Talk about fun and games!

My wife's ankle has now been broken for 40 days.  That is a long time to be confined to a recliner and a wheelchair and it is getting pretty tough on her.  She is doing everything she can to remain positive but pain every day when you are just sitting in a recliner has to be tough on anyone.  We have another 10 days before we see her surgeon again; that will be 6 weeks from the operation and we are hoping that she will be ok'd for more regular life.  She still has 2 open sores from the operation so they need care at least once a day.

I am learning about all the things she does on a regular basis from preping meals to cutting flowers for the table.  AND I'm getting to learn to do some of those things myself.  That's where the 'fun and games' come in.  I've always done a certain amount of the cooking but 100% is a different experience.  And I've always bought the flowers but never had to cut them.  Grrr!  That is a pain in the ass!

The funniest thing is that our dog just doesn't know what's happened.  My wife is his favorite person but now all she is doing is touching him a few times a day with her fingertips.  No treats, no fondling, no feeding, no throwing his toys for him to chase:  he just doesn't understand.  He just curls up on his place and sulks.

Gotta go.  Take care & keep washing those hands!

Well, another month gap! Lazy fool!

 I have to admit that I don't have a lot to share in this blog but not making it every couple weeks or so is just criminal.  Sorry.  Mostly we have been transitioning to cooler weather.  We even got some precipitation in the last couple days so we have snow on Mount Charleston.  That's the re-fill for our aquafier so we are always happy to see that.  Seeing 10 feet would be great but I imagine it is only a couple feet.  I actually looked the snow level up and apparently it varies between 8 inches and 160 inches!  Well, we can but hope.

Our dog, Gus, has had a problem with his right front paw since we got him in February.  He's had 8 or 10 different medications, both oral and applied to the paw.  We finally asked our vet to operate on his paw and see what is going on.  She didn't find anything specific but there were some poorly healed scars and some crud in his foot all of which she cleaned out.  Of course we had more salve and bandages which did not make him a happy camper.

I'm  happy to say that this seems to have done the trick.  He is still receiving medication but he's lost the cone and generally is just ignoring his foot just like a dog should do.  

Our town had it's annual Balloon Festival.  It was a bit too windy for much ballooning though.  I did get a couple of shots but usually you will get a shot with 4 or 5 balloons fairly close together.

We have also decided that we may as well get rid of our 31' travel trailer.  It is 12 years old and moving it around isn't as easy for us as it was back in the day.  (There is quite a difference between 62 and 74!)  Anyway, rather than fool around trying to sell it we've decided to donate it to the American Legion Vehicle Donation operation.  So far it is still in the back yard but we are hoping that it will be gone before Xmas.  It is still in good shape so we are hoping that they will get a nice amount for it.  We'll see.  This afternoon we will be going out and taking photos of it for them and unloading all the 'stuff':  plates, glasses, cooking utensiles and who knows what else.  There is even a certain amount of canned food that we'll probably just pitch since it is at least 2 years old!  Fun and games.

I'll end with a photo of something someone put on the back window of their car.  You can tell me what it means!

Take care.  Keep that social distancing and washing those hands.  Hopefully I'll get back here fairly soon but if I don't; have a Merry Christmas and may 2023 be a great year for us all!

A little trip!

 If you've read much of this blog at all you know my wife and I really love to travel.  But now we have a dog and were unsure about what kind of a traveler he might be.  We wanted to give him a trial so we planned a little trip to Bishop, CA.  We decided to drive west across Death Valley then pick up highway 395 and go up to Bishop.  Oddly Google Maps says it is 223 miles and coming back via a different route is also 223 miles!  Oh well.

So last Tuesday we headed out for a planned 3 day trip.  It turned out really well.  I've never been in that part of the country and it was really quite beautiful and a bit strange.  It's hard to tell from the maps but 395 runs quite close to the mountains on the west and a small river, the Owens River, on the east.  Because of the river it is also quite green with lots of farming.  I took this photo of the mountains when we stopped for moment.

I have to admit that I didn't get any photos of the river.  It was quite small and I just didn't manage to get a good shot of it.  My wife had made room reservations at a motel in Bishop and we found it with no problem.  It was a nice place to have the dog but I really couldn't recommend it otherwise!  They had fake wood floors that had seen much better days and the door had definitely been broken into on several occasions.  However we didn't really want a fancy place in case Gus decided to 'mark his territory'.  It turns out he just did his business on his leash outside just like you would want him to do.  We ended up having a cheese and salami dinner in our room.

Wednesday morning we headed up 395 a bit more to visit Mono Lake.  Mono Lake is a saline soda lake which ends up with really odd salt formations.  It was quite interesting.

Then we moved south again to stop in Mammoth Lakes for lunch.  The Mammoth Ski Area is nearby and we got a real tree fix.  We stopped at Liberty Sports Bar & Grill partially because they had outdoor seating and we could bring Gus.  It turned out to be a great stop.  The food was excellent and the beer was pretty good too!  They even came up with a bowl of water for Gus.  After lunch we drove back to Bishop and just looked around town a bit.  For dinner we found a Mexican restaurant with outdoor seating but unfortunately it wasn't as much of a hit.

