Adventures in Home Taxidermy

Kx and I were at the local steakhouse for a nice dinner tonight and while waiting in the bar for our table, looked up and saw this...

By the look on his face he is either....

A Surprised to be up there.
B. Terrified of something or other..
C.  Not the sharpest tool in the shed.
D.  All of the above...
E.  None of the above, but whoever stuffed this cat had either a strange sense of humor, or was just as surprised as the bobcat to have something to actually stuff in the first place.

Whatever the issue....   it had to be this person's first because I've never seen such a goofy look on a dead cat's face.....

Belle

Guns Welcome Sign increases business!!

Bluegrass Bruce  posted up an interesting little story on his blog.  He sent an email to me and pointed it out to me.  Bruce, thank you for reading our blog and welcome to the blogroll!!!  

You can find the story here .

On a side note, a bank in Chappel Hill, Texas had been robbed several times within a month or two and they posted a similar sign.  Interestingly enough, the robberies stopped.

Amazing what happens when you allow encourage law abiding citizens to exercise their right to self defense by keeping and bearing arms, in your establishment.  You increase traffic and suddenly your place of business becomes a much safer place.

Also, I can recall back in the 90's car jackings in the Houston area were on the rise.  It seemed that every night on the news there was at least one in town that was reported.  Often the owner of the car was at a stop light and pulled from their car and either killed if they resisted or left standing there while the perp drove off.

Once the concealed carry law went into effect and people were getting their licenses to carry....  well, car jackings decreased significantly.

Again, when you allow encourage people to exercise their right to self defense, violent crime tends to decrease and your neighborhood is a much safer place.


Belle

Gray hair and computers do not mix well

Actually that is a misstatement.
People and computers do not mix well...from a security standpoint.

Anything a human hand touches will get fucked up to some degree. That is more absolute than taxes or death.

One of my very senior partners emailed today to tell me he ran the computer "cleaner" program my part time IT guy put on his computer and now it was asking him for money to "clean" his computer.
He was on the intertubes and clicked the pop up that told him his computer was infected.
Similar name to the malware program we do use, so he clicked away.*

My gray haired users fuck up their computers because of ignorance.

My twenty something users fuck up their computers because of stupidity, and "OH! A Shiny Thing!"

I see all kinds of quips on the net about how adept the younger generations are with computers. Hell I can't figure this out, I'll get my ten year old to fix it.
It is a lie.  Yes, they know how to get this app and that app and how to stream music on their iphone.
Yet, they still have to find the email with the link to click for their timesheet so they can get paid.

Really? That's how you get to your timesheet?  Let me show you how to make an icon on your desktop with a quick link that will get your right there.

We are still cavemen, we just have higher tech clubs.

My network would be pristine and perfect if the "users" did not have to touch it.

* Years ago, pre-pentium days, when we first got Winders, he clicked the excel icon and it did not open right away.
So he clicked it again, and again...and again. He called me and said his computer was not working right.
As I arrived at his desk, I witnessed about twenty-seven instances of excell cascade across the screen.
PIBCAC
"May I have your chair?"
click "X", Click "X" twenty-seven times.
" if the program does not open right away, wait for a minute"
"ok, thanks Kx"

He's a very healthy cat

So said the vet when Belle took TC in for a check and to get his nuts cut.
Well, except for all the scabs from claw marks on his head and shoulders and the abscessed bite wound on his front leg.
Oh, and the..gak...tapeworm...in his mouth.  First time i've ever heard of a Vet uttering the word, "gross", but I have to agree.

The Vet says the locations of his fight wounds point towards him being aggressor.
He adopted us by seige and he protects his territory aggressively.

I'm waiting for the remaining testosterone in his system to wear off.  He needs to chill out a bit.
Giving him his pain meds is no fun. Why can't they make that stuff taste like fish?

I have been there

I know for fact it is real.
A friend emails confirmation from the road:

Also: have you ever wondered...via instapundit

Dragons in the kitchen....

I just thought this was too damned funny.....

A day without a meeting is like...

Totally productive!
I loath meetings. The decisions and useful information that can be distilled out of a 6 hour meeting could be accomplished in twenty minutes or so if the participants were willing to make a decision.
However, plausible deniability seems to be a fundamental defense tactic.
" If I make a decision, and it goes South....I could get in trouble. Egads!  Quick, deflector shields UP!

