s “Oh Sh$t! Handle” that I talked about in yesterday’s blog. You can check it out here – Livingston Bound and BBQ.

Getting to Wal-Mart, I was surprised to find it wasn’t that busy, not really any more than a typical Saturday, it seemed to me. Certainly not like a Christmas Eve Eve.

Leaving Wal-Mart I made a dinner stop at the Culver’s right across the street to pick up burgers and fries for supper. Since Jan had already been cooking a lot today, supper was on me, and we both really love Culver’s Butterburgers.

After dinner, I decided to wait until after Christmas to drill the holes in the dowel rods and mount the handle. Instead I wanted to upgrade the two front 18” fluorescents by installing the LED strip lights that I’ve used before. I’ve done this several times by now, so I’ve got it down pat.

After removing the plastic cover, I removed the bulbs, and then the center ballast cover comes off by just squeezing it until it pops out of the tabs.

LED Strip Light Upgrade 0

Then I’m left with this.

LED Strip Light Upgrade 1

With a pair of wire cutters, I cut out all the wires except the black and white wires at the right end. Unfortunately they’re hard to see in this photo.

The black and white wires are the 12v supplying the power to the light. I don’t worry about removing the ballast since it’s not in the way.

LED Strip Light Upgrade 2

Next it’s simply a matter of connecting the red wires on the LED strips to the black wire in the fixture, and the black wires on the LED strips to the white wire in the fixture, using wire nuts. At this point, I always test the hookup. Looks good to me.

LED Strip Light Upgrade 3

The LEDs come with a peel-off adhesive stripe that I use to mount the strips in the fixture.

LED Strip Light Upgrade 4

Then I just reinstalled the metal cover over the center ballast, and snap the plastic cover on, and I’m done.

LED Strip Light Upgrade 5

It now takes me less than 10 minutes to do a light, and they’re brighter than the fluorescents they replace.

LED Strip Light Upgrade 6

And at less than $7.00 for a pair of strips, it costs less than just replacing the fluorescent tubes.

2ea Super Bright COB White LED Lights

Tomorrow Jan and I will head out about 10am, with our first stop for breakfast at the Cracker Barrel right down the Interstate, where we’ll also pick up the Cornbread Dressing and Turkey Gravy we ordered last week for our Christmas dinner tomorrow.

Then it’s off to our daughter Brandi’s down in Katy for our Christmas Eve get-together. Unfortunately, our other set of kids, Chris, his wife Linda, and our granddaughter Piper are all scheduled to work tomorrow evening, so they won’t make it tomorrow night, but we’ll all be together on Christmas Day for dinner.


December 23, 2016

You Know You’re A Regular When . . .

After a somewhat busy time on the gate last night/this morning, I was back at the rig and in bed by 5:45am.

This gate is the Sand Truck Staging Pad for the frac gate right across the street, so we had a lot of sand trucks in and out, but we don’t have to log them at all. We’re really just a traffic cop because this is a one-lane road, so we have to be sure another truck isn’t coming out before we let a new one in.

Franke Gate

I was back up about 11 and about 11:45 Jan and I headed out to Barth’s for their Chicken Fried Steak Strips/Fried Catfish lunch buffet.

I guess we’re officially ‘Regulars” at Barth’s since the waitress now brings us our drink orders without me telling her what we want.

And when we left they had our Christmas dinner takeout meals of Turkey & Dressing with Gravy, Mashed Potatoes, Fresh Green Beans, Mac N Cheese, and Cranberry Sauce all ready for us.

Leaving Barth’s we made a swing by the bank to see if my checks had come in, but they’d closed at noon so it’s next week I guess.

This gate I’m on for the next 3 days is a 5pm gate, rather than a 5:30 one like yesterday’s, so I have to be on the road about 30 minutes earlier today. So when we got back to rig I went down for a couple of hours of nap.

When we came back from Beeville the other night we followed up on a tip Nancy Christian, our RV park owner, had given us about where to see Christmas lights in Kenedy.

And although there weren’t a lot of them, there were some really nice ones.

Christmas Lights i

Christmas Lights 2

But this house was the best. On a corner lot it rivaled anything in the ‘small’ house category that we’ve ever seen.

Christmas Lights 3

I say ‘small’ because Jan and I have seen some mansions in the Houston area that looked this good, but never on a home this size.

Here’s a close-up.

Christmas Lights 4

Everything is so ‘right’ that I’ve got to think that this one is professionally done, or done by someone who does this for a living.

As I said, this is a corner lot so here’s the other side.

Christmas Lights 5

I guess Kenedy doesn’t have a Christmas Lights Competition because this one should have a big Blue Ribbon on it.

There’s been talk about some gates closing for Christmas, but so far nothing about this one. So I guess we’ll see.


December 23, 2017

Catching Up . . .

Coming home from the TSO concert on Thursday night we had no more overheating problems, probably because it was a lot cooler and we weren’t sitting still in traffic.

But when we stopped at the Longhorn Steakhouse I could smell antifreeze over the hot engine, so I’ve got a leak somewhere that I’ll have to check out.