Thursday was our day to drive home and we wanted to take highway 168 for a couple reasons.  It is not heavily used AND it leads to the home of the Bristlecone Pine up in the Inyo National Forest.  We decided we'd try the road, it was paved, and if it was ok we might make it up to visit some of the pines.  Well, it was narrow, totally curvy, constantly going up and had no guardrails but there wasn't much traffic so we made it!  We looked around a bit but they recommend that older folk not spend too much time at the altitude.  In fact my wife said her vision was kind of off at first but it cleared up after half an hour or so.  Anyway I took a few photos and we headed back down.

Of course I had to catch a photo of the GPS showing our altitude!

10,027 ft (3,056 m) - a record for the truck anyway!  There were some good views coming down the mountain but we also met 4 or 5 vehicles coming up.  Who knew we were such early risers.  Anyway we were back to 168 going east.  We got to 266 and kept going east.  We went through a town we've heard of, Lida, which turned out to be 4 or 5 houses just off the road.  Finally, about 11:00 we got to US 95.

US 95 is a major north-south highway around here and it was busy!  There were lots of semi trucks and to make it better they are working on the road.  We made it most of the way home before we got stopped for about 15 minutes waiting for one-way traffic coming from the other direction.  In the end we got home about 2:30 pm.  

Really it was quite a good trip.  Gus, the dog, turns out to ride in the back seat quite quietly.  He acted well at the motel and was just fine in the restaurants.  So, now when we want to go visit the kids, we don't have to worry about him.  What a deal!

Thanks for stopping by.  Keep washing those hands!

What's happening? We had MORE of a good time!

 My wife and I decided that we needed a little time out; this hanging around home all the time is so exhausting!  So we decided to check out the area around St. George, Utah.  St. George is slightly under 200 miles away so it's not a tremendous journey.  We've driven through St. George many times since it is on the I-15 but we had never stayed there.  It is also of interest because it is fairly close to Zion National Park, Bryce Canyon National Park and even the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.  So, off we went!

We took the dog mostly because we haven't found a kennel for him yet.  He spent some nasty time in the local animal shelter and we don't want to make him think those days are returning.  So we had to find a pet friendly motel and, because he is a nitwit and barks when he is left alone, we got to eat more take-out food.  Hmmm, sounds a lot like home!  Anyway, we drove up on Tuesday being careful to stop in Las Vegas at a restaurant that has some outdoor seating where we could eat with the dog by our side.  Driving up through Nevada is a lot like home except that the elevations are higher.  

Then I-15 cuts through a corner of Arizona.  This is stolen from Google Maps.  It gives you a hint of the Virgin River Gorge in Arizona.

It is a short part of the journey but very nice.  Unfortunately there are few places to stop along side the road.  There is actually a Virgin River that is running next to the highway; down maybe 100 feet but it's there.  

So we got to St. George and spent a quiet night having Thai takeout for dinner.  Tuesday we wanted to make a loop through Zion and on to Kanab, UT which we were hoping to use sometime in the future as a place to park the trailer while visiting the North Rim.  Zion was crowded!  I wasn't expecting crowds in the middle of the week; maybe they were Spring Break people but it was busy.  The roads were clean but there was snow on the mountain sides.

We just drove through the park.  We aren't really back country hikers and the dog certainly isn't!  Anyway, we got to see a bit of that beautiful park then went on to Kanab which wasn't quite as wonderful as we'd hoped but it will probably do for a couple nights.  We ended up back in St. George in time for some takeout Mexican food from a nearby restaurant.  

Thursday we found our way back home; amazingly enough timing it so we got lunch in Las Vegas again.  That night I noticed that our heatpump was cycling on and off a lot.  So Friday we got to have a visit from a local repair person.  He spent a LOT of time checking things then, hoping he found the problem, he recharged the system and we'll just see how that works.  So far it is working but if there is a very small leak I'm sure we'll find it given a bit of time!

I can certainly recommend spending some time in Zion even if it is full of people.  St. George seemed like a nice little town.  So we had fun.  I hope you did as well.  Take care and keep washing those hands!

Learning things...

 We got Ollie, our dog, almost a year ago.  In March we took him to Las Vegas with us in the trailer just for a couple of days.  In fact, the govenor declared a shut-down during the three days we were there!  So, he hasn't been in the trailer much; hell, neither have we!  So we decided we wanted to take him on a trailer trip just to see how he would act.  

My wife found a park she liked in Morro Bay, CA and called to ask about a reservation.  She was told that making a reservation a year in advance would be normal.  Well, that isn't our style for sure!  So we decided we'd just go over to the Las Vegas RV Resort, our go-to place in Sin City, and spend a few days.  It is a nice park and we had some nice sunsets.

 

 Hmmm.  Well, we did learn one thing.  When we are gone the dog howls!

We went out to breakfast at Blueberry Hill, our go-to breakfast restaurant, and about 3/4ths of the way through our meal my wife's phone rang.  Yep, someone had complained to the management that our dog was howling.  I can't blame them.  The park is an adult-only place and all those old folks seem to have dogs.  Actually the dog area is GREAT.  There are four separate fenced areas and one that is unfenced plus another unfenced area on the far side of the park.  It is really unusual to have so many places for the 4 legged ones.  

The park is basically paved with little graveled areas for the trees.  This was our site.

It was kind of funny.  It was a triangle with roads on all three sides.  There was noise from rigs going to and fro but the view out our windows was clear of other rigs.  We were at least 50 feet from any other rig and that is unusual!  Anyway, we really liked it. 

