I've lost my mind and I can't get up...

About 3 weeks ago, as I was sitting in my car going somewhere, I took the tab, on my phone, off so I can charge my phone. It broke off of the hinge so now I have to keep tabs as to where I put it. For the love of me, I could not find the tab later that day. I practically cleaned my car out looking for the tab. The tab keeps the phone water-proof.

A few days ago, as I was reaching into the armrest, you will never know what I found. Yes, it was that tab. I have no idea why I never looked in there first. What I had thought was, I put the tab in my hat and when I went to put the hat on, I thought I saw something, little and black, fly by me. I thought it was the tab and I decided to look for it when I got out of the car.

This past Saturday I went on a 4 mile hike and I took a lot of pictures. When I got home, I could not find my camera. I tried to remember what I did with it. Again, I searched the car, under the seats, in my backpack, in my hiking boots, to no avail. This morning, just before the alarm went off, I woke up and tried to think about where and what I did to lose my camera. 

 I turned it over in my mind for 10 minutes or so. I got to the part where I took the camera out of the camera holder I had attached to my backpack and I remember getting into the car with it. After that, everything drew a blank. I got up and went about my daily grind. I went out on my daily walk and the thought of not taking picture got me angry, for a moment.

A few minutes ago, as I was taking a shower, I happened to think about that tab, and I had to chuckle. Then it hit me! I remembered where the camera might be. I put my clothes on and went downstairs and out into the garage, opened the car door, lean in and opened the arm rest. Sure enough, the camera was sitting there laughing at me.

I am really going to have to give up drinking or when I am on a hike quit picking and eating them mushroom! 

Happy Birthday, Tom and Jerry!

Two brothers -- It's a love hate relationship

I cleaned out Jerry's water fountain yesterday. Scrubbed it clean, changed the filter and filled it with nice clean water. He loves it even more now, because every time I sit down he runs and jumps in my lap and his face is soaking wet. He would rather drink from the stream then out of the water bowl.

Not only that, since yesterday, as clean as it is, the water is coming out harder and further out into the water bowl, below. Now it sounds like someone taking a piss every minute of the day! Talk about annoying! I can hear it even when I am watching the boob tube.

I don’t have to worry about Tom; he could care less about that $100 cat fountain. He gets his water from the toilet. I once closed the lids and he acted like he was dying. He made it an issue that I open his water dish so he can stay hydrated. He whines a lot.

Tom

Anyway, October is Tom and Jerry’s birth month. I have no real idea what day they were born. I got them in early November and they were about 6 weeks old. So, say Happy Birthday to my two fat cats – Tom and Jerry! 

Jerry

Tom and Jerry

Sleepyhead Tom

Jerry hiding

Let's get ready tooooooo...backpack!

The last of my backpacking gear came into today. I packed everything into my 70+10L backpack. Total weight; 25 Lbs. (24.6). The only things missing, I only have partial food, (b'fast and 2 days of snacks.), water, (I ordered a water bladder, should be here in 5 days.) and I don't have any clothes in the pack. 
My next weekend trip is in 14 days. I should be totally ready by then.

I almost blew up my house and killed my cats!

I almost blew up my house and killed my cats!

I decided I would only walk today, I didn't feel like running, and I wanted some split-pea soup when I got back from my 5k journey around the block. So, I put a pot of water on and a few minutes later I poured a bag of split peas into the boiling inferno.

I turned the fire on low, on low it usually takes about 90 minutes or so for it to cook and get to that consistency I like, soupy. As I got ready to head out, I thought I should turn the fire up, just a little, I think it was a 2 or maybe 3 on the knob. Anyway, I put the top on it and went on to my daily walk.

About a kilometer into my walk I started thinking, what if that pot overflowed and the water started to spill out, that would put the fire out and the house would fill with gas and first, kill my cats and then would blow up when I entered the house. That thought stayed with me for a few more minutes and then dissipated as trudged onward.          

