The Mixer Meets It's MatchProduct

Loaves and Fishes...


Here's a look at "Loaf #1" talking things out with it's maker...

Loaf #2 is still in the oven basking at 350 degrees F.

Here's another view of the Tsoureki Loaf with a Dyed Egg in the middle.



By the way, that is in fact a dyed boiled egg in the middle there (along with other experimental eggs there in the bowl in the back.

You can go here and learn how to use water and vinegar and of all things...yellow onion skins...to make a red dye to color eggs. (I'd somehow missed that process in the past 50 years.)

What looks like Brown Eggs is actually some I took out of the dye when I got impatient...but I got several darker ones by letting things sit for a couple of hours after I took them off the stove.

Now it's time to go pull the second loaf out of the oven, let it cool a little, and deliver it to Papa George...

Regards Y'all

Making Baking Bread

I'm Afraid Of My Mixer...


So three or four years ago I decided that I wanted to add a stand mixer to my arsenal my list of kitchen tools.

Since I make pizza about three times every two weeks, it sounded like a good idea at the time.

Then you know me...I couldn't settle for just "any" stand mixer, I wanted something that bolted to the kitchen cabinet or stood in the floor and made the windows rattle when I turned it on and started mixing something.

Something like this 60 quart model would do nicely, don't you think???

Then upon further consideration, realizing that my kitchen was basically 12 feet x 14 feet, I realized that, since I generally only make one or two pizzas at a time, that unless I wanted to have to wheel the monstrosity out into the carport when we had company or when I actually wanted to COOK something...that I should downsize my aspirations and get something a little more portable.

Then I started looking at the KitchenAid mixers which are in every store except possibly AutoZone and the local Men's Big/Tall Shop, but I wasn't satisfied with the speed selections and the fact that the bowl just sat there on the base and could start spinning around while unattended and fly off into space or something.

Finally I found out about the larger capacity KitchenAid Professional 6 quart model...



(except mine's gunmetal grey...remember it's part of my "arsenal" by default...)

which has more motor horsepower and additional speeds, but more importantly it had a lift stand base that allowed me to lock the mixing bowl onto the unit so when I come back from the basement or restroom after ten minutes my dough is still inside the kitchen rather than sitting out in the back yard with the Robins and Nuthatches pecking at it.

I ordered it on sale, online, with free shipping, and when it arrived and I busted it out of the cardboard and Styrofoam and tossed it up on the counter top, and I'm sorry to report that I've only used it once or twice since.

Why, you might ask?

Because it's too large to only make dough for one pizza!

When I dump 2-1/2 cups of flour and a cup of water and a pack of yeast and some salt and white pepper into the bowl and turn it on, the paddle or dough hook barely touches the mixture.

I think that my mixer laughed and taunted me and said "that's all you got" in "Mixer-ese"

Then I had the brilliant idea to take it off the stand and stir things up by hand, and then remount the bowl on the mixer. When I turned the motor back on the dough hook grabbed my little blob of dough and proceeded to make it slowly crawl up to the top of the hook and ride around in circles like some kind of silly kitchen amusement park ride.

I know that when I use yeast I'm basically "fermenting" my dough...so I might get "drunken" dough in the process, but spinning my dough around getting it "drunken"???

So any way, in a few minutes when my milk finishes "scalding" and my butter finishes melting, I'm going to make another try at using what has been a giant paperweight for the past two years in my kitchen.

I'm tossing together about 6 cups of flour and 6 eggs and a bunch of other stuff and trying to make three or four loaves of Greek Easter Bread.

I'll try to avoid having to repaint the walls or buy new flooring or replace my counter top, or wash flour off of the Turbo Pup in the process.

Wish me luck...if you will...

(And I'm REAL glad I didn't buy that 60 quart model else I'd probably need counseling)

APRIL FOOL DAY

Couldn't I Be Considered A Fool Almost Every Day???


Yes...locking up my blog until noon today was my weird Blogger "April Fools" joke for 2010.

Hope you enjoyed it...if you stopped by before noon.

I haven't had time to write anything until now this morning because I've been up working since about 4 AM trying to catch up from my lethargy exhibited earlier in the week.

Yesterday I ended up wallowing in the bed with the newspaper listening to Neal Boortz until about 11 AM and then after a couple of hours working in the yard I dedicated a couple more hours to sitting in the sun on my deck smoking a cigar...getting a little pink on my cheeks (the upper ones, not the lower ones), and enjoying the sound and smell of weed eaters and leaf blowers.

Then early this morning I started feeling guilty and spun into a whirlwind of wearing out my uncallosed hands and fingers cranking on socket head cap screws and risking cancer breathing mineral spirits fumes cleaning parts and putting everything back together.

Later today after washing the grease and lawn chemicals from my hands I'm baking a couple of loaves of Tsoureki...a sweat "Greek Easter Bread" for the Family of a friend here in Knoxtown who's dealing with bringing his dad home from the hospital after his first Chemo treatment last weekend.

Harry's become a good friend and business associate in the past six months and with his old line Greek roots (they have a house here and one in Greece) it's been fun talking about Greek food in between technical conversations.

Any way, his mother has her hand's full taking care of Dad and since I was already going to try my hand at baking the stuff before I found about the illness I figure I'll just double the recipe and drop by tomorrow morning and deliver some.

Time to go package things up in bubble wrap and cardboard and spread some fertilizer...

Y'all have a LOVELY day...If you will...

Sunshine 1...Taxes 0

Summer-like Weather Has Me Mentally Paralyzed...


Well, I looked at my taxes for a minute this morning.

That is, if you can call walking past the stack of files sitting ominously on the Dining Room table as "looking at."

I had to move them out of my office last weekend because I kept piling other stuff up on top of them and sorting them around accidentally and then after losing one or two of them spending a half hour panicking.

I did manage to open up all eight of the giant pneumatic valves in the new batch and didn't find anything surprising, so I'm promising myself I'll buckle down and get four of them torn down, soaked in solvent, rinsed off, and put back together with new o-rings and seals and out of the building tomorrow, BUT...

right now it's time go sit on the deck in the sun with the Turbo Pup and smoke a cigar and yell at make faces at the guy with the leaf blower.

My Lawn As An Excuse?

Anything To Avoid Finishing My Taxes...


I have to finish three tax returns this week...two personal and one Business.

The company's return was pretty much done last month and just needs a final check, and Pat's is done and just needs a final check and signature...not including the small check we'll put in the mail to the IRS.

Mine, unfortunately, is about fifteen pages long and I don't like the answer I got as to the amount I owe--not enough for a penalty/interest situation-- but after doing some more reading I think that I've found some more stuff which with a little creative accounting...wink...wink...could lower the tax bill if I'll take the time to sort through the receipts and document it properly.

Did I mention how much I hate tax forms, tax form instructions, and the IRS in general? Just wait until they start coming to the hospital to check and make sure you have the right government mandated insurance.

Meanwhile, it's supposed to be near 80 degrees F here at the Turbo Pup Compound on the banks of the Mighty Tennessee River for the next three or four days, and with the recent rains and warmer weather my lawn, weeds and all, is growing like crazy.

In a fit of well intended lawn improvement shopping last weekend I bought fertilizer and a giant bag of grass seed to do some over seeding and try to crowd the wild onions and clover and Dandelions out of the way.

Our yard guys lawn maintenance technicians have promised to come by and assault my ears with a weed eater and blow grass clippings all over my cars and carport give everything a fresh going over and haul off another giant pile of tree limbs and shrubbery prunings which are green and/or I'm just too lazy to burn.

That's pretty dang lazy when a guy is too lazy to stand in his yard with a beer and watch a fire burn, isn't it?

Sorta like being too drunk to FISH, I guess...

So any way, I have to try to get the minimum done in the yard while at the same time getting the taxes out the door because I'm supposed to be out of town visiting a client next week and I don't want to make taxes a last minute fire drill this year.

If I start now doing the final filings certainly in 15 days I can get things out the door and into the mailbox.

OK...maybe not...because I also have to rebuild 12 more pneumatic valves which will take a couple of days at least, depending on what I find when I get inside them.

