dec 7 2022

next wednesday at 2:37 i plan to have a nervous breakdown.   it is long overdue.

in the meantime.....

i am totally enjoying the repurposed materials daily list of industrial waste .  but my real interest is in....rats.... 

yesterdays comment about brilliant ideas are often a cumulation of odd  bits from several people

however that must be tempered with  a camel is a horse designed by a committee...

my goal is to be able to say to the new york  city rat commission... i have a solution and would like to be paid $170,000.00 per week - plus  i have a a few charitible  demands.

(currently i have a solution and have only the slight detail of making it work) .----- in the process of working out the details-  i would have to guard against "leaks".. so to address that problem,   i would put out false information  to get everyone scrambling-- like telling everyone the solution involved ear wax - which would put a huge demand for the earwax cleaners now advertised..  which would be amusing to watch...

it is a cinch that victor snap traps ain't the way to go... and the solution is more 50 rats at one time- i don't even think you could poison. them fast enough.   whoever figures it out will have to be out of every known  box-- and that will easily be worth$170,000 per week... or day....

now as for the charitable demands.... firstly......i would insist that all of these smart   tv manufacturers produce only a smart tv that has an on / off button. that turns on the explore.org channel aquarium and then ability to. scan explore----- and if you wanted anything else you had to use/find the remote. this would improve the living conditions for millions  of people  who currently sit and stare at a black. screen ... or worse yet.. a game show and the news.

i have not asked charlie( explore.org) about this-- but it seems like it would go along with  his  "never stop learning" mantra. . if i ever get enough recognition ot be abler to demand anything... that will be my first.... well maybe second... after the "finders fee" of $170,000 per something.  i would not let them get away. with the $170k for life because at my age  solving the rat problem would be worth far more than that.

back to the drawing board....

 

 dec 6 2022

 I had a brilliant idea for a daily doggie this morning but as I sat in my chair with the back perpendicular to the seat I was so excited I forgot the topic that's because   It's working beautifully

 

the gastronomic report of the day

Janine bought me a piece of pie last night---spinach pie--it's green and slippery and I have to admit I don't think I've ever swallowed a piece of cooked spinach -----I'll eat it raw but not cooked.. and she stood there with her best mommy attitude “ just take a little bite it's good for you” And forced me to put a tiny bit on the end of my tongue..., after which I had trouble talking and she finally said “if I turn my back you're going to spit that out aren't you”  sounds like something I would have said to her 50 odd years ago and it was absolutely true I I can't do green slimy and I have never bitten into a tamato

Although she forced on me a vegetarian chili which really was very good if  didn't pay attention to what was in it which was not only tomatoes which I did manage to eat but fake fake hamburger.. I've run into fake hamburger before

 

So store bought veggie chilli gets good marks— mainly because the fake hamberger is.. almost real te TEXTURErextu

Lesson there  you may not speak and type and dictate.  a spelling correction and say the letters at the same time.

 

Now w/r/t what was formerly known as “the guest house”  will now be called Janine’s home  -- this will maybe discourage anyone from going in and helping themselves to a cuppa coffee and leaving the cups in the sink. ----  we have 11 other buildings and a teepee....--- somehow we should be able to make due with minimal disruptions of her  home .

it is her only home at the moment.. plus her office ( she does have a demanding  computer type job at home(-- along with feeding 20 odd animals   at meridith and trying to stuff healthy foods down her aging mother.) Her presence there is critical  to me.......as sdp morphs down to  no overnight help she is “covering” 3 nights  plus food. – you will see  people come and go overnight—on my  payroll... I am not helpless- but an extra set of younger legs make life so much easier. Especially for the  midnight snacking. ( see store bought  chili above ). Judy keeps me going straight  daytime... a few days a week...  it all works--- and we entertain over 100 people a week in the  senior places....i could not do it alone... neither could judy .. so we are a team.

 

one other improvement....  if you are coming in the house... please announce yourself—loudly---otherwise when the dogs bark, I don’t know if I need to get up ( out of my wonderful recli=ner chair...).and remind the dogs  to get on the sofa

 

mark—also gets up at 4:00--- we have alread y discussed the fact that I need to drop off my car in saugus.... to get teh snow plow put on it before 8:30 –and somehow get back to unload teh purina food..

 

next wierdo....  the purina food comes wiothj pallet size cardboard. – a lot of it...

 well back when I was designing the kennels, I found that building  full size kennels was a huge lesson in desiging the most functional—so I am suggesting lynn get the duct tape and put  together a cardboard version before any money gets spent..

\

 And betty--- down there on the cape.... you wouldn’t have any of the pictures of me/you/ and brownie. With all teh cardboard and duct tape????