So, our dreams of wandering around and seeing some sights in Las Vegas were cancelled:  we'd be either at home with the dog or taking him with us.  So, we drove around Vegas seeing some new things & some old with the dog.  Hmm, a new definition of life in the fast lane!  Anyway, we ended up driving 145 miles around in the town.  We did stop a couple times and leave him alone in the truck & he seemed ok with that.  I'm not sure why but maybe it is just someplace he is more comfortable.  Or, there isn't anyone to complain about a howling dog in a store parking lot.  

Then, just to make our visit more memorable, there was a spike in corona virus cases and the govenor asked that everyone stay home as much as possible for the next couple of weeks.  Is there a curse about us visiting Las Vegas?  We did manage another breakfast out but mostly stayed in the rig and Saturday we came home.  

Since then my wife, who has had some minor lung issues, has stayed home while I do the shopping, etc.  The local VFW has a food bank that we like to contribute to so yesterday I went out and bought a few turkeys & stuff for them to distribute.  I even managed a couple of hams for those who can't manage a turkey.  We ordinarily get there when the distribution is almost over so we don't see many people; yesterday there were easily 7 or 8 times as many people there as I've ever seen.  I guess there are more people in need that I'd been thinking.  

So that's what is going on around here.  Staying home and washing hands a lot; now that is exciting!  Take care!

Life in the REALLY fast lane

 It's been a bit since I updated the old blog but at least this time I have an excuse:  we went to Texas!  Yep, movement is possible in the good old USA these days.  The thing is that our daughter moved to the Austin, Texas area and we wanted to check out the house she has been renovating and the area in general.  We did visit Austin a few years back but we were more interested in the Presidential Libraries and stuff than the town itself.  Besides, she doesn't live in the city but out a bit.  The other thing we wanted to learn about was taking our 'new' dog for a long journey.  

Ollie, the dog, is a rescue; probably 8-10 years old.  He has trouble moving and has had more than his share of bad treatment by humans.  Even the rescue shelter managed to shave his fur off so closely that the hair folicles were damaged and some places may never grow back!  Anyway, we wanted to know what his reactions would be to traveling all day in the back seat of the truck.  Also, how would he deal with motel living?  And what about stopping in rest areas?  I can lift him in and out but neither of us likes it much and my wife cannot.  Therefore because he has trouble moving, I built a little stair for him to use to get into and out of the truck.  He had used it once or twice but a trip would give it a real workout.

So off we went.  It turns out Ollie did very well.  We had his dog bed and he slept on it every night.  He had some trouble with the stair but by the return side of the trip he was just fine with it.  He loved our daughter's back yard which is fenced and has grass which our's does not.  She has a swimming pool and I was thinking he might fall in because he was so interested in the water but he managed to not do that.  He even managed rest areas and such well.

The trip was actually very good.  The 'Really fast lane' I refered to in the title is the fact that the speed limits on the highways were usually 75 or 80mph(120-130kph).  I haven't driven that fast in a while!  Weather was great.  We did get to drive through a rain storm that was heavier than anything I've seen in a long time.  We also got to drive some of the Texas Hill Country which was very pretty.  Then on the way home we went north from I-10 to I-40 via the Salt River Canyon and  Show Low, AZ.  The canyon was spectacular.  I took a few photos but nothing that really reflects the place.  I've always wanted to go see Show Low; no real reason just that it has a neat name!  It seemed like a nice enough town and they have real trees!  We don't get a lot of real trees here in the desert.  

Anyway we had a great trip and are now primed for staying home a bit.  The California fires are still covering us with smoke usually at a high enough level that you don't really smell it.  This morning we can smell it; it isn't pleasant at all.  I feel for all those folks who are losing their homes and livelyhoods and sometimes even lives.  

Of course this morning I get to read about Mr. Trump telling the folks in Minnesota that they have 'good genes'; meaning basically that they are white.  What an a$$!  How the devil people can vote for that idiot is beyond me.  Especially, black, Hispanic, Asian and female people:  what the hell can he be doing to earn their votes?  It just doesn't make sense to me but he's doing something right or this election would be a shoo-in for Biden.  Don't get me wrong; I'm not really crazed about Biden but at least he's not a closet Nazi.

Gotta go.  Have a good one and thanks for stopping by.

What a slow poke!

 I've been wanting to add a list of SOME of the blogs I read for quite a while but was too lazy to work on it.  So today I attacked Blogger to try and add that list.  Oh shit!  Sorry about the language but I'll bet it took me an hour to get that little list added.  And it's not nearly as long as it should be!  I'm going to work on making it longer now that I have the secret but OMG it took a while to figure out that seemingly simple thing.  Ok, I can breath again.  

Not much going on around here but we are having fun anyway.  We have almost always had a dog but our last dog passed away late in 2013.  Before she died we had purchased tickets for a Viking cruise in China and that was the start of six years of heavy travel.  But we missed having a dog so we decide to adopt one from our local animal shelter.  This is Ollie (Oliver) when we got him at the end of November last year.

They said he was a year and a half old.  Well, that's obviously wrong.  They said he had stickers so deep in his fur that they had to shave him.  They said they did that in September when he was taken in 2 months before that photo was taken.  Our vet said they had shaved him too closely and his hair follicles might be damaged and the hair might not grow back!  Well, after two months there wasn't much there. 