It's nice being busy again and making more money than I spend every month after bumbling and stumbling around with sporadic Consulting Forensic Injuneering work every month or so.

But it's hard to teach an old dog old Pirate new tricks, so I guess I'll go lay back down and read the newspaper and take a nap...

Regards Y'all.

Capitolism With A Kapitol "K" Capitol "C"

The Ground's Shaking Under My Feet...


Man did I ever have a GREAT day on Monday.

The phone was ringing and I was wheeling and dealing and stuff went out the door at the end of the day with invoices attached.

Politicians just levy taxes when they need money, but I was doing what is historically known as conducting "Business."

Those that know me in real life know that I suffered a catastrophic business blow out in the late 1990's and pretty much mentally parked my ship in the harbor for a few years and elected to do nothing all day.

That is, if you don't count fishing or sitting in a bar bending my elbow or possibly eating and/or cooking.

I was burned out and angry that nine years of hard effort had been wiped out when a couple of my customers decided to go out of business and in the process take me with them by not paying their bills.

For most of the subsequent ten years I pretty much swore out loud that there was no amount of money or circumstance that would cause me to ever again be responsible for turning off and on the lights and handling payroll and shipping and receiving for anything with my name on it.

If you've read this blog for a while, you'll remember that from time to time I did, like this guy...



...consider a number of other employment opportunities including newspaper writer (I actually had an interview), line chef in a four star restaurant (interviewed for that too), and then like Jethro the Brain Surgeon and Fry Cook opportunities which never came along for some reason.

Then slowly but surely things changed in the last year or so, and the old fires re-ignited, and through a convoluted series of events and circumstances today finds me again living life as President of a Corporation--currently with only two employees--but looking at what I believe could be a pretty interesting future here as we go into the second quarter of 2010 at the Turbo Pup Compound on the Banks of the Mighty Tennessee River.

If the damn Democrats and the "across the isle reaching" Republicans would get out of the way and stop stimulating themselves and their constituents with other people's money I believe that the business world could actually develop a good head of steam and put some people back to work in spite of their idiotic efforts in the next year.

My new little company has already "injected" over ten thousand dollars back into the economy, not to mention me and my associate spending almost 1000 hours into the development and production of new custom products and most recently in a totally new rebuild process for a component used on a bunch of multi-million dollar machines both here in the US and in Europe and Asia...something which could be our ticket to not only our survival as a company but some amazing success in the near term.

With the latest PLC panel in route to our New England client and now weekly shipments of rebuilt valves into and out of our impromptu basement "loading dock," and with finally receiving payments and having an at least break even funding situation we're poised to launch into a limited national marketing effort for our products and services.

Of course I, being a professional pirate and beach bum and blogger, still intend to keep a generous portion of my calendar open to the prospect of doing absolutely nothing all day, but when the opportunity presents itself and I feel like getting off my butt and making someone want to give me their money to do something productive, I'll certainly read the fine print and further entertain their offer.

The main thing I've learned a couple of times (which means I didn't really learn it the first time,) is that you have to have enough spare time in life to enjoy the money you're making when you time is not "spare." If you can never leave the office you tend to burn out and burn up your brain and then things get ugly...

I reference 1998 and 1999 in my life as an example.

Maturity and discipline are one thing, but being a slave driver to anyone including myself has long ago been crossed off of my To-Do list.

I'm truly blessed to still be here physically and mentally after the crap I've been through in the past 50 years, and as we go into this Easter week I can't help but want to thank my family and friends for their endurance of my weaknesses and their support in my efforts, and of course the Man upstairs and his Son Jesus Christ who gave all of us our frailties and delivered us from same.

Late Night TV Shopping

I'm Retiring From Working And Blogging Once UPS Gets Here...


I'm excited to report that I made the first of three "three easy payments" tonight...on four different products...for somewhere between $19.99 and $39.99 each.

First I got myself into "Winning in the Cashflow Business" and I'm sitting here on the phone waiting for all of the people out there holding all the underutilized "cash flow notes" to give me a ring.

I'm also busy planning on spending most of this week standing by the mailbox when the phone is not ringing waiting for my checks to arrive.

Then, in anticipation of collecting my first half million dollars in cold hard cash, I bought myself a membership in two hair replacement systems, ordered my free samples of Extenz, and in a last minute fit of vanity I bought the Luminess Air "airbrush" makeup system to make my buttocks and nose look good after I move down to the nudist colony sporting a six foot long penis.

(I'm also seriously thinking of Botoxing my Buttocks...but I have to wait for the "cash flow system" money to come in first)

Is there anyone out there but me that doesn't understand why almost everything sold on TV after about 3 or 4 AM is called a "system?"

There must be some kind of state or federal law or something...or maybe the United Nations has a rule that stupid people only have their money legally stolen from them over the airwaves in return for buying something with the word "System" in the name.

Let me know if you find out because it worries me a great deal, but meanwhile I've got to go now and place an order for "Your Baby Can Read" because I anticipate needing that "system" shortly after the ladies get a look at my new airbrushed, hair covered head and erection lasting longer than four hours.

(Just in case you mis-understand, this late night TV marketing crap makes me crazy when I see it for five seconds let alone five minutes, and I think Comcast should just show me this...

instead of making me endure flipping past the insanity on over half of the channels I'm paying for. Just like junk mail, I think 99.99% of it deserves to go in the garbage unopened.)

While I'm at it, the same goes for Home Shopping Networks.

Dang I'm cranky...time for a nap I guess...

Brunch, Anyone?

Here...do this...


I'm still feeling a little lethargic today--mentally and physically.

Our brunch on this rainy, lazy morning here on the Banks of the Mighty Tennessee River consisted of scratch made Crepes I tossed together in an unexpected fit of cooking energy.

I make a really good crepe after about a decade of practice....it's not hard really.

Two kinds of crepes actually, and in support of my efforts I have a giant electric griddle which allows me to cook three or four crepes at one time in just a couple of minutes. If I'm cooking for a larger group it even has a warming tray underneath which keeps things ready to go while you produce even a dozen thin little pancakes.

Now I figure that a lot of people are saying to themselves..."Of all things...Virgil..."

CREPES?

Not PANCAKES?

Crepes?

I know...I Know...I KNOW...

You're thinking, like I used to, that somewhere out there it is implyed that "Real Men" don't eat Crepes.

sigh...

You're right, I've heard that too...BUT...

No matter, my answer to that comment is to quote the words of comic Steve Martin...

"Well excuuuuuusssssss Me..."

And all that said, I'm here to tell you that this former "real man" which is today either "less real" or "more real"... depending on your perspective...not only enjoys EATing Crepes, but I have more than a couple of pretty good ideas about the how's and when's and why's gained from my personal experience with cooking Crepes.

For instance, here's what happened at the Turbo Pup Compound this morning.

First of all the crepe batter is easy...I use this when cooking breakfast for two:

1 cup flour
2 eggs, beaten
dash of salt
teaspoon sugar
1 cup milk
(dash of vanilla if you want and are only using sweet fillings/toppings)

Basically you put all of the dry ingredients into a bowl, add the wet ingredients, and then whisk or beat the mixture together until smooth...I use a hand mixer with a whisk attachment.

For smooth uniform crepes you need to make up your batter mixture and then let it rest in the refrigerator for a half hour or so to allow the air bubbles to come out so you get a good consistency with your cooked crepes.

Then the filling can be almost anything you want, but I usually make mine from a combination of ham and asparagus with slices of cream cheese, then I make up some Knorr Holandaise sauce and toss it on top on the plate after baking the finished crepes for 20 minutes or so in the oven .

Google the details because it's easy and everybody does it basically the same.

Then the other thing which goes good for breakfast is to make some sort of sweet crepe to go with your savory crepes.

Again, using the basic crepe as a wrapper around some slices of cream cheese, this morning I put together a mixture of sliced fresh strawberries and canned pineapple. You dump the pineapple juice into a skillet with the berries and pineapple chunks, saute everything for a few minutes with a quarter stick of butter (and I'm sorry...some BACON grease...don't tell my cardiologist...), then add a tablespoon of sugar, a tablespoon of honey, and a teaspoon of good Balsamic Vinegar to the mixture and cook it down until it thickens like you like it.