That waws during teh time when every night I would partially empty the dumpster at partridgeberry place of useable 2x4’s. they approved because it was less for them to pay to get rid of.—and their carpenters threw away a lot.

 

They also had a bbq one night with 20 of my chickens—not a feather left behind....—2 weeks later it was  my turkey that “went missing”.

a load of hay... one weeks worth to meridith/

 dec 5

chair problem solved-- with borrowed brains.-- nick... with meghans help---- (or meghan with nicks help depending on which gender is reading this.)..but clearly it was the thought process that fascinated me...... with over 10 failures.. myself included..... meghan looked at it ..... failed to get it at 90 degrees.. and called for nick.. who failed...but then meghan said she knew her grandfather did not get stuck because it had a 9 volt battery which was good for one "straightening" before you had to replace the battery... i chimed in with "we tried unplugging it to reset and got no where..." nick put those 2 comments together....... "that is a expensive chair so if a battery was necessary they must have put one on this model.....which would not have allowed the chair to reset."  so he crawled under my desk and un plugged-- but followed the cord to the chair and found a rechargeable battery "in line"-- so he unplugged that and BINGO... it could be reset to factory details. ?90 degrees?? no problem-- all buttons work logically now... like up with the opposite, down.. i got a good nights sleep. thank you!

that is the biggest reason to drink coffee with people who's brains are loose enough to wander thru ideas....

With that in mind.... time to pay attention to...... why I built the kennels the way they are... and how can we achieve the same goals with the remodeling.

 This may go on for days......

 

the design of these kennels is not a totally random thing I spent a great deal of time trying to figure out the pluses and minuses of which there are many...... one thing I did do and Betty can verify this because I do have a photograph somewhere of her.. when I was building these kennels with cardboard and duct tape to see what would fit where and why things had to be made a certain way ------that's long before I got into it with wood and nails and things like that I have a picture of the cardboard loft system.

because of that and because purina will be delivering food today which does have great big pieces of cardboard involved in the palettes. I'm going to hopefully ask that the cardboard be saved and that we try and design these kennels with cardboard before we spend any money on it which is what I did to begin with to come up with things that must happen..

 

My first  concern is the safety and comfort of the dogs..... and I never wanted to worry about a dog being locked out of their kennel..... that is no problem in the summer but it would be misery and death in the cold of our winters... . as in.... it's impossible for a dog to get locked out.  or a second very important one it's impossible for a dog to have to sleep on the cold floor when it's 20 degrees warmer up 42 inches in a loft..

 

Fact number one.. occasionally a dog will be locked out ---it has happened over the past six months.. we try all kinds of things to prevent it from happening but it will happen--- which is why I insist that any door we put on the kennels is a door that can be opened from the outside which is the way I had the kennel doors years ago when I built these kennels----- I have never wanted to lock a dog out and I really don't want to lock them in either but at least I had doors that would allow a dog to get back into the warm area of the kennel and also gave us teh option of opening the kennels from the outside.... in case of fire. I would insist any new door have that capability.

 

you would think we could legislate around it but you cannot legislate common sense. I initiated a system where an evening person or the last person out of the barn was supposed to fill out the overnight report which listed all the kennels and who was in them.. sounds simple enough but in the past six months the two times it has been critical to know which dog was exactly where I found the overnight report was wrong.. because I find that when people have a fairly routine job to do that they eventually will fill out the paperwork without regard for the reason they're having to fill it out ----as in which dog is where.

The last person out of the barn filling out that overnight report is supposed to check the water which should be fresh and clean but hopefully there's not a bird floating in it.. the water is supposed to be placed right next to the door of the kennel so people can see it as they walk around and make sure it's clean

I've tried everything to make that overnight report be accurate.. and the next thing I think I will do is instead of listing the kennels by number and having them write the name of the dog in there I think I list  the name of the dogs and they make them write in the number of the kennel to see if that improves their accuracy. more effort but maybe it's necessary.

 

A few other details

Kennel 8 has always had an easier ramp for the geriatric dogs.. kennels  don’t have to be the same... and maybe shouldn’t be.

 

Then there's the rain snow and ice off the roof of the barn which is why I have little dog houses to protect the dogs as they exit and enter  the rain may drip 6 inches from the kennel exit door.. and the ice will fall very close to that 6 inches but the snow we'll shoot off the top and end up 18 inches from the door which is why I have those little dog houses to pitch whatever's coming  off the roof sideways and because I had to have it I put flaps to cut the breeze

worked pretty well for 20 years or so.

 

As for chewing wood---- Good Morning America..---- animals chew wood---  there is no wood in the barn that's been chewed to the point of not being structurally sound =====.they chew  Wood 2 x 4’s ..  they also chew firewood-- And carry around small trees which are also wood last I heard.. For the past 40 years I don't think I've had any dog  vet expenses connected to any wood chewing..