 Anyway, we kept on feeding him and giving him medications and now we've got this.

He  has grown hair differently in different places:  his neck hair has guard hair but not fur; his shoulders haven't grown much at all; his butt is totally regrown; his back is spotty but coming along.  What you don't see is his limp.  He simply cannot walk normally and after trying three different kinds of pain medication we are kind of giving up.  He also cannot walk long distances.  Going down to the mailbox has him ready for a nap.  Of course we've over fed him; he's gained 20lb!  

He is also definitely MY dog.  He will put up with my wife but she certainly isn't his favorite.  We come home and he will walk right past her to come up to me.  It is embarrassing!  Of course it annoys her too.  But we are getting along.  

We don't expect much time with Ollie.  He is clearly more of a 10 year old dog than a year and a half.  If we have him for another 2 years we will both be amazed.  In the mean time, we'll try to show him some of the western United States in our truck and trailer.  I've build a little staircase so he can get into the backseat of the truck.  I was worried about hurting him lifting him in and out and he certainly couldn't jump!  

I'll keep updating you on Ollie as we go on.  In the mean time, this is his usual position.

He sleeps a LOT!  Take care and keep washing those hands!

Just hanging around....

It's been pretty quiet around here if you don't pay attention to any news source.  The news is, as always, pretty noisy.  This whole coronavirus mess is interesting.  By the way, I do believe there is such a virus and I do believe it will be growing more dangerous here in the USA.  Listening to our esteemed President about this makes no more sense that listening to him about anything else.

Anyway, our little town has lots of RV'ers who seems to have stopped here and they are making shopping just nasty.  Ok, they are spending their money here but they are also clogging up roads, parking lots and even restaurants!  Go away, people!

Sorry, I had to get that off my chest.  Actually, they aren't doing anything too awful.  They are just stocking up for their next month or two of self-imposed isolation.  A couple days ago there was no hand sanitizer left on the store shelves.  Now, I don't use that crap so I didn't care but that's not where it stopped.  Yesterday we went into Walmart for a couple things (dog food and some blackout curtains if you must know) and decided to look at the meat counter.  There was NO beef!  There were only a couple packages of pork chops left!  The frozen food area was half empty as well.  Really?  I should have taken a picture.  People are just going crazy over this.  Now, granted, the media is carrying coronavirus headlines every day but jeez! 

Ok, I'm over 70 but fairly healthy so EVEN I should have a decent chance of surviving this thing.  So who the hell has stripped Walmart of all their meat?  It is just stupid.  I guess I'm not used to seeing panic in the streets.  We were in a restaurant the other day and the two guys at the next table were talking about buying ammunition - lots of ammunition.  Like it is going to be the end-of-the-world and sick people are going to be attacking them and they needed to shoot them to save their hand sanitizer supply.  What idiots!  And, yes, we are still going out to eat.

Of course having the stock market go nuts is only to be expected.  Those traders are just one step away from nuts most days.  Do we have money in the market?  Yes.  Has our investment gone down?  Yes.  Will we be eating dog food next week?  No.  The dog will but, naw, unless the supermarket doesn't come up with more hamburger we'll stay away from his food. 

In the midst of all this our daughter is still in the process of moving to Austin.  Her house sale did go through and the one she purchased is being spiffed up.  I'd be going crazy if I were her having people doing things to my new house and not being there.  But, if it works for her, great.  Of course we'll have to visit her one of these days but Austin is a lovely town and there are lots of other places to visit between here and there.  It should work out just fine. 

Gotta go.  Thanks for stopping by.

Puzzling stuff

Our son and his wife visited us last week and the talk turned to home technical stuff since he runs a computer support group at work.  He highly recommended the Google wifi router so I ordered a two pack for our home.  When it arrived we installed it which was quite easy and internet speeds to my office which is way across the house from the base router increased nicely.  Then we figured out that it doesn't like our Wyze security cameras!  They are 2.4ghz and the Google really only likes 5ghz speeds.  It claims to do both but we sure haven't figured out how to make it so.  It's not a big deal, we only use the cameras to keep an eye on our dog when we are gone, but it's a pain in the......  Maybe we'll get them to work together or maybe we'll just pitch the cameras.  We'll see.

In other exciting news, Nevada and Pahrump got mentioned in a Yahoo Lifestyle article.  Of course, it was pretty screwed up but heck we'll take what we can get!  It highlighted a drive from Las Vegas through Pahrump to Death Valley and up through Beatty, Nevada and back down to Vegas.  It would be a really long day's drive but do-able if you didn't stop too long to admire what you were seeing.   Amazingly they didn't bother to mention that Death Valley is in California or that you pass by Yucca Mountain and the Test Site where all the atomic testing was done from the 50's to the 90's.  Of course you can't visit the latter two without LOTS of pre-planning.

Otherwise things are pretty quiet around here.  The dog is growing hair in VERY select places and not growing hair on most of his body.  We'll see.  My wife is already worrying about him getting sunburn next summer.  We are still getting freezing temps at night but 60-something during the day is pretty nice.