Pull the hot baked crepe/cream cheese roll out of the oven and spoon your fruit topping up on top, shake a little powdered sugar over everything if you want, and EAT.

I felt like I'd been somewhere for breakfast when it was all said and done, except there was a sink load of dishes somebody had to do.

Time to start thinking about cooking my soon to be famous "Rustic Greek Pasta" for dinner now...

Feel free to stop by about 7 PM if you happen to be in the neighborhood.

Mental Day Off

Excelling At Doing Not Much Of Anything...


Just in case you didn't notice, I'm pretty sure that I didn't write two dozen words yesterday.

I hardly read any (words) yesterday either, unless you count things like "Stop" and "Go", and "Men's" and Women's" and stuff like that. Single words...or just a few words standing alone all by themselves..phrases shorter than the 26 letters of the alphabet.

(trivial factoid of the day...my name has 26 letters and or spaces in it if you count the comma before III, thereby making it virtually impossible to fill in the blanks on most government forms when they demand that they tell you your "full name.")

Wait a minute...I did go shopping Saturday and had to go through the checkout at the dry cleaners and Home Depot and Kroger and also signed a couple of receipts for lunch and dinner along the way.

Any hoooo....The most significant thing I've learned through the years in "attempting" to develop some skills as a writer is that when it comes to "creative" writing, you can't force it.

Wait...OK...let me modify that theory while the ink is still wet.

You CAN force it, but the results most of the time will allow the stress and strain found in the process to slowly, insidiously ooze out onto your paper or computer screen, and your reader will detect the mental conflict and/or the lack of any real underlying substance in the manuscript and reject it out of hand go find something better to do with their time.

Here in the blog universe, I say that you can see that there's a lot of that (people writing with nothing to write about) going on at any given time, and it's even worse on places like Twitter and Facebook.

I don't consider writing the words "Getting dressed and going outside" or "believe I'll change my underwear and put on clean socks" worth blogging about, but you'll find stuff like that written all the time on Facebook.

And see how I was able to issue both statements here and get away with writing them because I have a larger point to make other than just blithering about freshly laundered underwear and socks?

It's all in the context of the discussion I guess, and making subjects like personal hygiene interesting to total strangers is an art form which escapes most everyone but Martha Stewart or your mother (or possibly your personal physician.)

And now I've attempted it ("it" being trying to make underwear and socks interesting.)

Hah...I got cha...now I've got to stop fooling around on the computer, since I really have nothing to say, and go put on clean socks and underwear and get into the shop and get some work done.

Talk to y'all later...hopefully...

I Made It Through The Week

Without My Head Exploding...


I'm pleased to report that things are generally working out...late but still...

Apparently with age comes a form of supernaturally induced patience, or possibly just a lack of energy to get any more excited about things than I do sometimes.

The words of Shakespeare sort of sum it all up for me... but instead of "Much Ado About Nothing," sometimes around here it's "Nothing About Much Ado."

Have a LOVELY Weekend ...Y'all...

I Bought Two Laptop Batteries...

Highlight Of My Day?


I'm hunkered down in shipping mode getting some stuff out the door today in boxes full of bubble wrap and foam peanuts, so until the pressure is off the words are going to be fairly few and far between here on the blog.

I've got owner's manuals to finish and other minutia to deal with but that's the way it is being in business, in spite of what the late night TV "Infomercials" and the Government tells people.

Bye Bye...

(Oh...I almost forgot...Next Monday I'll have new batteries delivered for two of my three laptops...true wireless computing...a nerds dream...)

Up And Coming Candidate For Governor Gubernatorial Senatorial Candidate

I'd Vote For This Guy If I Lived In Florida...

Marco Rubio, former speaker of the House in Florida, is running for Governor a seat in the US Senate of the state now. Check out his farewell speech, mostly delivered without notes or teleprompter:



I'd vote for that Cuban any day, so stop calling/thinking I'm a racist...

(and who came up with the word...Gubernatorial...Gomer Pyle?)

UPDATE 2:00AM

My title to this posting changed to reflect my Florida friends pointing out Mr. Rubio is running for Senate...not Governor.

My Head's On Fire

My Bank And the Employees Thereof Are Idiots...


Don't ask the details because you'll think I'm making things up.

OK...let's use the words Feckless, Obtuse, and Inane. No bounced checks, finally money available, but they managed to order the wrong checks, without authorization, and mis-spell my company name in the process.

Right now I'm just trying to stay off the 11 PM news having entered the building with a big stick and a bad attitude.

Some people DESERVE to be "unemployed," and I know where one or two of them spend their days right now if any one's interested.

Japanese Loui Armstrong

Funny...But They'd Put ME In Jail For Doing This On Stage In This Country

Slippery Slope...Part MCMVXII

Everybody Needs To Get A Grip...


I've been following this story for the past week or so now:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100320/ap_on_bi_ge/us_wal_mart_racial_comment

WASHINGTON TOWNSHIP, N.J. – A 16-year-old boy who police said made an announcement at Walmart ordering all black people in the southern New Jersey store to leave was charged with harassment and bias intimidation, authorities said Saturday.

The boy, whose name is not being released because he is a juvenile, grabbed one of the courtesy phones at Walmart's Washington Township store Sunday evening and calmly announced: "Attention, Walmart customers: All black people, leave the store now," police said.

The teen was arrested Friday and released to the custody of his parents; police did not know whether he had a lawyer.

"This was an extremely disturbing event on many levels," Gloucester County Prosecutor Sean Dalton said at a news conference. "Any statements like these that can cause harm or grave concern must be addressed as quickly we possibly can."

Dalton said the case would be handled in juvenile court in neighboring Atlantic County, where the boy lives. He would not say whether the boy has a criminal record, citing the teen's age, and would not disclose the teen's race, saying that did not factor into the investigation.

The 16-year-old has been charged with harassment and bias intimidation.


and I've stood it as long as I can stand it remaining silent.

Say that you're a middle aged dumpy, ever greying, ever balding, more than a little off of your fighting weight white dude, and you're walking through a Best Buy or Food City minding your own business.

Then say that suddenly you hear the in-store intercom crackle to life and someone then proceeds to blither out something like "all you angry old Anglo/European/American white bastards need to leave the building right now."

What would you do if you were an angry old Anglo/European/American white bastard?

Well, speaking from the position of having some inside knowledge of the ever growing minority of people with (ever shrinking) testicles looking at things from that perspective, I, personally, would assume that there was some idiot in the store...employee or not...which had gotten ahold of the PA system and two seconds later I'd turn my head and continue on my way looking at USB cables or Micro SD memory cards or possibly for a good deal on boneless chicken breasts.

Then by the grace of God I might actually manage to remember the (non)event long enough to recount it to some of my friends and family...that there was some idiot in a store last week... and I might blog about it, but most likely I'd forget the (non)event long before I had time to call the police and file a report and demand legal action.

Pretty simple, huh?

But TODAY, in the year 2010, in the cracks and crevasses of our once great Republic (not Democracy) if the EXACT same thing happens at WalMart...bastion of government liberal/progressive/socialist and Union Leader hatred (sorry for the redundancy) nation wide...

if the people/persons...the so-called "victims" of the perceived public slight/insult/or otherwise general racially induced commentary... happens to be a member of a Government/societal protected race/class of citizens, the managers and so-called "authorities" are apparently forced to run around like their hair is on fire, conduct an expensive government witch hunt, and in this case manage to find and lock up a 16 year old kid...and after much public indignation and hoopla...proceed to PROSECUTE HIM for something loosely called "harassment and Bias."

What the $#@! is this teaching the American people?

...and who the *$%# are passing these laws in the first place?

Dammit Ladies and Gentlemen, someone--a kid...probably a white male else there'd be no story here...acted in a socially unacceptable and boorish manner, but locking the stupid little bastard up and trying him in juvenile court?

Pluuuuuuuease...

Let the little shit-head finish growing up and let him keep acting this way and doing this kind of ignorant crap, and then let him go to trade school college and find out that he isn't invited to join a fraternity, and when he buys his first trailer moves in to a neighborhood with a clubhouse and home owner's association let him find that he and his wife get left off of all of the Christmas party guest lists, but don't LOCK THE IDIOT UP for picking up a phone and talking for five seconds.