Dinner at Longhorn was great, the perfect end to a nice day that started off so rocky. We both started off with salads, Jan with her standard salad,

Longhorn Salad 3

while I got the Wedge Salad with Blue Cheese and Bacon. But while most wedge salads are made with a ‘wedge’ of iceberg lettuce, Longhorn’s is made from stalks of romaine lettuce.

Longhorn Wedge Salad

Really good and crunchy.

Jan always gets the New York Strip which Longhorn does perfectly for her, somewhere between Med-Well and Medium, pink with no juice.

Longhorn New York Strip Katy

I of course always get the Ribeye, Med-Rare, and again done perfectly.

Longhorn Ribeye Webster

Afterwards we spent about an hour just stilling and talking about the concert, before getting home a little before 10pm.

Now on to Friday.

Heading into work I had planned to get gas at the HEB but it looked pretty busy, so I decided to wait until I was on my way home, a plus since it was also on the right side.

Bad decision! Costly decision!

When I passed the station in the morning, gas was $1.93. but coming home it had jumped to $2.05, a 12¢ Christmas present to holiday travelers. Ho! Ho! Ho!

I spent most of the day at work going through the paper catalog page by page, making corrections, deleting products, and rearranging products. But with 130 pages it’s going to take a while.

Getting home about 4:30, Jan and I turned around pretty quickly and headed back out, over to Stomp’s Burger Joint on 146 in Bacliff to meet up with Wil and Cyndy Olsen. When they’re not waiting on their truck to be reassembled, they work with Adventure Caravan’s, guiding RV tours around the US, Canada, and Mexico.

Stomp's Wil and Cyndy

We had originally planned to also meet up with Jan and Dale Thompson there, but Jan hurt her back a couple of weeks ago, so this time it was just us four.

We started off with an order of Texas Rattlesnake Eggs. We had fun telling Cyndy that this was Texas so of course they had real rattlesnake in them.

Stomp's Rattlesnake Eggs

But they’re really a big ball of cream cheese mixed with bacon and jalapenos, and then battered and fried.

Wil and I both had the Hog Wild Burger, the one with raw bacon ground into the patty.

Stomp's Hog Wild Single Burger

I did drop back to the single patty version, with only 8oz. of Angus Beef,  instead of the 1# version with two patties that I’ve gotten before. I told Jan afterwards that this time I was just pleasantly full, rather than the painfully full as before.

Cyndy got the smaller Cheeseburger, while Jan got her usual Outlaw Burger with a little bit of everything.

Stomp's Outlaw Burger

Hopefully we’ll be able to get together with both Jan and Dale and Wil and Cyndy before they leave.

This morning, Saturday, was a nice quiet one before we headed out about 1:30. Our first stop was our son Chris to pick up our mail and a few other things. Then it was on to the nearby Kroger to get supplies for the Christmas dishes that Jan’s making for our Christmas Day family get-together. Tomorrow will be a busy day.

It seemed like almost everything in the store was discounted with our Kroger card because we bought $104 worth of groceries but only paid $87 because we saved $17 with the card. Nice

Finally heading back toward Santa Fe, we stopped off at Pho 20 for a light linner of salads and a couple of appetizers. Delicious as always.

I know I promised more about TSO, but I’ll catch up with that at a later time.


December 23, 2019

Day And Night . . .

Or rather DayQuil and NyQuil.

Today was pretty much lost to a routine of DayQuil at work and NyQuil here at home. I’m trying to get rid of my head congestion, feeling like my skull is packed with cotton. Very tightly packed.

It’s been years since I’ve taken this stuff, and it didn’t seem to be working as well as I remember. Then, looking at the label, I think I know why.

Prominently featured on the DayQuil and NyQuil bottles are the words, “Alcohol Free’!

And they think this is supposed to be a PLUS?

image

And I even bought the ‘SEVERE’ version.

But my biggest problem is that fact that my head is so stopped up that I’ve lost a lot of hearing in my right ear. And due to guns and loud rock music, my hearing isn’t too great in that ear to begin with.

So hopefully this stuff will help. Unfortunately though, it seems like I’ll have to get better completely sober.


December 23, 2020

Jan Has To Get Her Own Next Time . . .

Coming Up:

Landon at Sunflower Cafe 2

Today is a typical December day in Texas, with a high of 79° and a low tonight of 39. And then for the next few days we’ve got days in the 50’s and nights in the 30’s.

Nice for a change!

About 1:30 Jan and I headed out for the afternoon, with our first stop back at the New England Lobster and Chowder Food Truck located at the Three Acres Food Truck Park on FM1764.

Of course we wanted more of their fantastic Clam Chowder,

NE Lobster Clam Chowder

but we also wanted to try a Hot Lobster Roll.

NE Lobster Lobster Roll

(They also have it cold, but it’s better hot with the melted butter)

And I also got Jan an order of their Fried Mushrooms.

NE Lobster Fried Mushrooms

All really good.

But what turned out to be the actual highlight of the meal was something I really got just for me.