I've had two whole days in a row with only one short meeting. Yesterday I got a butt load done. At the end of the day* I got in my car and realized my stress level had gone down noticeably.
Today I got a butt load done and was feeling quite peppy at the end of a 10 hour day as I got into my car.

I've come to realize meetings are sucking the life out of me. I've known, and do know people that actually love going to meetings. They tend to be the ilk who's one contribution to the discourse is, "If we used Fedex Ground delivery that would only cost $2.67."



* Stop me if you've heard this preface in a meeting before,  "At the end of the day" is the preamble to, "We've run out of time, the deadline is TOMORROW, Please make a fucking decision!"

Fishing is soooo relaxing....

Okay not really so much when you're on a boat.  Nope no relaxation about it unless you hire the boat and they have their own deckhands.....

Yes, this is Belle, deckhand for the BAR boating and fishing trips.  Kx is of course the captain, since he has way more experience at all things nautical than I, especially when it comes to being at the helm.  Years ago, while I have learned to pilot a boat and I do pretty well, it was decided that  I really am good at all the grunt work that's involved in boating.

I am always in charge of the anchor, both deploying and pulling up the anchor.  I am also always in charge of or better said really, I am THE BAR standard and nonstandard methods of unsticking the boat as referred to by Kx in his previous post.  Here let me explain these methods to you.

The standard BAR method for unsticking the boat is for when it's a typical sticking such as, but not limited to:

1. Trapped in the mud due to anchoring close to shore to find the fish in salt grass or other in water structure close to shore.
2.  In the sand when the boat is intentionally beached for fishing or fun purposes.
3.  Trapped in the mud simply because there is a low tide and the navigator (oh yeah that's me too using a GPS and a map) is just slightly off course.

The standard BAR method for unsticking the boat consists of Kx at the helm, barking at deckhand to get to the front of the boat.  Deckhand then takes the depth sounder (otherwise known as an oar) and uses it to push the boat out of the mud while the captain is at the helm maneuvering the boat using the wheel and the engine.

The non-standard BAR method for unsticking the boat is used after at least 20 minutes of standard method being tried.  This method consists of Kx at the helm, deckhand finally throwing up her hands and saying, screw this and laying depth sounder on the deck and going overboard to push and 'manhandle' the boat off of sandbar or out of mud while Kx is expertly maneuvering the boat using the wheel and the engine.

So, after having read Kx's account of events on our 'relaxing' fishing trip, you can see that really it wasn't very relaxing until we got home, ate dinner and for me personally, after I took a muscle relaxer and had two glasses of wine.  I was so sore when we got back to the house that even my eyelashes hurt.

Hubby and I, are really a good team on the boat.  Though when the kids were small they would think that we both lost our minds because there is a lot of raised voices and creative cussing going on.. but really if I am ever in a jam, then it's Kx that I would always want in my corner..  thank goodness I married him!

I really have nothing else to add about our outing other than it was great to be down there despite the issues we had and I can't wait to get back down there...

Away for a year and everything changes

Plans work perfectly until they meet reality.
Belle and I headed down to the coast to do some fishing for the first time in well over a year.