He didn't yell "FIRE" and cause a stampede...

He was just young and stupid and and I guarandamtee you if ANYONE else of any other RACE/GENDER had done the exact same thing there'd be no NEWS STORY here.

Was it WRONG?

Yes...absolutely YES.

But was it CRIMINAL?

You decide for yourself, but you know where I stand here...

Is it just me?

Am I Considered "Anal Retentive" IF...

Things I Spend Time Thinking About All Day


All I want to know is, does anyone but me manage to write down their grocery list in the order in which they generally encounter the goods they wish to purchase, IN ORDER, from MEMORY, based on the layout of the isles in their favorite Grocery Store?

Problem for me is, Kroger has a "Regular Kroger" a mile or two down Kingston Pike from us in one direction, and in the other direction a little ways there's one of their new "Kroger Marketplaces" which...if you haven't seen one, sells stuff like furniture and other home decorating goods along with fighter aircraft and Electrical Power Co-generation Systems and nuclear weapons produced by the Pakistanis and Iranians.

...OK...I made the part about the aircraft and Co-generation and Atomic stuff up...but still...

Then I'm not even going to get into what happens when I make the occasional trip to a Food World doing my shopping or any other purveyor of Foodstuffs from other lands and planets.

I think that while our Congress is busy forcing me next year to go see Dr. Rashee, the local medical practitioner who attended medical school for twenty years at DeVry Institute or Phoenix University while also working as the pool boy/Gigolo at the local country club about my erectile dysfunction, that they could take the time to pass a few laws that will do all of us "Seniors" and "Seniors in Waiting" some good in our lives.

Why not pass a law that says that every single Grocery Store in the United By-God States of 'Merrica shall have exactly the same layout when it comes to finding Beer or Vegetables or Bologna or Baby Food or Feminine Hygiene products?

Is that too much to ask?

If I want to go on an "adventure" I'll go on vacation and hike my way to the top of Mt. Kilimanjaro in Africa in a "Hover round", or wade the Everglades in a Speedo towing a shopping cart full of dead chickens, or attend a NASCAR race and camp in the infield of the track in an old School bus flying a giant Confederate Flag with a bunch of people who's favorite cheer is "WhooooooHoooo..."

That way I can avoid walking down the isles looking for Asian Hoisine Sauce wasting time only managing to find stuff with Gerber and Massengale on the label.

And while we're talkin''...friend to friend...another thing's bothering me.

Why the heck doesn't the state or federal government...those same bodies responsible for crap like the FCC and the FAA and the E-I-E-I-O and whatever (wait...Old McDonald still handles the E-I-E-I-O part of our government I think...) make every cable company in the continental US--including the satellite companies--do this simple little thing for old men with "remote control amnesia"?

STANDARDIZE THE FREAKING CABLE CHANNELS!!

Is that too much to ask?

Wouldn't it be incredibly simple for everything from... say channel 1 to channel number 69 (or whatever the highest VHF channel is) be actually NUMBERED in each city or cable jurisdiction in the same manner?

Forget having channel #2 be channel #4 and channel number #5 be channel 11, let me poke a button or series of buttons with my thumb and whatever fingers I don't have stuck in some bodily orifice or using to scratch something that's itching and get the results I expect.

Then with these new "digital TV's" and remotes that can access every number ranging from negative to positive infinity, logically place all of the stupid tear jerking Women's channels in a group, and the jock strap sniffing sports freaks sports channels in a group, all of the info nerds stuff and all of the home improvement stuff and everything else in channel groupings so those of us growing ever longer in tooth and shorter in memory can find something while we're up sitting on the toilet watching TV in the restroom reflected off the mirror of some strange motel in a foreign city trying to get over last night's Mexican dinner indiscretions.

I swear to God I can't tell you where anything but Fox News and the weather channel and possibly Food Network is here on my own TV in my own home after living here for nearly TWO YEARS.

But I can go to the Grocery store at Kroger tomorrow, and unless they have remodeled it since last Thursday or Friday, I can buy some stuff which will allow me to cook Asian Baby Back Ribs (already have the ribs) and some spicy Asparagus and some other as yet to be identified side dish and then watch something weird on TV--I don't care what because I can only solve one problem in any given day.

And I'm a bigger man for admitting that problem in the first place, don't you think?

That will be all...for now...

It's Easy To "Cut The Deficit By Half"

When You Quadruple It In Your First Year In Office

You Decide...

Graph stolen from here (and they got it from the Washington Post)

More Random Thoughts And Cogitations

You Don't EVEN Don't Want To Hear/Read What I Really Think...


OK...

Here's a listing of all the reasons that I, as a younger man, would have had a bad weekend this past weekend here at the Turbo Pup Compound on the Banks of the Mighty Tennessee River.

#1. Obama and Reid and Pelosi managed to bribe Stupak "the stupid" and his fellow "pro life" Democratic (non)representatives with an "executive order"...something which can be reversed in the milliseconds of time it takes to sign another "executive order" or reverse by judicial fiat because it's terms aren't reflected in US law...so now everyone living and dead and anywhere in between has guaranteed "healthcare" courtesy of my wallet.

#2 Georgia Tech lost to Ohio State in the NCAA Division I Basketball Tournament.

#3 It started raining before daylight this morning and rained all freaking day on and off and will continue for another two or three days.

But you know what?

I have stuff to do this week professionally which will ultimately get me paid to do it...in SPITE of the the best efforts of certain members of the stupid Imperial Federal Government of the By-God United States of 'Merica's best efforts.

Isn't it truly a sad state of affairs these days when a person has to try to succeed in spite of their government, because I'm fairly certain that our founders wrote the US Constitution in a way where it wasn't the government's job--local or state or Federal--to ensure I had a job or income or housing or even "healthcare."

And regarding "healthcare", for a long time in this country it was up to me and my predecessors to hire someone like this lovely guy:

...or this fellow...



...or even this kid...


...or in the end of hope this politically incorrect medical pioneer...



or God forbid this silly man if we as individuals want to take our chances...



and then if and when things went wrong we were responsible for our decision making process and the cost of the services or non-services delivered, and we didn't expect to be able to run screaming to the mayor or the Governor or the President complaining when we grew an extra big toe or something important like our liver or penis fell out or off of our bodies.

Not so today, because we've slowly abdicated the certification/qualification of everything from the guy that installs our toilets and puts shingles on our roof...to the people pulling our teeth and inserting cameras into our anuses, to some sort of Government entity.

And when things go wrong, instead of accepting responsibility for the problem or poor quality of the services and scope of options we're forced to buy, now their solution is to take further control and further limit our control over the maintenance of something as personal and intimate as our own bodies and minds (minds now being screwed with by "Public" government schools.)

And another thing.

Does anyone but me have a problem with them attaching control of "student loans" to a "healthcare bill."

Just wait, within 20 years you won't be able to study anything the Government doesn't like you studying, and learning anything that the Government doesn't want you to learn---things like history and how fecklessly and obtusely government delivers services, and I can see a time when people that the government doesn't like or approve of their thinking and beliefs being prevented from going to college...even if they can afford to pay their own costs and choose their own curriculum.

We're pretty much SCREWED Ladies and Gentlemen, if this thing passes the Senate and is signed into law unless something miraculous doesn't happen in the next year or so.

And instead of "SCREWED", I'd like to use another word, but you know what I mean anyway...

But in spite of all of that, I had a pretty good weekend anyway. I guess that the Official Government Induced Mind Numbing Process (OGIMN for short) is already taking effect.

Here... Do Cook This

I've Got Camels and Desert Palms In My Kitchen...


I might have mentioned previously on this blog (and on my cooking blog The Redneck Gourmet) that I cook some pretty complicated stuff around here sometimes--stuff with detailed formulas like people use making industrial chemicals and pharmaceuticals.

Then other times I like to fly by the seat of my pants and just do a little reading and Internet research and then have a few cocktails and have it out with myself and my spices and refrigerator, almost dirtying up every single pot and pan and dish in my kitchen in the process.