NE Lobster Deep Fried PB&J

A Deep Fried PB&J Sandwich.

I figured that Jan, not being a big PB&J fan, might want a bite just to try it.

Boy was I wrong.

Once she had one bite, that led to several more. So many more bites that next time she has to get her own.

I’m not sharing again.

The Clam Chowder was just as delicious as before. And the Fried Mushrooms were also ‘Have Again’ good.

The Hot Lobster Roll was also very good, but not $19 good. At least to us.

Even though we split it in half. Hey, it costs a lot to fly lobster in from Boston every day or so.

And this one was just as good as what we had in New England when we were up there in 2009. The thing is that neither of us are really big lobster fans. I’d much rather have a pound of boiled shrimp than a pound of lobster.

It may be just that I was raised in the South. Now up in New England in 2009 even the McDonald’s had a McLobster sandwich.

But we’ll certainly go back soon. Just not for lobster, I guess.

Finishing up with lunch we next made a WalMart for a few things, and we were surprised that it really didn’t seem much busier than usual. Nice, though.

Tomorrow I’m going to pick up a set of front disc brake pads for the Jeep. They’ve started scraping some, so hopefully I can do them on Saturday or Sunday.

Also tomorrow, of course, we’re meeting Brandi, et al at King Food for our traditional Christmas Eve dinner. Really looking forward to it.


December 23, 2021

Merry Christmas Eve Eve . . .

With Jan nursing an on/off migraine-ish headache since yesterday, today was a stay-at-home day with not a lot going on.

Tomorrow Jan will be making her world-famous Sausage Balls for our Christmas get-together this weekend. Much anticipated by everyone.

As I mentioned before, we’re meeting Brandi, Lowell, and Landon at King Food tomorrow evening for our mostly-every-year Christmas Eve family get-together. Then we’ll all head back up to Brandi’s in Katy to spend Christmas with them.

Can’t wait.

I got an email earlier this month concerning the renewal of our CLEAR membership. We signed up before our Christmas in NYC trip in December 2019. And it was really nice to bypass the long lines as we went through the TSA check-ins, but we’re not going to be flying again anytime soon, at least until we can fly without being vaccinated and/or masked up.

So I cancelled the renewal and saved $229. And I can reactivate at any time without having to do the biometric stuff all over again.

Before our recent trip up to Branson a few weeks ago we added a few accessories to our Jeep to make the drive nicer.

First up was a set of these Blindspot Mirrors. Unlike our Dodge Dakota truck, the Jeep has a blind spot in the rearview mirrors for me. No matter how I adjusted them, a vehicle passing on my left could completely disappear from my inside rearview mirror before it would reappear in my outside mirror. And these work great.

Rear View Mirror Extender

As you can see in the above photo I can see much further to the left with the stick-on mirror. You can put it either on the top or the bottom of the outside mirror.

A great addition!

I also added some new seat support cushions to my seat to give me better support for my back.

This cervical and lumbar support seat back really worked great and made the drive a lot more comfortable.

Jeep Seat Back Support Cushion

it’s easy to install and just held in place with straps.

I also added this padded seat cushion to complete the seat.

Jeep Seat Cushion

Very comfortable. So much so that after Jan drove the Jeep with them installed, she had me order a set for her side of the Jeep.

On To Christmas!


December 23, 2022

18° !

was our low last night, but we weathered it just fine. My heat lamp kept the water bay in the mid-30’s so no problem there. And we got up to a balmy 33° today.

Tonight’s a little warmer with a forecasted low of 24° and up to 42° tomorrow, but back down to 28° tomorrow night.

So it looks like we’re past the really bad part.

I was happy that our Old Faithful Dodge Dakota cranked right up this morning with no problem, even though it was 19°.

Good Girl!

While I was gone today Jan started making her world-famous Cream Cheese Sausage Balls, a must-have at every family get-together, particularly for our Christmas celebration on Sunday.

For my part I doing a Chicken Cheese Ball tomorrow morning for Sunday too. But I’m also going to add some dried cranberries to the mix for a little sweetness.

Then tomorrow evening we’re meeting up with the entire Texas Bunch, Chris, Linda, Piper, Derek, Brandi, Lowell, Landon, and Jan and I at King Food for our almost annual Christmas Eve dinner.

We’ve been doing this for longer than Jan and I can remember, but at least 35 years or more. Of course we’ve been eating at KF since December of 1978, right after we moved down here from Alabama when I went to work at NASA-JSC.

Good then, good now.

Then early Sunday morning we’ll head up to Brandi’s in Katy for our Big Family Christmas Blowout. Really looking forward to it.

I’ve got a nice long Christmas VaCay since Monday’s a holiday, so I don’t go back to the office until Wednesday.

Nice!

Jan and I decided we wanted to see 2022 off with a nice dinner, so I made reservations at the Webster Saltgrass Steakhouse for New Year’s Eve.

Not sure yet where we’re going to get our Black-Eyed Pea, Collard Greens, and Cornbread on New Year’s Day.