 

And  that is just a few....

p.s.   Costco is another source of pallet sixe cardboard.....  I learned a lot in that process.

 dec 4 2022

Someone sent me an e-mail saying I must read an  article ------ I noticed it was about New Zealand and I can appreciate the fact that what happens in New Zealand is probably going to have some effect on me if for no other reason then roast leg of lamb---- but my problems are far more local

 starting with the y#$%^&*() reclining chair right next to me, it certain will recline you/me... what they did not tell me is that I would have to call 911 to get out of the damn chair.  

 

you can now add bud to the list of people who just can't seem to operate a reclining chair with its 15 buttons --13 of which stand you on your head ---one does nothing and the other one moves   up. ever so slightly for maybe an inch raising the head part.

it's funny how everything  resorts to ask bud...  and he certainly is capable---- but not of managing this chair ---he gave up

 

. Lynn did get me a phone / name of the company ---goldentech.com and it has all sorts of descriptions of the comfort zone and the lower body and the upper body and the headrest and the lumber the lumbar button does seem to work very nicely it pushes on your rear just a little bit and there's a lifetime warranty on all sorts of things including one year on electrical labor well let me tell you there's this thing is just not working right --- oh yes,,...the  weight capacity is 375 so I'm not I'm not a problem there.

.......

 

My back is better mainly because I'm learning to manage it better  ---- I'm happy to report I can now both cough and laugh as long as I stand in a perfect West Point brace my shoulders back and head up etcetera but it works.

 One arms length from that #$%^&*() chair is total chaos.  As I tried to get some work / thinking done while tipped on my head.

 

gastronomical report

on the Sous vie---- Of the lamb chunks they turned out perfectly at 134.5 for much longer than I thought I was going to have them in that  pot. 

today I will try the bright red Chinese pork which I bought from the butchery already  vacuum  packaged.

I am still enjoying perked coffee--- Now with those tiny spoonful packages of actual half and half maybe--that don't need to be refrigerated.

and I'll never get to the store to get more flour so there's no brown sugar and karo syrup in sight yet

 

there is a board meeting this morning at 9:00 o'clock apparently which should be interesting.

and that it is chicken Sunday ----we really do need to have people buy in if they can,

 

Bud  and I discussed the white fencing  and possibly a post hole digger auger for the tractor.. And decided since it was December we were not about to start the project in January so we basically put it on hold ---- to be considered in the spring if we have not  sold the whole pile of fencing to somebody else.

They demonstrate these augers so beautifully -----well if you look at what's coming out of the ground it could be cream cheese ----Meredith farm they dug those holes there must be 3 feet of topsoil on that place...  we are not so fortunate.

our place it's gonna be rocks with the added complication of underground wires which dig safe did not even attempt to locate.    with all. their rules and regulations and time i may dig or get another "permit"   i know darn well there is "stuff" wires  pips. conduit - on both sides of the driveway.. they only located  one side and figured they "had done it"

i need to have that negative proven.....

 dec 3 2022

now lynn -----( who is remarkably tech savvy) has been bewildered by the chair... we all conclude  the remote must be wired incorrectly.

15 buttons--13 tip it backwards--- 1 tips slightly forward -- 1 does nothing. there is an "M" button which may be memory-- and may mean ?reboot".  but the plug is not reachable  once stuck in the chair...lynn did get a phone number...

to be continued...

that sous vie steak- ny sirloin-at 133.5 for 4 hours  then sprinkled with the monterey steak salt/seasoning..  then briefly broiled---has to be right up there with the best steak i have had.... Costco..usda choice to start with... i ate 1/2 and mark took th. e. other 1/2 home--- not had his report yet...

i thought of bread making today.  that brown sugar/butter/karo. pulls me strongly in that project... but.  janine tells me wallace ( the. person .wallace.. not the neutered dog wallace)--- will be riding that horse with 4 white feet this morning at  7:30 at meridith-- and she will. have picked up a dunkin pumpkin latte - 2 sugars - milk---

mail call last night art 4pm there was a heavy suggestion i dig up my old animal episodes stories and ??photos??  i never failed a shot... but i don't think there were many that finished out the way they started...they do get complicated... one job -- downtown boston-- big name actor-- i touched some liver paste to his face to get the dog to. lick his face... and he bolted--running down the block in his underwear because he is a vegie and did not want meat to touch. him...as opposed to a reallllly big

guy ? jack  Nickxxxx who  said " i don't care if you fill my shoe with liver-- whatever to get the shot of the dog"   following him  down teh steps in the wang center..

i have some digging to do...

 dec 2 2022

4 people have now been buffallo'ed by " the chair? 