Last night was one of those nights, and Food Network's Alton Brown and Guy Fieri would have ran away screaming if they saw the process and the mixture of stuff I put together, but I think that it came out pretty dang good in the end.

I guess it was sort of like staging my own version of Iron Chef ... Cast Iron Chef Redneck Chef America North Africa, if you know what I mean.

I call the assemblage...Morrocan Pork Tenderloin with Savory Vegetables and Glazed Dried Fruit Compote.

(somebody probably needs to stop by here and slap me for that name, but then when I stick a couple of spoons full of the stuff into your mouth you might just change your mind...)

Here's the deal if you want to try it, and it's really not that hard if you do a little planning and your pallet likes something besides Burger King and Taco Bell Crap.

First things first, if you are cooking northern African/Southern Mediterranean cuisine, you need to go to the store and buy yourself a mixture of spices which when combined will produce something called Ras el Hanout.

Translated, the term "Ras el Hanout" in Arabic means "Head of the Shop" in English, and in spite of our Geo-political differences these days I've been cooking things from everywhere from Turkey to Morocco for two or three years now and find this basic spice blend or variations thereof to work well as a staple seasoning mix in my kitchen.

The history of the blend says that in the days before Railroads and interstate highways and Federal Express that the guys in northern Africa created these blends of exotic spices--with no specific recipe--from the very best herbs and roots and seeds which they had in their shops at any given time.

Thus once you start making it and cooking with it you can make your own "Ras al Hanout" with things you like the flavor of and leave out the things you don't like smelling or tasting.

My Ras el Hanout, which I put together last fall and stored in my spice cabinet in a big glass jar with a shaker top, included ground Cloves, Cinnamon, Paprika, Cumin, Coriander, (Fresh) Nutmeg, and Turmeric. I think that there was some Cayenne pepper in there somewhere also.

Once you have your version of that spice blend in hand, I swear that you can make cardboard or kitty food taste good on a cracker.

It works with pork or chicken or beef or even sea food as far as I can tell, and your imagination is the limit as far as side dishes you can put with it...rice and Couscous or vegetables and so on.

To duplicate my Dinner for Two and one half (including our little Missy the Turbo Pup) last night you'll need:

Two or three 1" thick closely trimmed Pork Tenderloins

Three or Four small new Red Potatoes...washed and quartered or cubed

Three medium carrots...scraped and sliced as you like them

1/2 medium Red Onion, sliced thin

1 cup sliced button mushrooms

1 apple...I prefer Gala or Fuji Pinks

Two Lemons-sliced into 1/8" to 1/4" slices and seeded

Six Dried Medjool Dates

Six Dried Apricots

1/4 cup white wine

1/4 cup port wine (or other red wine)

two or three tablespoons of Peach or Apricot Jam

One and one quarter cups of prepared Couscous

Now as to the preparation of all of the above stuff into a meal fit for a King an Emir, I rubbed the closely trimmed pork tenderloins with the Ras el Hanout on Friday and left them laying covered in the fridge for 24 hours. You need to give them at least two hours if you don't start things the day before.

Then I chunked up a couple of three or four New Red Potatoes and chopped up some fresh carrots and put them in a pot on the stove top to simmer on low for a half hour to an hour...until fork tender.

Meanwhile, I started preheating my oven to 400 degrees, and in my heavy 13" Lodge Cast Iron skillet I crisped four slices of thick bacon, and over on the cutting board I cubed up a Gala apple and sliced and seeded the Lemons in thin slices.

Once you get the bacon done, pull it out on the side on paper towels to drain, then pour out some of the grease and turn up the heat and put the rubbed pork tenderloins in to sear on as many sides as you can stand watching and waiting for.

Once your tenderloins are seared toss them and the cast iron skillet into the oven to finish.

You can pit your dates or let your dinner guests fish the seeds out of their mouth while you watch...and if your dinner company happens to be female...er...um...

Then over in a stainless steel skillet I take some of the bacon grease and a few splashes of canned chicken stock and start a simmering mixture including the Dried Medjool Dates and Dried Apricots, Mushrooms, and Red Onions and as things reduce I add a few lemon slices and pour in the white wine and then a splash of Port wine and then add the apple cubes apricot/peach jam and keep cooking and simmering and stirring and cooking and simmering and stirring and then...

Once you can tell the interior of your pork is up to about 135 to 140 degrees F (I use a digital instant read thermometer), pull it out of the oven...slice it up (or let it rest a few minutes if you can stand it), then plate everything up on your veggies and Couscous.

You know, Couscous, little itty bitty teeny tiny pastas made with 1-1/3 to 1-1/2 cups of boiling chicken stock simmered over some dried Israeli Couscous (or other Couscous you have on hand.)
You can even use rice I guess if you're lazy or just afraid of Couscous...but finally...

In the end...

Smell it, taste it, and then dump it all out of the pots onto your plate and enjoy it...

I'm going to take a nap now because writing about it all makes me tired...

But PLEASE try it when you have the time.

You'll Like it...

Fire On Beside The Mountain

Massive Lawn Clean Up Efforts...


Everybody look out, because "Burn Permit" in hand, this morning shortly after sunrise (and after downing a pot of coffee or possibly a couple of Bloody Marys) I'm hitting the back yard...chainsaw and electric hedge clippers and pruning loppers in tow on a mission to remove every stick and branch and bramble that is deemed to be out of place within reach of my hands...while standing on top of a 6 foot tall step ladder or my 20' tall extension ladder.

Look West or East or North or South on the horizon (depending on which way you happen to reside relative to the location of the Turbo Pup Compound here on the Banks of the Mighty Tennessee River), and that plume of smoke you see will possibly be from my expert combustionary efforts (is "combustionary efforts" a real word?) today.

Now where's my cigars and lighter...wait...I have time for a nap first...

Fair Warning...Don't Listen To Anything I Say Or Write Here

Insanity Cubed...


One of the reasons that I write so much here on this blog is because I'd like to think that in a million years a thousand years between now and whenever it is that the Democrats and the United Nations finally take over the Internet and scrub it clean of independent political thought and other content like I deliver that people might trip over my ramblings and remember that there once was a crazy guy named Virgil Raymond Rogers, III, and he not only lived in the late 20th and early 21st century in America, but he also had some interesting things to say every now and then.

Sort of like a self glorifying time capsule left in the electronic ether of what we call "the Internet."

Then there's the satisfaction I get in writing down things which are bothering me and having the ability to come back next week or next month or next year and see if there are any trends to my behavior and personality which have been improved in the process...else lost in time and aging dementia.

I realize each day that I could die in a car wreck or suffer a stroke and spend the rest of my earthly existence laying astride a hospital bed peeing and drooling on myself, but at least as it is right now everyone has five or six years worth of written records of the contents and goings on in my neural synapses on semi-permanent record, and thus be able to determine whether they should celebrate my demise or start a campaign to name a national holiday in my memory.

I guess right now unless I invent a cure for the common cold or cancer, the former is more likely than the later...but I digress...

I'm absolutely losing my mind right now wrestling with ongoing technical issues with my business efforts. Just when I solve one problem...technical or commercial...another one pops up and makes me want to pull what's left of the hair from my ever greying, ever balding head.

Hang on...I'm sitting in front of not one but TWO Laptops and the one I'm not writing on is demanding my attention in the process of installing a "USB to Serial" software driver...


AhhhhhhhhHHHHHHHHHH...I'll be back later...

MORE at 6:30 AM

I swear that this stupid PLC software is haunted...because once again after doing something as simple as shipping away my only programming cable to another customer and buying a couple of new replacement ones from the manufacturer, now my computers refuse to talk to my control panel.

So now I'm stuck literally within minutes of having everything finished and I can't make the machines speak to each other.

That's it, where's my really BIG Hammer...

Anybody Want A "Limp Pickle"?

I'm Headin' Toward Happy Hour...


I think that I just came up with a new Shooter Drink which could actually go somewhere given proper promotion and marketing.

As those that know me in real life know, I enjoy the occasional (or not so occasional) "Dirty Martini" made with super chilled premium Vodka with Olive "juice" spashed in for color and flavor.