We do need to get some work done around the house.  We have a concrete block wall that needs some repair.  The people who built it didn't provide a sufficient base so it shifted and cracked.  We'll just see if someone can 'do it right'.  Anyway, it should be 'fun'

Thanks for stopping by.  Have a good one.

Wow! The year is going fast!

It's hard to believe that the year is 1/12th over already but I guess it's true.  I'm avoiding politics as much as humanly possible but it is totally in my face every day.  Jeez, what a mess.  It is distinctly difficult to see a good outcome for the country regardless of the outcome of the impeachment hearings OR the 2020 election.  Is there another planet I could live on?

Personally things are fine.  The usual aches and pains associated with being over 70 but I prefer them to not being here any more.  Weather in this corner of Nevada is weird.  Yesterday morning I was spraying weeds in my shirtsleeves at 70F(21C); then the wind came up in the afternoon and we had gusts around 40 mph (65kph).  It freezes the birdbath most nights so that's pretty chilly.

Our 'new' dog is coming along.  He had a bad day early in the week where he threw up during the night.  He must have gotten into something we didn't know about but about 03:00 he decided to rid himself of it on the rug in the bedroom.  He didn't even want to eat that morning and we only gave him about a fourth of his usual dinner.  Now he seems completely recovered.  His hair is growing back in small patches which makes him pretty funny looking.  It is still likely, I believe, that it will never grow back completely.  This is his most usual position.

We want to take our trailer to Las Vegas on a shake-down trip.  It's been a LONG while since we've been anywhere in it.  Like I think it was October of 2017!  Wow!  Anyway, we hope to start checking out parts of California, Arizona, New Mexico, Utah and Nevada that we've overlooked.  We'll see how that works out.  The dog seems to travel well enough but we'll just have to see how he does in a completely new environment.

Hope the new year is treating you  well.  Thanks for stopping by.

Happy New Year!

I hope that your holidays were everything you could have wished.  Mine were ok aside from being troubled by the general situation of the United States in the regard of the world.  There is also that idiot we've elected President but let's not go down that path to doom and destruction!  I can't say I have much admiration for either party these days.

We had friends visiting between Christmas and New Years.  They are perhaps our closest friends though we live a thousand miles apart.  The guy is great; the woman is as well but can be somewhat trying; but we manage.  This isn't a resort town so we spent a LOT of time together.  I know that one of our first trips with our new dog, Ollie, will be to see them.

I've been doing a lot in the kitchen lately.  Our daughter was here for Christmas Eve and we had a ham so any cook knows what is coming along:  ham leftovers!  Yes, I've done ham and cheese omelettes, ham and bean soup and more - not forgetting the simple ham sandwich!  Of course there is Hoppin' John for New Year's Day.  BUT, I did insist on a rather large ham so I'm not complaining.

We do have a pretty house these days.  Well, especially outside.

Our celebration is rather subdued since neither of us believe in God but we were both raised in Christian households so honor the holiday.  For us it is simply an enjoyable time when all those other people try to be nicer to one another than usual.  Isn't that sad? Why can't they start with being nice to one another?

The dog is coming along nicely.  He is responding to commands and (knock on wood) hasn't had an 'accident' in the house in a couple of weeks.  His hair is taking it's own sweet time growing back - like maybe never!  I guess we'll just have to see how it goes.

Otherwise it it a normal Navada day. A belated Happy New Year to all.  Take care.

Something different

We've been doing a lot of international travel since our beloved pets died 6 and 7 years ago.  The dog had a cancer that was operated on several times and it just got to the point where she would still be in recovery at the time a new eruption would be found.  The vets just could not get all of the cancer out of her.  The cat just died of old age.  We took the opportunity and traveled via cruise ship a lot but also just taking a month and visiting Italy or Australia or wherever.  Well, that's over now!

Saturday, Nov. 30,  we went out to lunch then thought we would stop by the local animal shelter to see if they had any new dogs that we hadn't seen before.  Long story short:  we brought home our new dog!  It's a weird dog for sure.  It doesn't pull on the lead much when you are walking it but it is totally untrained.  Of course we don't know what it's previous owners called it so we can't call it by name.  However, it doesn't know any of the common commands:  come, sit, stay....  He doesn't even know how to play.  If you bounce a ball in front of him, he watches you but has no real interest.   We were told that it was found out in the desert abandoned and covered in stickers so it was shaved!  They said they thought it was a year old and starving.  On Wednesday we managed to get in to see our vet and she suggests the dog is more like six or seven years old and we believe her to be correct.  The dog just doesn't act like a young dog.  Also, he weighs something like 57 lb (25kg) and while you can fell his ribs they aren't sticking out as though he was starving.  So anyway, here's a photo of Ollie our new dog.

According to the animal shelter, Ollie was shaved in late September or early October and his coat is still not growing out.  The vet suggested that the follicles might have been burned and the hair may never recover.  At any rate, he looks like he was shaved last week by a drunk who didn't know what he was doing!  There are little tufts of hair here and there but large portions of his coat has hair that is perhaps 1/16th of an inch (1.5 mm) long.  We'll see.

He is pretty smart and he definitely responds to food!  He's learning his name, sit and come.  He is a long way from perfect but it's coming along.  We have a crate for him to sleep in since he isn't house trained at all.  We put him in the back seat of the truck and took him on a trip to Las Vegas that worked out really well.  There is a restaurant/bar called BJ's that has a small outdoor area and they said having a dog out there was just fine.  He was really good just waiting for us by our feet while we had lunch.  We are already thinking of our first trailer trip with him!

