rascal
Forum GOD!
I love driving. I recently relocated a truck from middle of South Island to the north island. 2x 12 hr days, and I felt safe as. Never saw any wrecks!! Mind you the roads are prolly a bit more quiet than Texas.
Russ
Plans for today (2019-2022)
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I love driving. I recently relocated a truck from middle of South Island to the north island. 2x 12 hr days, and I felt safe as. Never saw any wrecks!! Mind you the roads are prolly a bit more quiet than Texas.
Russ
I went through a phase of genealogy searching - it becomes addictive and also exponentially more difficult with every generation you go back (the choice of male/female lines at each juncture... it can become quite mind boggling.
Stay safe. I hate driving too and try to avoid it these days if possible. Talking of cars I drove up here to Saffron Walden at the weekend and found myself shivering on the way - turns out the car heater had stopped working. So my plans for today including taking the car to a garage up here to get it fixed.
Other plan: to cook a pheasant - probably pot roasted with root vegetables and herbs, juniper berries, garlic etc.
That's precisely why I have virtually no interest in it. Eventually, it's all going to lead to everyone related to everyone else, so in a way, I already know the answer.
It's just too broad a thing to tackle, and taking one branch all up through the men (which I guess makes some sort of sense, with the never-changing surname) just seems patently unfair in some way, but that's how it's always presented, father to grandfather to great-grandfather, etc.
I have a good idea about my dad's side (again, men only), as my granddad's brother paid for thorough genealogy study back in the 1970's (and kept it to himself!). An amateur did my mom's side, started with her mother, but immediately shifted to the men, so it goes my grandmother, her father, his father, etc.
The truth is, though...there are interesting little stories on either side, and that's fun, but I just can't see obsessing over ancestors, or somehow drawing a connection that because my great-great-great-grandfather played violin in the Richmond, VA community orchestra, that's somehow why I'm a musician today.
I actually get irritated with the Ancestry.com adverts here because they really play up that angle. The one that really gets me is the guy who thought he was German and found out he was Scottish (or the other way round). At the start, he says something like, "I'd always been told my family were German, and I belong to a German society, and my kids dance in a German dance group, and we always have bratwurst and sauerkraut," all spoken while he's in lederhosen.
Then he goes on to explain, "...but after my DNA test, I discovered that my family is 53% Scottish!" - and now he's in a kilt and doing Highland dancing and trying to play the bagpipes.
That's just posturing to me. That's phony, fake. You find out your family has Scottish origins, so you just turn your heritage on and off like a tap? For some reason, that really irritates me. I yell at that guy every time I see that ad.
Dive Bar Casanova
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We’re in Central California USA.
Wifie has a bag of Equestrian treats and carrots. We’ll head out to the Desert Wild Burro and mustang rescue retreat where she can fuss over them.
We’re buying property where the wife can be a crazy Cat, dog and burro lady in retirement.
We just adopted a Shepard from a fast kill shelter.
Working out good.
We were told the dog was 2 years old but the Shepard fanatic friends say she’s not even one yet.
People we know that adopted the baby Mustangs all say they become excellent horses.
Wife wants to adopt the burro closest to the camera:
Wifie has a bag of Equestrian treats and carrots. We’ll head out to the Desert Wild Burro and mustang rescue retreat where she can fuss over them.
We’re buying property where the wife can be a crazy Cat, dog and burro lady in retirement.
We just adopted a Shepard from a fast kill shelter.
Working out good.
We were told the dog was 2 years old but the Shepard fanatic friends say she’s not even one yet.
People we know that adopted the baby Mustangs all say they become excellent horses.
Wife wants to adopt the burro closest to the camera:
Getting our tree today! 
What is a fast kill shelter? It sounds ominous....
Mountain Cat
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- 12 Apr 2019
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- Hilltowns of Massachusetts
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- goatsandgreens.wordpress.com
LOADS o SNOW. I can't find anything on line with approximate snow loads just yet.
Did lose Internet/phone for awhile, but I'd downloaded stuff for the Kindle, for reading.
There's more to come, but not much in the scheme of things - lightly snowing now. The chickens are fine, but they don't like walking on this stuff.
Today I am a homebody. Some cooking (nothing to post), two more trips down to the chickens are planned, some basement organizing.
Did lose Internet/phone for awhile, but I'd downloaded stuff for the Kindle, for reading.
There's more to come, but not much in the scheme of things - lightly snowing now. The chickens are fine, but they don't like walking on this stuff.
Today I am a homebody. Some cooking (nothing to post), two more trips down to the chickens are planned, some basement organizing.
rascal
Forum GOD!