So fast forward to this afternoon when I'm cleaning up from cooking my German Night extravaganza last night (I call it an "extravaganza" because there were three meats and two vegetables and the Swedish already have the word "Smorgasbord" copyrighted...) and in the process I ended up emptying a jar by eating the last dill pickle...but there was still juice in there...

Then one thing lead to another and I couldn't resist taking a sip of the Dill Pickle Juice, and then I said to myself...I said...

"Self...I bet that there juice would be good tossed on top of some vodka."

And then, being a professional Injuneer and part time scientist and amateur research Chemist, I remembered that it just so happened that I had some 100 proof Vodka in my Freezer for use as a solvent and for other scientific purposes, so in the interest of world piece peace and promoting human welfare the happiness of yuppies and drunks everywhere I did this...

I poured exactly 20 ml of Vodka into a graduated beaker, then added 5 milliliters of Kroger brand Dill Pickle juice to the container, shook it with ice, and proceeded to come back here and risk giving away all my secrets a bunch of stuff which shouldn't make it on to the Internet....

so I'll be going now because I still have Vodka and pickle juice and it's calling me back to the kitchen laboratory.

(I almost forgot...the reason I call the drink "Limp Pickle" is because I believe that's all you'll be left with if you're over 30 and drink more than a couple...go figure...)

New Karaoke Tune

Live From The Banks Of The Mighty Tennessee River Saturday Night...




(That would be the group The Holleys doing their #2 ranked hit in 1972, "Long Cool Woman In A Black Dress"...I'm bumping it down a couple of steps in Key and adding a Harmonica solo...should be interesting...)

I'd Rather Be Dead Than Red On The Head A Banker

...You Better Be A Good One Else Look Out For Me...


Have I mentioned that I generally hate Bankers?

Well...I do...

It's just that simple.

I come by it honestly, but let's just agree that most of my dislike is beyond the scope of this current missive, but still...

I've nothing against the Bank Tellers and the other lowly employees forced to sit around in the bank accepting deposits and issuing Cashiers checks because they have no choice but to follow inane rules and procedures while handing out receipts and lolly pops to children.

I'm talking B A N K E R S...

The idiots who are the so called "decision makers" in our country's financial institutions.

I'm in good company I guess in my disdain, because my fellow writer and idol Mark Twain is quoting as saying this truth ism:

"A banker is a fellow who lends you his umbrella when the sun is shining and wants it back the minute it begins to rain."

My reason for disliking the profession in general and many if not most of the people in it is their poor regard not for my desire to BORROW THEIR MONEY from them, but rather their insidious desire to KEEP MY MONEY FROM ME at every opportunity.

Take the occurrences of this past week, for example.

After being in business for almost five months and having delivered products to customers since January, after waiting what seemed like an interminable amount of time ..."net 60 days"...we finally opened an account in the Corporation's name with a local credit union which I've been doing business with the past two years.

Now mind you I've let them process the funds to buy one house here in town and store the proceeds of the sale of another investment property, and in the span of those 23 months I've never once bounced a check and never had a check I deposited into my account returned at any time.

EVER.

And when I walked in the door last week to open the commercial account I told the branch manager that the reason I was giving them the opportunity to serve my business banking needs was because I assumed that being a long standing customer...someone who had pushed SIX FIGURES through an account with them previously...that they would give me some consideration in processing what would sometimes be large checks without forcing me to go through the government allowed (but not mandated) and much hated "check hold."

You know, the old "check hold" game where a bank takes your money, written on Fancy paper with water marks and security seals and God knows what else, and signed with something besides a color crayon or magic marker, and then proceeds to act like they have to send it by a courier riding a donkey to Philadelphia to the Federal Reserve before releasing the aforementioned funds into your account for your use.

Now everyone with half a brain knows that in today's modern banking system, if you write a check for five cents or five dollars or five hundred thousand dollars that your bank knows about it within 24 to 48 hours and will gladly assess you a $39 fee for "overdraft" if you're 1 cent short on your "available" balance.

So why the heck do these morons and ingrates feel obligated to sit there with a straight face, a WEEK after you made the deposit...

a WEEK after they promised you they'd clear the funds ASAP...

and that same WEEK later tell you about the federal banking rules which allow them to hold the funds for ten days and there is nothing that they can do about it.

What a total, unmitigated, stinking, steaming pile of BS.

I'm probably going down to that credit union (which will remained un-named here in an uncharacteristic fit of personal restraint) next week when all the funds have cleared and withdraw, in CASH, every single penny they have in my name and the company's name and go buy a case of Ball Mason Jars and bury the stash out back in my garden.

(And they're dang lucky all of my guns are in Alabama or else I might just go down there and make a withdrawal this afternoon.)

That will be all...for now...

DAMMIT

Beware The Ides Of March...

"Et Tu...Pelosi?"


I swear to God, ladies and Gentlemen, I'm afraid that Speaker Nasty Pelosi would actually kill and eat her children and grandchildren if she believed it would help her in her effort to get the abortion (excuse the pun) they call "healthcare reform" passed in the US House and Senate.

Notice that I absolutely refuse to capitalize the words "healthcare reform," because it's anything but true medical care reform in any shape or form in my opinion.

It's going to screw things up like you won't believe, and I personally am seriously afraid of its affect on my own condition because, in spite of them telling me I'm going to enjoy "improved, lower cost access" and "removal of lifetime caps" and "elimination of pre-existing condition exclusions"...

I actually think that they're going to look at my crappy history over the past 25 years as someone with Genetic Hyper-coagulativity and just decide that the next time my blood trys to turn to the consistency of Jello they'll just buy me a lovely government issue Pine box and wait for Nature to take it's course.

I'd rather take my chances and pay the costs...as giant as they have historically been...under the current system, than have the government come to YOUR house and screw around with YOUR checkbook and change where you and your mother and your kids go to the doctor in the name of giving me ANYTHING for free or at a reduced cost.

It's just that simple...

Unfortunately there is still a large segment of of our population--legal and illegal--which has no problem having the government come to your house and make you pay for my Coumadine and Heparin IV's when I need them.

If and when that happens, I offer my heartfelt apology because I've done everything I can...phone calls and letters and e-mails...to stop this insanity.

Now getting back to my earlier reference to the Poster Child for Progressive Partisan Insanity--Nasty Pelosi.

I further suggest that if, by some miracle, President Obama finally started listening to the American People and took appropriate charge as the top Executive in the Executive Branch of our Constitutional Government, and in the process decided to end his abdication of power in letting Senate and House Democrats write this constantly changing, constantly evolving "invisible bill", that she would lead an uprising similar to the one staged against Caesar in Rome in 41 BC and assassinate his useless "community organizer" butt.

(The FINE PRINT: For those reading this and working with the CIA, the FBI, and/or the Secret Service, take note that I'm not advocating the assassination of an American President nor am I supporting a legislative/judicial/military uprising, I'm just saying that I believe that the egos out there in various elevated office are dangerous and I'd be worried if I were in the mix and stepped out of line...It's probably amazing how far sHrillary Clinton's $1000 high heel can penetrate your skull if she walked by and found you already knocked to the ground...)

Is it just me???

Lost Star Wars Clips

People With Waaaaaaayyyy Too Much Time On Their Hands...

Not Still Winter

Not Yet Spring...


My bones are aching for some sunshine these days...at least that's what I've diagnosed the problem to be.

It's been crappy and cool for over a week now and with the time change I'm not only mentally cranky, I'm physically about to jump out of my skin in anticipation of being able to go outside and get some things done here on the property.

The house is set pretty far back on the lot off the street so we have over twice as much front yard--maybe three times as much--as we have back yard so the private areas not visible from the street and the neighbors properties are at a premium, and thus far with all of the construction and renovation and general fooling around I've done the first two summers we're probably in violation of numerous municipal codes and home-owners' association rules if we still had an active homeowners association.

Which we don't because everyone got old and all the kids graduated and moved away and they let an idiot with a backhoe tip his rig over and cave in the side of the neighborhood pool long before we moved in here, but I digress...