Let's just say that pretty much everything that could have gone wrong did.
I'll try the abridged version.
* Full Moon Friday night - more on this later
* Favorite restaurant out of bidness.
* Backup restaurant lost liquor license.
* Cut from Caney Creek to Intercoastal:    Cut is now silted to 12" deep. Stuck the boat, slowly thankfully. Boat in front of us and boat in back of us stuck as well. (I am amongst good company)
* Deploy standard BAR boat unsticking protocol.
* Air was dead still, surf was still too high to get out in the gulf and fish the sandbars. damnit.
* Seaweed moving on the incoming tide was immense in the channels nearby.  Got a Bite! No. Wait. just a ten pound clump of seaweed.
* Tidal current shifted the boat while anchored onto a mud shelf, boat stuck again.
* Deploy standard BAR boat unsticking protocol.
*  Back to the intercoastal to head 6 or 7 miles west wherein we snagged a sizable sheet of plastic floating subsurface on the lower unit that plowed copious amounts of water OVER the stern. Brain says, " I don't remember the boat doing this...something must be wrong.
*  Clear Plastic.  Decide to call it a day.
* Change mind on the way back and decide to hit the bay through the really narrow and shallow cut.
* Stick Boat.
* Deploy standard BAR boat unsticking protocol.
* Ease across bay, fish bird island...nothing.
* Head to the south shore of the barrier island separating the bay from the gulf. Nothing.
* Really decide to call it a day.
* Stick the boat on the way back through the really narrow and shallow cut to the canal.
* Deploy standard BAR boat unsticking protocol.
*  Barge traffic now looks like rush hour interspersed with shrimpers too lazy to hit the deep parts of the bay pulling nets in the intercoastal.  WEEEEEE!
*  I think I've figured out where the deeper part of the cut from the intercoastal to Caney Creek is on the way back.
* Stick boat for a good half hour.
* Deploy Nonstandard BAR boat unsticking protocol.  Belle is likely to post on this later as well. You could never ask for a better deck hand.
*  Belle brought some truly awesome steaks which pretty much made all the bad day go away.
* The two things that did go right is I did not trash the lower unit on the boat while sticking it and the engine did not crap out on us. (been there, done that, got the sunburn scars to prove it, once 30 miles out in the Pacific...not my boat.)



* Full moon. When the moon is full, the fish feed at night and lay up fat and happy during the day.
We know this, but we had not been down to fish in over a year and we were going FISHING DAMNIT.

I think I've missed two other boat stickings and omited some other miscellaneous shit that went wrong, but that's enough for one post.

Can't wait to get back down there again! 

R & R

On the water.

Peer Reviewed, no less

The climate "scientists" that have foisted the global warming hoax upon us have forever given science in general, a black eye in my personal opinion.
Just about any report that comes out regarding a "scientific study" I look at with skepticism now.

"Peer Reviewed"  scientific papers just don't carry the same weight they used to IMHO, considering the Peer Review process appears to have a history of being rigged.  

 Today I find this is not limited to the climate sciences.

60 scientific articles retracted.    I find my skepticism reinforced rather than abated.

Doing my civic duty

Jury duty tomorrow.
So far I'm batting a thousand.
I've yet to be selected. This even includes a federal jury where I was on call for a week.
I suspect it is because I am unequivovating in my responses to loiya's questions.  One set of eyebrows will go up, the other set into a scowl.
The scowl has historically struck me from the pool.
And then I'm on my way with the rest of my day.

Mindless amusement.

Happy 4th Ya'll.  I'm certainly enjoying the down time.

Playing "Red Dead Redemption" loaned to me by Son.  Third person action game on the Xbox 360.

Things are not going so well.

So Far:
I've ridden my virtual horse all over the map with out a clue as to what I am supposed to do.
Been gunned down by the town's people.*
Accidentally bought a whore house.** and now I'm broke.



*Not my fault. I was just practicing my six gun draw. Ok, I was out in the street and the auto-aim thing targeted a guy.  To my surprise, he drew and started shooting me. So I shot him.  The whole town chased me and shot me down like a mangy dog.

** Also not my fault.  Blue dot on the map. Blue "X" when I arrived at the waypoint and a HUD display popped up that read "purchase". So, I did.  Normally, dots on maps are objectives, not money pits.

I suspect there's a deep moral lesson to be learned here, but it's escaping me at the moment. I'm busy. I need to find some wanted posters and go kill some bad guys.

Back on the BAR homefront....

On Sunday I began getting a shooting pain in my neck, up into my head.  Turns out I have a pinched nerve and it is causing my neck now to be numb.  I'm on meds for it, but will see what happens with that..

Today, KX was putting on his socks.  He was moaning and groaning and wincing in pain.  The conversation went something like this:

Kx -  "Ugh, ooh ow..moan groan, grumble"
Belle - "My goodness are you okay?  What is the matter with you?"
Kx - "I have this pain in my hip and am having trouble putting on my socks!" (wincing and groaning)
Belle - "well geez, between your hip and my neck, I'm a pain in the neck and you're a pain in the ass, aren't our kids lucky?"

Laughter.


Hope everyone has a great 4th!  Happy Independence Day!!!


Belle