 when i sat in the demo model in the store... it was a normal 90- to 91 degree angle-- and being a recliner i knew it would tip back... so i assumed it would tip forward to the 90 degrees again... not true. painfully not true... judi jami and donna --- plus me.... not capable of working a recliner chair back to. that 90 degree sitting position...

that tells me a bunch of things i do not. want to hear. why should i be expected t work my phone if i can[t even work a chair????

to make matters worse... my phone had a 1/2 moon on the top line... how was i to know it was the sign for " do not disturb"--and i don't know how that got that way-- nor could. judy figure out. how to get rid of it---- then all of a sudden the moon was gone---

Both times I said to Judy would you please put that online the fact that you couldn 't work the chair and you couldn't get rid of the other phone thing before everybody blames my age on the fact I can't even sit in the chair or work the phone.. I can still do the suduko extremes.. fat lot of good that'll do me.

*** 

Somebody in Hamilton moved their horses down South for the winter and has an extra 100 bales of hay which sounds good to me so mark and I are gonna go and try and collect it. Where.  neither mark nor I could lift one Bale of hay let alone 100 so I'm hoping somebody is around to maybe make two trips out of it.. I'm really good at dumping it Meredith for somebody else to deal with it .

 

 it is in a barn which  has been in my lifetime an extremely fancy horse establishment owned by a woman who drove a foreign hand no that's a four that's right 4 in hand- horse hitch very well enough to compete in Europe with them---- just think fly them over with the carriage..and back again !!   I'm also told that in the process of getting these horses ready to compete she nearly drowned herself and her mother-in-law in a swamp when the horses decided to run away the horses and the mother-in-law all survived very well but the story is still around. Driving horses is not for the meek. Sometimes you have no more control than to say “please don't do that”.. and your destiny is left to two animals in the front whose combined IQ is maybe 37.

 

that's why I drove donkeys... my donkeys ran away once in the topsfield fair parade it's very embarrassing---- I too had no control except after they went about 20 feet the front ones stopped and said “why are we doing this.?”... and tiptoed back on to the street and wandered on Never to do it again..

 

as opposed to a horse---if a horse has run once they definitely will again making them quite dangerous. I think it was George Bush senior who passed some law which allows horse  owners put up a sign that says if you get involved with horses it's your own damn fault and don't even think of suing anybody---- we have a sign like that posted somewhere I think it was George Bush senior.

 

Just to bring you up to speed in the kitty litter. And  horse  manure. department again---- those pellets that I had on the kitchen counter where I experimented dampening some let's see what would happen----they're sold by tractor supply as bedding and Matt reported that they are still doing a super job in the stalls because the hay doesn't get churned up in them and the Manure is much easier to pick out of the pellets than it is in the normal what I've always used--- shavings..

 

Moving on....

 dec 1 2022

Dec 1 2022 ah

No bread today----   the basic ingredients I mentioned yesterday assumed 1 packet of yeast needed ¾ to 1 cup fluids to which you added flour til you could pick up the wad without  it sticking to our gloves...very scientific....

 

I was on my feet too long yesterday—more heating pad time required..

It is an unusual day when I'm not annoyed or confused about something and certainly today it's this recliner chair ----because of this back deal I really would like to sit up as in 90 degrees and maybe put my feet up a little bit ----this recliner has 15 buttons.. so if I plunk my  ailing butt in the chair.... When the back and the seat are in an obtuse angle of more than 90 degrees 14 of those buttons move the back further back -- And it does seem to me if an arrow button is pointed up that whatever it does the arrow pointing down would do the opposite.. but that's not true with these buttons which is particularly annoying when every time it goes further backwards it hurts.... so I may have to write a letter to them.

sorry on yesterday's daily doggy I obviously have button trouble in places more than with my recliner chair ----I think I finally sent it out about mail call time and by then I realized that this recipe which I use if there is such a thing is about One Cup of fluid of one kind or another pounded with a cup or so of flour and the consistency tells you when the quantity is correct

 

other than that---- my infirmity has adjusted placement of the dogs at night because if I ever push the  help. button I don't think anybody could get in the front door easily thanks to lackey jimminey and siz.....and Janine is here to help with that Monday through Thursday but Friday Saturday and Sunday I I would love to have someone stay here overnight between 7 to 7 where your only responsibility would be to. straightened out the dogs if I push my button that says I've fallen and I can't get up type thing. small parties could be encouraged.. bring friends... whatever...i will buy the pizza !! an evening at crazy acres.... i remember the 4 crazy texans-- and then ingrids college friends... there must be a way....

 

I also need to get the dogs better trained if someone knocks on the door they should be trained to get up on the couch..  if I'm there I can make them do that but if I'm not there they should be trained so that anybody could tell them to get on that couch and they should go so I have that to work on... along with some paperwork