So I've spent the past two years whacking away at overgrown shrubbery like is common on houses near 50 years old and burning piles of branches and leaves and putting bags and bundles of stuff out on the curb for Waste Managment to pick up once in a while, and now I can see the end in sight, a rennovated landscape where I can actually start hauling new plants INTO the property and growing them rather than having to kill them and cut them down and then pay to have someone haul them away to the landfill.

A number one priority is to design and build some sort of "composting facility"--a group of two or three bins constructed of wire mesh and pressure treated lumber which will allow me to process the inevitable leaves and other folage which will be produced as a byproduct of growing a garden this year.

Then there's the expansion of the fenced area in the back yard, something which started out 24' x 24' for the Turbo Pup's use and then grew to 24' x 36' last year with the addition of two more 12 foot panels and the relocation of the end wall.

I guess I'm going to torture myself again and go rent a gas powered auger and drill three more holes in the ground another 12 feet further down the property line and end up with a fenced area that is roughly 24' by 48' in size....actually 32 feet wide on one end because I'm extending the fence all the way up to the back of the house in the process.

Then because we have rabbits the size of footballs hopping around everywhere here munching on everything in sight that's green or light brown, I'll have to put some kind of Chicken Wire or other material around the base of the perimeter to keep the little buggers away from my garden crop.

It pisses me off that you have to get a "burn permit" even here outside the city limits in Knox County, TN (my grandfathers are turning over in their graves because of that), but our neighbor got one last week which is good for a month so in return for using their "burn barrel" I'm handling processing all of their stuff laying around in piles on the line between our properties while I mix my own stuff in with theirs in the process.

Isn't it a stupid world when people have to ask their government for permission to build a fire outside?

I hear that in California the sniveling, booger eating, tree hugging, patchouli stinking, tie dyed hippy politicians won't let you cook on a charcoal grill or have a wood fire in our own fireplace INSIDE your own house in some areas of the state.

I guess if I lived in California when my house burned down they'd have wanted to come over and write me a ticket for having a fire without a permit, and if they found me roasting marshmallows on a stick over smoldering ashes when the fire department left I'd have gotten another one for grilling out in a restricted area.

$#@%ing liberal/progressives...

can't live with them, and it's apparently against the law to try to live without them because just like integrated schools in the 1960's, they bus them around to places like Eastern Tennessee and southern Alabama in electric powered mini-vans so everyone can enjoy them.

And speaking of electric vehicles, does anyone but me find it somewhat funny that more than a few of the stupid computerized "drive by wire" Toyota Prius...battle emblem of the sniveling, tree hugging, booger eating et.al. greenie weenies world wide--is accused of losing it's mind on a regular basis and crashing into stuff?

You don't hear about any mean old ever greying, ever balding bastards driving gas hog Chevy Suburbans with 454 cubic inch V-8 engines crashing into stuff out of control while getting NINE MILES PER GALLON ON REGULAR UNLEADED do you?

No...

Because we won't...

We'll just keep on putting up with the liberalization/feminization/deterioration of America, while being forced to eat our portion of government dirt and cheese and paying taxes and sitting around crapping our pants and muttering "I told you so" while beating the TV set with our walking sticks.

Geeze...I started out trying to write a little this morning from a positive perspective, but things didn't work out and I have to go now and stop thinking about this before my head explodes.

Government Clocks

Keeping Time According To Idiots In Washington DC...


On a positive note, I love this time of year when the "official" time lets me have daylight past 7PM on my clock.

On a negative note, it totally pisses me off that we've mindlessly let the government take control of stuff like our own methods of tracking the passage of the minutes of our lives and even the beating of our hearts...a rapid pulse being something the government will soon come knocking at our doors complaining about if the Obama/Pelosi/Reid "Health care plan" passes...

The older I get, I just seem to get crazier and more insane by "polite cultural standards" when it comes to my reactions to people in a state capitol or Washington DC telling me what the numbers should be on my clock or what the balance should be in my checkbook.

I guess that I'm just a mean old bastard...and I pride myself in perfecting the standard against which everyone else will be compared.

Mission Impractical Impossible

Obscure Old MAD Magazine Cartoon References...






RIP Mr Graves...

I'm "Extra" Inarticulate

A Pain In The Butt Writes About...What?


Sorry Ladies and Gentlemen, but I've probaby written about 10,000 words here in the past week which on second thought I haven't allowed myself to publish for public consumption on this blog.

It doesn't in the end diminish the value of writing them, it just keeps me from offending the delicate sensibilities of some of my regular readers and family and the occasional random visitor who ends up stopping by.

In my defense, as one of my favorite Authors...Samuel Clemmons once was quoted as saying:

"Under certain circumstances, profanity provides a relief denied even to prayer..."

Or this one...

"When angry count four; when very angry, swear."

In the end, I know that everything will be OK, and even if it isn't what I want, it will still have to do because after 50 years I've learned that things "are what they are" and life "is what it is..."

Don't worry...I'll probably be back full form within the week after regrouping and re-organizing and re-establishing a new head of steam, and until then...

Regards Y'all

Cheer For The Yellow Jackets

GT Plays Duke


The final game in the Atlantic Coast Conference starts in about 15 minutes, and much to my surprise my beloved GT Yellow Jackets' team is still standing after starting play Thursday.

After 33 seasons I've learned not to get too excited and cocky, but a victory over Duke today could be the first time in 17 years they win the conference title (the others coming in 1985, 1990, and 1993.)

Too much to hope for probably, but you can't blame an old Ramblin' Wreck for dreaming I guess...

MORE at 4 PM.

Oh well, Duke took GT 65-61 but Tech can hold their head up high because it wasn't a blowout...and there's always "next year" I guess

A Week In Computer Hell

My Face Has Been Removed From Facebook...


(Blogging live from my underground dungeon computer complex somewhere on the banks of the Mighty Tennessee River)

So, Ladies and Gentlemen, I started out the week with some kind of stupid little piss-ant computer hemorrhoid on the server PC which spent all day and night popping up telling me it was on my computer's butt and wanting to sell me some kind of salve to smear on the hurting area of my technical life.

Norton/Symantic couldn't find it and therefor couldn't fix it within the first 36 hours of infestation, but somehow either by being on the ball for once or accidentally Microsoft offered a "system update" that my Vista operating system downloaded and installed all by it's stupid self and as a result the festering computer canker sore/rectal intrusion seems to have gone away, although the machine is still belching and farting a little when I try to run important things like AutoCAD.

Then this morning an old friend from High School reported that someone was impersonating me on Facebook saying that I was stranded in London and asking for money to get home.

WTF?

Anyone that knows me knows that the last place on the entire planet I would go is London, England, with Paris, France following along a close second...even behind Opp, Alabama or Morocco or Turkey or Greece or anywhere else on the European or Asian Continents.

Then another friend down on our little island called me and said some woman had contacted him, referencing me, and wanting to offer her services.

Dangit, where were these women when I could have used them, and why didn't they call me first?

Then I got this e-mail from "the Facebook Team":

Hi ,

Your account has been temporarily suspended for security purposes. Our systems indicate that your Facebook account has been compromised by cybercriminals attempting to impersonate you. These criminals often will try to trick your friends into sending them money by claiming that you are stuck in a far away location and need assistance. It is possible that your email account was compromised as well. As such, we have sent this email to all email accounts recently associated with your account. Obtaining access to a victim's email is one of the primary ways these cybercriminals have been operating. Please take the following steps to regain control of your account:

1. Select new, unique passwords for any email addresses associated with your Facebook account.

2. Respond to this email to get the account verification process started.

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By the time I re-read their correspondence...realizing that FACEBOOK was having a problem and requiring ME to take action to correct it...I was tired and cranky and as a result I wrote this back to them...

**** you ***holes...I hardly used your stupid "social networking" service and if it takes more than 5 minutes for me to jump through the hoops to correct something which happened on your system and servers then I won't be back.

I write my own blogs and own and pay my own domain names and I didn't do anything which caused YOUR SYSTEM to be compromised, so get it fixed and get it right and make it easy or let's just say goodbye...

DAMMIT



at this point I assume that I'm probably banned from Facebook for life, even though whatever happened happened on their end of the Internet universe, not on my machine I don't believe.

Regardless, I did follow up and changed all of my passwords on important stuff like bank accounts and stuff but here's my point with Facebook.