When we flew to Norway to take that North Atlantic cruise something happened to my back and I've had pain ever since.  Before the cruise we would walk around our neighborhood about 2.5 miles (4 km) 5 or 6 times a week.  I still can't walk a tenth of that distance without severe pain.  Just shopping in the grocery store can send me for more ibuprofen.  The doctor sent me to Physical Therapy but after 10 visits I've had only minimal improvement.  They are going to try dry-needling which sounds like a semi-copy of acupuncture.  It would be cool if that worked!  However I'm scheduled to visit a orthopedic specialist the first week of January.  Should be lots of fun too. 

So, that's all the news from around here.  Thanks for stopping by.  Hopefully I'll manage to update this before but if I don't have a Happy Holiday - whichever you celebrate!

Not much to say!

I'm kind of out of news.  The closet has been such a big deal for the last week or so that I haven't done much else.  We planned this to be a quiet day because all the weather forecasters in Vegas said there was a big system coming down from the north that would bring us at least rain but most likely snow.  Well, that didn't work out!  It's about 55F (more than 12C) which certainly isn't anything to complain about.  Not here in December for heaven's sake.  It's been mostly sunny as well.  The wind is blowing but you can't have everything.

We have this huge pile of broken down boxes in our living room.  There are some boxes full of 'protective packaging' but lots of empty boxes.  Here is what the protective stuff looks like: 

On the left is a piece of maybe inch and a half (4 cm) cardboard that is cut into the right size to protect stuff in the boxes.  It's just ordinary but thick cardboard.  On the right is some cardboard that has been sliced up so it still has some strength but is really flexible.  I have serious cubic feet of this stuff!  It ranges from about a foot long (.3m) to 6 feet (almost 2m).  Then there is a pile of flattened cardboard boxes.  I'm pretty sure I've got a pickup truck load.  I'm thinking I'll load it into the truck then wait until next week and take it to the recycler.  Life in the fast lane.

I saw two stray dogs in the neighborhood; one would come to me, the other wasn't really willing.  It's the first time I've touched a dog since our dog died last January.  It was even a black dog much like ours.  It was tough; I wanted to grab them and take them around the neighborhood asking if anyone was missing a dog but don't really have the facilities for that - not to mention the one with a collar didn't want to come talk.  Called Animal Control; I guess that's about all one can do. 

My wife is wrapped around her own axle about Christmas.  It's looking like we'll have both Number One Daughter and Number One Son (and Number One Daughter-In-Law) for the holiday.  That would be great but it brings up questions.  Presents:  should we or should we not?  We are talking 40 year old 'children'; they can buy anything they want.  I'm hoping the don't still believe in Santa!  Food:  everyone has an opinion and everyone but me is a picky eater.  Can't have this; can't have that:  I probably draw the line at bugs but who knows?  Length of stay:  we have one very jealous Number One Daughter.  Can't have anyone else staying longer than she does.  Let me tell you, I'm in search of a place to hide next Christmas; somewhere they won't want to follow us to!  I'm reading Kevin & Ruth's blog and they are making Africa sound really great.  Who knows.

Gotta go.  Time for some feet up time in the recliner before dinner.  Have a good one!

San Diego sadness

We did have a very nice time visiting San Diego; did lots of tourist stuff, had a great parking spot, looked at water a lot since we can't do that here at home but there was one very large downside:  no dog.  We had stayed in this same park once before and taking the same walk we took last time only with no dog was pretty sad.  There is an excellent place for walking, complete with little doggie bags so you can pick up after Rover, but we had no dog.  We still have the cat and he is an annoying little sh!t but it's not the same.  Well, we'll just have to get over it.

We have an appointment to have the trailer axles lubed next Wednesday over in Las Vegas.  We are taking the trailer back to the people who sold it to us.  They want us to get there early so they can get us out the same day.  It shouldn't be too tough but who knows.  We had Camping World lube the axles on our old trailer and that was the start of a number of problems.  They didn't bother to use the right size dust caps so they came off, spread grease all over & just generally made a mess.  Of course, without grease, the bearings went south.  It was bad.  I don't think I've been back to a Camping World since.  After getting the maintenance done, we'll put the trailer away until our trip next summer.

It's funny how the human mind works; or at least how mine works!  I was reading a guy's blog and he discovered that his car is without an oil dipstick.  We've had the Toyota for three years and I don't remember ever looking under the hood so of course I had to rush out to the garage and look to see if it has a dipstick.  Sure enough; in fact it has one for the engine and one for the transmission.  I don't really care but if I hadn't gone to check, it would have bothered me until I did.  I'm so easy!  The car is coming up on 29,000 miles so I'll be taking it off to the dealer one of these days to have it serviced.  This driving to Vegas is getting habit forming.

I've been trying to figure out if I should take the truck over for an oil change.  The thing is that it was due 'by time' in January but we really haven't used it much so we are about 3,000 miles short of needing to change it 'by mileage'.  Seems kind of silly to change it but I would like that engine to keep going for a long time.  I imagine I'll split the difference and take it to get fresh oil just before our summer trip.

Well, that's all the wheeled news that's fit to print.  Have a good one! 

Getting on...