Sixty-two minutes later, as I sat on the ground, at my garage door, I decided to go into the house and rest for a bit, shower and then make my lunch. As soon as I entered the house, the smell of gas bellowed through my nose. I ran to the stove and shut off the gas and then went to the closest cat, Tom, to see if he was okay. I grabbed him and he slowly turned his head, looked up at me and said, meow.

I then went over to Jerry and touched his head; he seemed to be okay, too. To a small degree, I am glad left the back door wall opened. I went around the house and turned on all of the fans and the bathroom exhaust fans. A few moments later, I remembered to turn on the blower, on the furnace, which also is an exhaust fan. I thought of it first, but I thought that when I turn it on it might ignite the gas…it didn’t.

When I am at home, I have always, turn the fire on the stove to low when I am cooking any type of beans, and I love split-pea soup, (I never liked split-pea soup at all when I was younger). I do not know why I turned it up a notch today. I am going to have to be a lot more careful from now on. I would hate for something like the house burning down and losing my cats!

If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck...

If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck...It just might be a T-Rex

I just read and saw on the boob tube that Scientists have suggested that dinosaurs coo'ed and quacked like ducks! Think about that for a second. A T-Rex quacking...before it ate you!

http://nerdist.com/dinosaurs-didnt-roar-they-cooed-or-quacked-like-ducks-says-new-study/

nothing has happened...

Nothing happened today, nothing, not a thing, zilch, nada, nothing..so far. I do know, I gotta stop throwing peanuts at my cats, those things are  too good to be throwing at those cats. And, to make matters worse, I only had one cup of coffee...go figure.

Don't mess with Grandma...

I went to Kroger to pick up some breakfast food and my favorite, Swiss cheese. Not just any Swiss cheese, but the big-eyed, cheap, (inexpensive) Swiss cheese.

At the deli counter, they usually have a number system to accommodate the customers, if a large number of people converge on the deli counter at the same time.  Today was not one of those days. At the time, it was only me and another lady at the counter and we were both being served, at the time.

A couple minutes later, an older woman, I would have to say she was in her late 70s, early 80s, five foot tall, strolled up to the counter and went straight to the machine that dispenses those little tickets with the current number, waiting to waited on. I looked over to her and said, “You don’t have to get a number.” She looked at me for a hard second and proceeded to pull a number ticket out of the dispenser.

I then said, “You must be a Republican!”

“What?” She grumbled, with a look of disdain and daggers being hurled at me through her eyes, 

The woman standing next to me blurted out, “He’s just joking, he’s just joking…”

“Only a republican wouldn’t listen. You didn’t have to pull the number; they would have waited on you without a number…” I said with a super large, silly smile glued to my face.  The older woman just smiled and gave me a thumb down and said, “Not me!”

I gave her two thumbs up, grabbed my Swiss cheese from the counter and High-tailed out of there.

Stranger things than writing...

I did it again...I went to a writer's conference this past Saturday and they talked about procrastination in writing. So, I said, at the time, this coming Monday, today, I would write at least 2000 words in my novel. What happened? I sat all day (well, after running 3.25 miles), and watched that Netflix series, "Stranger Things", All eight episodes. The stories were compelling, reminded me a lot like a few Stephen King novels. My only thing, where does season 2 take the viewers to? And was the end of episode 8 a "kind" of cliff hanger? I guess I'll have to wait until 2017.

Will the real coffee drinkers please stand up...

"Heard at the KDL Writer's Conference, in Grand Rapids, today; Her: "I love coffee!"
Me: "No you don't, you love sugar and cream..." As she poured a couple of teaspoons of sugar and then a lot of cream into her coffee. "Real coffee lovers drink their coffee strong and black.""



'via Blog this'

I've forgotten and I can't...

I consider myself a thinking person, someone who always has a brilliant thought on his mind. But, I guess as I progressively age, a guy just wants to have fun…but, alas I digress.