I DON'T REALLY CARE.

I write this blog and my cooking blog The Redneck Gourmet, and I'm on the verge with a little more financial success in 2010 of buying my own domain names for my company and my personal use and leaving Blogger and Intuit behind. While many of my friends and family are just now discovering the Internet and beginning to do simple blogging by using Twitter and Facebook, I'm an old man in the Internet world.

My ex-wife had an Internet account while working with the Georgia Tech Research Institute way back in 1984, and I had a MCI mail account I set up with my company in 1985.

I remember when there was nothing on the Internet but a bunch of nerds sending Wordstar files and Lotus 123 spreadsheets back and forth in between comma delimited Dbase III database files.

There was no "social networking" and no "retail transactions" and no pictures of naked women to be found unless you liked printing out something on a dot matrix printer produced with periods, commas, and other ASCII characters.

Something like this made a young computer nerd's day back then...



So any way, right now now I'm afraid to use the server for any financial transactions for fear that there might still be some keystroke logger or something lurking around under the surface.

I'm tempted to buy a new small external hard drive, do a full back up of all of my photos and word processor/spreadsheet files, and then wipe the hard drive clean and re-install a copy of Windows XP professional which I bought last year and be done with Vista in this building...because Vista SUCKS.

Did I mention that MICROSOFT WINDOWS VISTA SUCKS?

It not only SUCKs, it TOTALLY SUCKS.

Only problem is I'll have to spend half a Saturday re-installing things like Photoshop CS3 and AutoCAD and then downloading Google Earth and the latest editions of Adobe and all of the zillions of other programs I use on a daily basis.

I swear people, it's times like this when I'm tempted to rip off my clothes, put on a loin cloth and moccasins boat shoes, smear my face and chest with colored mud and clay, and go live in the woods for a month just to prove that I can do it again (picture the scenes out of the movie "Predator" with me being the Arnold with a ever greying, ever balding head and a pot belly.)

...shudder....

I don't LIKE it, but I realize that we're all in a world of hurt when the sniveling, bed wetting, tye dyed, booger eating, tree hugging socialists finally overload our infrastructure and it all comes crashing down around our heads one day.

I admit it...I'm ADDICTED to my COMPUTER(S).

OH...oh...ah....eee...oh...OH..OHHHHHHH...AaaaaaaahhhhHHHHHHHH

THUNK (the sound of me falling over backwards out of my chair)

Nothing To Say

So I Won't Say It...

Garden Takes Shape

I'll Swap A Cow For Some "Magic Beans"...


I don't believe that I've ever mentioned here on the blog that the family who built our house in 1963 and owned it until we bought it in 2008 also owned a small farm here in Eastern Tennessee, so when we moved into this place we weren't surprised that the property was literally infested with wooden and metal poles and stakes and other artifacts left over from them having planted and grown an extensive assortment of vegetables and other ornamental plants over the past four plus decades.

There's a vegetable plot, covered with "landscape cloth" with holes cut every 12 to 24 inches which covers an area about 12' wide x 30' long, out in rear corner of the back yard.

Thus I regret to admit that through a combination of being gainfully employed and busy as heck the first season, and just being generally lazy the second year...2009, that best intentions aside our well intended efforts to extend the gardening traditions around here have basically consisted of growing a few potted plants and watching our "lawn technician" mow the grass and assault us with the hated weed eater and leaf blower every week or so.

All of that history ruefully behind me, this year I'm resolute that things are going to be different in the area of home gardening on several fronts.

First of all, with all of the cooking that goes on around here on a regular basis, a herb garden plot could definitely enhance our efforts while at the same time possibly saving a little money in the process.

Things like Basil and Cilantro and Parsley are staples in the bottom trays of my Fridge and I end up throwing away or drying probably 25% to 30% of what we buy, so having fresh stuff growing outside the back door would pay back immediately and those kind of plants basically take care of themselves because they--in spite of all of the hype--are actually WEEDS.

Next there's things like Tomatoes and Tomatillos, stuff we use for sauces and salsas and which are just plain fun to produce. I find the Roma and "Bunch type" hybrid tomatoes to be much more useful to try to grow at home according to my Googling efforts, although a couple stalks of the "Better Boy" or "Best Boy" or "Beefsteak" variety sandwich sized slicers will probably make it into the dirt here in the end.

I don't think that we have enough room to do beans or peas or any other of the "staked" varieties, but I have a spot where I want to toss out some different varieties of Summer and Winter Squash and let them fight it out for space, and possibly do a couple of hills of Watermelons, and I have a package of ...get this...SIX "GIANT PUMPKIN" seeds which I paid almost 50 cents each (that would be PER SEED...not PER PACK) for last year and never planted.

These so-called "Dill's Atlantic Giant" seeds are supposed to be capable of producing pumpkins which weigh between 400 and 500 pounds each.

A FIVE HUNDRED POUND PUMPKIN?

I guess that's better than growing a bean stalk going up out of sight outside my deck, into the clouds, and having to screw around with all of that "Fee Fie Foe Fum...English Man's Blood stuff..."

Me and the Turbo Pup would probably pee on ourselves and everything else in sight when the "not-so Jolly Green Giant" came stomping down...you know?

But then again I guess that on a positive note managing to actually grow something alive a gourd that sized could get me on the local news without involving the police or fire department unless the thing fell over or rolled over me while trying to move it into the kitchen.

I've previously handled and carved a 140 pounder back on SSI in 2005 or 2006, so IF I ever manage to grow something which weighs that much I'm considering hollowing it out, putting a tag and tires on it, and hitting the road towing it behind the old Chevy Suburban doing carnivals and circus side shows.

Does anybody know...is there a Redneck version of "Cirque du Soleil?"

Oh yeah...we call it the "County Fair" down in these parts here in the South.

Any way, I think that you could almost LIVE inside a 500 pound pumpkin, you know?.

Back to gardening in general, basically anything else included beyond the above listed vegetable/fruit inventory, with the exception of possibly some hot and sweet peppers, has yet to congeal/coagulate within the confides of my hyperactive mind.

Wait...no...I forgot...I also need to plant some Onions and Garlic and Shallots...got to do something to keep my breath from being all fresh and minty...

As then as is usual, now I have to do an AutoCAD drawing of everything overlayed on our residential plot plan. And there will be a surveying crew involved (survey crew = me and little Missy the Turbo Pup and Pat running around outside with my 100' tape measure, a can of OSHA orange paint, some wooden stakes, and a giant roll of string), and then there are the endless Bills of materials...and a rental soil tiller and...

Man...I get tired just trying to write about it all...

New Hobby

I'm Learning To Walk Like These Guys...





(Someone call all the King's Horses and Men 911 when I'm through with my lessons)

Chili Withdrawal

I'm Perfecting Being Useless...


So after being out of town for five days and basically wasting Monday waiting on some people to respond to questions and get me paperwork, I ended up working my butt off yesterday getting caught up on some personal and business stuff, and about 5:30 PM managed to get four more rebuilt valves packaged and out the door to FedEX in the process.

Now since 3 AM this morning I've managed to get all of my paperwork done including the invoice for yesterday's shipment and the job files have everything punched on my little micro three hole punch (I've got to buy a big honkin' three hole paper punch before I lose my mind) and organized in their little tabbed binders and so now I can settle back into my normal lethargic existence.

Please excuse me because I just might doze off here at the keyboard...but I digress...

Not to brag, but it's supposed to rain all week here in Knoxtown so working outside on the house is out (and I've basically replaced and painted everything in arm's reach inside the building in the past 23 months,) so here's a look at my carefully considered plans for the balance of my morning. (I know that some out there might pity me in my slovenliness because I actually aspire to conduct myself this way, but I offer no apology because I have so much time invested in perfecting the process.)

5:30 to 6:00 AM.........finish blogging and fooling around on the Internet

6 PM until 7 AM...........wallow around in my bed with my dog watching FOX and Friends in the morning

7 AM until 8 AM.......doze watching FOX and Friends

8 AM until 11 AM............Doze while listening to talk radio

11 AM until...zzzzzzzZZZZZZZZZZZ....snort...snore...