We are still getting used to the new normal of no dog.  It will be a long while before one of the other of us goes a week without thinking we see or hear her but it will happen.  In the mean time we just need to get over it.  We got her almost twelve years ago and were separated from her for a total of 16 days in that time.  When we had her put down there was absolutely nothing wrong with her aside from the mess that was her cancer.  However.....

I was reading RandomRoger (famous financial blogger) a few weeks ago and he pointed out that there are a LOT of funds and ETFs that mimic the SPY ETF; which is supposed to mimic the S&P 500.  Since I read that I've been trying to find funds that will give us diversification while keeping charges low.  The problem is the HUGE universe of products almost generates an inability to make a choice.  I've read of this condition but now it's got me.  In the end, I know what I'll do.  I'll go for large products and just go along for the ride.  We certainly won't get famous or particularly rich but we'll do ok.

We have decided on a new way to spend money; well, new to us!  Viking River Cruises have been sending my wife their brochures for some time.  Right now they are giving 'special' rates if you book a 2014 cruise now.  We just couldn't say 'no'.  It is weak of us I know but what are you going to do?  Take it with you?  We have signed up for a China river cruise that includes flying around to some sites that aren't on the river.  It is one of those drag you around by the hand things where you are either on one of their ships, one of their planes or in one of their buses.  It is going to be really weird but we are both intimidated by not knowing the language or even the script.  We don't go for over a year but are already getting excited.  It will be the first time we've been out of the country since 2000.  Amazing!

Somehow I managed to watch much of President Obama's inauguration.  I thought it was ok as such things go; the poem that was written for the occasion seemed longer than the President's speech!  It will be interesting to see what he does with a second term.  His first seems to have polarized the country even more than it was before.  I'm afraid he isn't a man who learns cooperation easily and the Republican party seems pretty divided so I'm not so sure anything much is going to happen.  I hope he doesn't take the back door approach to things and start proclaiming Presidential Privilege all over the place.  That crap will stick us in the ass.  The Constitution did a great job of defining three parts of our government; having some fool try to jimmy the definitions on the fly for his own ends is not good for any of us. 

Have a good one.  I'm going to work on it too!

Getting used to the new normal

No, I'm not talking about some idiots view of the economy but rather life without our companion of the last, almost, 12 years.  Well, it won't be easy but we'll get there.  My wife thinks she hears the dog every now and then.  I'm not quite there but I am looking for her in all her old places.  I keep forgetting to feed the cat too because the dog isn't here going 'where is my food!'.  Happily the cat self-feeds so if I stock him up a bit it will keep him going for several days. We took our first walk out in the desert without the dog.  It was a little weird but....  We saw two jack rabbits; I was tempted to chase them for the dog but gave up on that thought.

We are getting our travel planning going for the next year.  We'll be in San Diego late next month then in the summer head north for Yellowstone and Glacier.  We are really looking forward to the summer trip.  There are some quiet, hopefully little used, roads heading up there & that will suit us just fine.  I love the Interstate system as much as anyone but when you aren't in a hurry it's fun to visit the backroads.  We haven't gotten so far in our planning that we have any idea of the time we'll be gone; could be three weeks or it could be six.  We'll cross that bridge later!

Short post today.  Maybe I'll have an actual idea tomorrow.  Take care!

RIP Sammie

Yesterday a.m. we woke as usual and I took Sammie out to do her thing.  When we returned my wife noted a small spot on her tee shirt.  By the time she lay down for her first treat of the day, it was bleeding.  When she got up, there was a puddle of blood a foot across.  Oh shit!  We bandaged her up as best we could but the emergency vet was in Las Vegas.  We went in to Vegas and had her put to sleep.  It was bad for us all but was the only solution. 

I'll be back later but until then RIP Samantha - D - Dog.  We love you!

Quiet before the literal storm

We are having some quiet days but the forecast for the next few is cold with precip. possible and gusts to 50 mph (80 kph).  It makes staying home a lot more reasonable. 

Yesterday we put a bunch of fiberglass insulation up in the attic.  There are places were we had very little and didn't realize it.  I believe the house is warmer; we'll see what happens to the electric bill.  We have these two small openings to the attic, maybe 2 ft x 3 ft (.6m x .9m), and we have 10 foot (3m) ceilings.  You would have laughed at me trying to get up the ladder with a roll of insulation that would only just go through the opening.  For some reason the builder managed to put the ceiling openings right next to a doorway so it isn't possible to get the ladder in a good position.  I was crawling up the ladder holding on with one hand with my stomach right against it carrying the roll of insulation off to the side in my free hand.  It was pretty funny.  My wife rolled the stuff out while I fed it to her.  By the time we were done with just four rolls, we were both soaked with sweat and definitely in need of a shower!

We did take the dog to the local vet for some blood work.  The oncologist wanted to be sure she was accepting the pain meds. without any problem.  The blood work came back fine so her only problem is that she has this huge cancer on her chest that we can't do anything about.  Here is her photo from 12/28.

And the following is what it looked like yesterday.

The cancer is just growing like crazy.  She has been pretty good about leaving it alone but this morning we caught her licking at it.  NOT good, so now she is wearing an old tee shirt to keep her tongue off it.  This is not a good news story.