I used to breed German shepherds, one was the youngest to qualify in nz police dog ranks. I had cops knocking on my door for years wanting pups.
Russ
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- SE Australia
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- www.satnavsaysstraighton.com
Mine is no different. Drops out in dust storms, heavy rain (wishful thinking atm), thunder and lightning, or just lightning, high winds, and obviously any time I've not got electricity. If it can't see the satellite going around the equator, we don't get broadband. And solid matter in the air (dust, snow, ice (think ice particles in clouds) etc) then there is no internet.
Well, we got the tree. It's sitting out in the garage in a bucket of water.
Last year, we went to a cut-your-own farm, but bought a precut tree there because it was miserable and muddy. That tree looked ok, but didn't hold its needles very well. It cost $70US and was around 6' tall.
This year, we went back to specifically cut our own and left treeless, in disgust.
Walking through the fields, it quickly became apparent what they were doing: they were growing large (15' and up) trees, purposely shaped over the life of the tree to produce a superior Christmas tree shape in the top half or so, topping those trees, and selling those in the precut barn, and not really shaping anything to be cut in the 6'-8' range. If we wanted a cut-your-own tree, it was either a 4'-5' "apartment" tree (for $60) or a 15' misshapen hulk of a tree for $300, of which the top half was all that was useful. Otherwise, it was a precut tree from the barn, cut from the same 15-footers we were looking at in the field.
Both the wife and I agreed...walking around a field with scores of topped trees was definitely depressing and not at all festive. I felt like I was walking through a strip-mining operation, where the trees had been weirdly tortured. No thanks.
So, it wasn't our first choice, but off to Lowe's (big box DIY store) to get a precut one there. We've had good luck with their trees in the past, and they're not nearly as much as the tree farm.
I had a gift card and I get a veterans discount, so our 6' cost me $30.
Last year, we went to a cut-your-own farm, but bought a precut tree there because it was miserable and muddy. That tree looked ok, but didn't hold its needles very well. It cost $70US and was around 6' tall.
This year, we went back to specifically cut our own and left treeless, in disgust.
Walking through the fields, it quickly became apparent what they were doing: they were growing large (15' and up) trees, purposely shaped over the life of the tree to produce a superior Christmas tree shape in the top half or so, topping those trees, and selling those in the precut barn, and not really shaping anything to be cut in the 6'-8' range. If we wanted a cut-your-own tree, it was either a 4'-5' "apartment" tree (for $60) or a 15' misshapen hulk of a tree for $300, of which the top half was all that was useful. Otherwise, it was a precut tree from the barn, cut from the same 15-footers we were looking at in the field.
Both the wife and I agreed...walking around a field with scores of topped trees was definitely depressing and not at all festive. I felt like I was walking through a strip-mining operation, where the trees had been weirdly tortured. No thanks.
So, it wasn't our first choice, but off to Lowe's (big box DIY store) to get a precut one there. We've had good luck with their trees in the past, and they're not nearly as much as the tree farm.
I had a gift card and I get a veterans discount, so our 6' cost me $30.
rascal
Forum GOD!
A family member in the north island rang my mum many years ago to get all her details, with us boys (3) and our partners etc. they were doing a family tree. Anyhow about 3 years later the guy rang my mum and said it was done. Mum bought about 4 or 5 copies. We all got one each. Mine traced to 3 brothers who emigrated to nz from Bodmin in Cornwall. It's quite funny as they were miners that moved to nz. I made my living selling to coal and gold mining companies. Kind of full circle. When I did my big trip to the uk I spent time at the cemeteries in Bodmin looking at my forebears graves.
Russ
Wichita Falls what -- um, "interesting" place (not). . It is always hotter there in the summer, and colder in the winter than anywhere else in North Texas.
CD
The drive from Dallas to Houston and back sucks. Long, straight Interstate (motorway?) with big trucks (lorries?) everywhere, and truck tire carcases to dodge. At the holidays, the road is full of cars with drivers who seldom do long trips, and they are clueless.
I started the trip home on Sunday, and after three hours, I'd gone a little over a 100 miles. I saw a nice looking hotel, got a room, went out for a decent meal and some drinks, and finished the drive today. The highway was practically empty today, and the drivers were people who drive a lot of miles on a regular basis. No wrecks.
It is kind of like air travel on holidays. The airports are full of people who have no idea how to get through security. I fly about 100 flights a year, so I have it down to an art -- along with all the other frequent flyers.
CD
Dive Bar Casanova
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Public run dog pound. 14 day max stay.
Wife is active in rescuing cats and kittens, dogs and puppies and placing them.
One of them:
Pawpurrs Kitten Rescue - Simi Valley, CA
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