About a month or so ago my Keurig coffee maker died, or so I thought. What did I do, I went out and purchased a Mister Coffee, coffee maker for about $20. Prior to that I had purchased an expensive, well a near expensive couple bags of coffee, which I used in my Keurig coffee maker. That coffee was great, great taste and so forth.

The only problem, coffee tends to spoil after a couple of weeks (actually a week or less. I just can’t drink coffee that fast, though).  And, what made it even worse the Mister coffee maker left my cup of coffee with a bad plastic after taste. Yesterday, after having no coffee for a couple of days, I thought I would try the Mr. Coffee machine again. This time, the coffee was just terrible, I mean terrible! A biting, stinging taste on my tongue. I took one sip and had to spit it out, it was that bad.

This morning I opened up a jar of instant coffee. I have never really liked instant coffee, never. I usually drink it when I go camping. As of right now, eight hours later, I still feel that coffee in my gut. It seems to be hard to get out of my system.

Anyway, I remembered something my son told me a very long time ago…”Use YouTube, Dad!” Sure enough I went to the web and looked up Keurig coffee makers on YouTube and my exact machine came up and the video explained what was wrong and what to do about it. A very simple thing to do.

I now say to myself, “How stupid could I have ever been?” This is something I should have done two months ago and I wouldn’t have suffered as much as I have in the long run. And I have suffered. I need my morning coffee. Not because I like it so much, (love it), but it offers me the energy to get out of the house and do my daily run or walk or anything else that requires exercise.

If I can ever remember, old age seems to be doing that to me or I have been drinking too much…I’ve got to remember to use YouTube when something around the house breaks. Anyone wanna buy a Mister Coffee maker, cheap?

13 hours!

I had a dream this morning and they usually end up as a Sci-Fi story I want to write. After I woke up, fed the cats, made coffee, breakfast and read all of my emails, I thought I would flesh out my story. So I decided to go out and walk my three mile route and come up a story line.

When I got back I had the story laid out…in my mind. I was planning to write today, I have a bunch of things I wanted to get out and finished, let’s say, at least 2000 words worth. However, nothing happened at all with all of those thoughts I had, Nothing, nada, zilch, nope…Nothing!

Why you ask? I watched all 13 hours of the New Netflix series, “Luke Cage”. Thirteen hours! I watched six episodes last night and I was up until 1 am. Then when I finished with most of the things I needed to do, today, I hit up Netflix, again, and finished the rest of the series. Thirteen hours!

The good thing, though, I never let the idea out of my head. I don’t have a title, yet, but I know I will think of something sooner or later, so it’s “untitled – 10/2016”. I better outline it so I don’t forget.

When I get up tomorrow, I hope to find some motivation to keep my butt in this chair, in front of this computer and finish the novel I am working on now by at least November when the NaNoWriMo starts. That’s because I have another novel I want to start.

I am going to have to break some of these plates I have piled up over there in the sink. Because my plates are getting full and its getting hard to keep up. Fingers crossed… procrastinating? 

I got nothing...to write about

I got nothing…nothing to write about this very minute, nothing. I am sitting here watching the Lion’s football game and it’s at the end of the first half and of course the Lions are losing, go figure, so I am fuming, sort of. Heck, Michigan State lost last night and them damn Tigers lost, too. Really fuming now.

I just don’t have anything in mind to write about right but, I need to calm the *Frack* down. Anyway, them Tigers, what to do? They hold their fate in their own hands today, well, Toronto and Baltimore have to lose today. If that is the case, the Tigers will have to win, today, and win their make-up game tomorrow.

Now that I think about it, maybe I should just get up and wash the dishes, during the halftime show, and finish washing and folding my week’s worth of dirty cloths. Or heck, vacuum my rugs or just clean up. I am going to do something, just what…maybe take a nap. I'm due a nap right now. I didn’t drink a lot of coffee today so I am getting tired just sitting here and watching the Lion’s football game...I just bored watching the Lions lose. That’s too close to call…