I've been trying to adjust some of our investments to keep my mind off the dog.  It is embarrassing how long it's been since I've done this.  Some investments are doing fine but too many of our mutual funds are in Morningstar's 2 Star category.  Gotta change them out or put up with below average yields.  There are just way too many choices but I'll get there.  Happily there are only half a dozen positions that are really crap.

Speaking of crap, the charger for my DROID phone died; how tough is it to make something that will last a couple years without breaking?  Especially since this isn't a terribly complex article.  Guess I should be thanking my lucky stars that it is the charger and not the phone.  Nah, I'm still torqued; not that anyone is going to care. 

Anyway, have a good one.  If you keep putting one foot in front of the other, you'll get there.  Good luck!

Animal blog?

No, not quite, but almost.  At least we'll have an animal post.  Sammie the dog is just doing her doggie thing.  She doesn't even seem to know she is ill.  Here is a shot of her sitting, not to patiently, since she was just playing with one of her Christmas toys.

You can see the odd growth on her chest.  Here is a closer view.

That wasn't there before Thanksgiving!  In little more than a month this growth the size of a man's fist has appeared.  It seems it cannot be long before it bursts.  We'll just have to see.

I spoke of a Christmas toy; well, we got toys for the cat as well.  One was a laser pointer, I though he'd love chasing that little red dot.  Turns out, he basically doesn't care, the dog is more interested.  Now we are betting that the cat is at least partially blind.  He is 17 years old and has fits of howling in the night as if he were frightened.  We are guessing that he wakes in the night, can't really see very well, no one is in the room and he gets frightened.  So he howls.  After three or four howls, he figures he has scared off anything that would attack him so he shuts up.  If there are any cat psychologists out there who have a better idea; I'm certainly open to learning more. 

If I may jump to a completely different subject, how do you store your photos?  I store my photos by date; my wife stores hers by subject.  I have started using 'tags' so I can search by subject but that is relatively new.  (This is all Windows PC stuff; even when I had an iMac I stayed away from that Apple proprietary crap!)  Finding specific photos is obviously a pain in the ass regardless of the system.  When looking for a specific photo I have to have an idea when it was taken; my wife has to sort through tons of photos of the same subject to find the one she is wanting.  Any advice would be appreciated. 

Have a good one!

Happy Holidays!

Merry Christmas to all and may you and yours have a fantastic New Year!

Things are happening around here; some good and some bad.  I'll start with the bad.  Last Thursday we loaded our dog Sammie into the car for a trip to visit the nice people at the Las Vegas Veterinary Specialty Center aka the oncologist.  Just before Thanksgiving we noticed that the growth on the dog's chest was going wild.  This is the same spot where she has had three surgeries for cancer; the latest only last April.  We spent quite a long while talking with a very nice (and very pregnant!) vet who explained what kind of cancer the dog has and the various treatment options.  The options are all over the place.  The most aggressive is taking her to Los Angeles or San Diego for surgery and a month of radiation treatments.  Let's not even discuss cost!  Then there is surgery done here in Las Vegas, various radiation therapy options and finally a simple painkiller to keep her comfortable until we need to euthanize her.  The doctor helped us understand why this sort of cancer is so difficult to remove completely and that even the most aggressive treatment would probably not be successful.  The doctor took a lot of time to help us come to our decision which is, of course, the last since it is so doubtful that the cancer can be overcome.  Right now she doesn't seem to be in any particular pain.  She is slow to get up but likes her walks and is always looking forward to feeding time.  The huge growth on her chest doesn't seem to bother her at all.  So we are good to go until something causes a reduction in her quality of life.  When that happens, it will be time to say goodbye. 

The good news is that talking with the vet brought us a better understanding of what we will be facing for the next few months.  Knowing that makes facing it easier.  Our other good news is that we are actually ready for Christmas.  Part of the reason is that we are reducing the size of the celebration.  Since it is only us and Number One Daughter, we don't need four appetizers, two desserts, rolls, two vegies, etc.  We'll have a ham, mac and cheese and a vegie.  We even managed to find a slightly under six pound ham (2.6 kg) - it should be fun to find out if that will provide enough for dinner plus all the secondary uses we find for ham. 

We made a trip into Las Vegas about a week ago for shopping.  Shopping together means that there won't be too many surprises under the tree but we are confident that we'll like what we get!  Old people can do this stuff!  I think it's in the Bible somewhere; near where they say you have to go out and go into debt buying presents at Christmas.  

I did actually write (email) to President Obama and my Congressional representatives about the fiscal cliff and how they shouldn't act like school children but should keep us from going over and under.  My Representative and one Senator responded with canned responses; nothing from Mr. Obama who is so proud of his "open and responsive adminestration".  I hope they can manage something but I guess we'll just have to get along if they don't.  It wouldn't be the first screw up by those idiots we voters send to D.C.

We have been having all kinds of different weather.  Cloudy days, clear days, windy days and all the possible variations have been coming our way.  I left the hummingbird feeder out one night and discovered it frozen the next morning.  I'd forgotten that last year we brought it in every night so now that is added to the nightly chores.  I saw a hummingbird trying to drink from it the morning it was frozen; afterwards he perched on the holder and kind of looked at me.  Bet he was thinking nasty thoughts!  Here's a shot of Mt. Charleston with the desert floor in the foreground.  Have a happy holiday.  I'll be back before the new year.