When it comes to wedding anniversaries, I know you should be properly sentimental. Show some respect for the institution of marriage. After all, it’s our 45th. But I can’t help myself; I found this quote the other day and so here it is…
“I love being married. It's so great to find that one special person you want to annoy for the rest of your life.” - Rita Rudner
Of course, having posted this, I'm in danger of being pummeled severely.
Be careful, you may get what you wish for. We were hoping to see the fence finished up yesterday and sure enough, it was. Jeekers! We’re surrounded by a blank wall! Our view of the orchard is gone and we’re trapped here...Help!
Ok, I know we will become used to it after awhile; after all, it was our normal view of the world just a month ago. And the return of the roses will help to soften the look of all of that bare cedar fencing. The roses were pruned last week and so they are just stumps at this stage, leaving even more of the new fence exposed.
While the fence is new, I will take the time to remove a board or two and fashion a hole for Boo the cat to escape through. Both coming and going.
Last night, here on the Planet Orland, it was time for the annual Valentine Dinner at the parish hall. It’s put on by the youth group of the two churches, the Catholic Church and the Federated church. Yes, it’s (Gasp!) ecumenical! And it seems to work quite well. The money raised this year will go towards their trip south to
What I find most refreshing about this group of teens is the fact that they don’t go to
Truth be told; the youth group wouldn’t even have to go more than a mile or so to find the kind of poverty that comes along with an agricultural economy here on the Planet Orland.
How nice; the wind is decreasing and now, maybe, the fence guys can finish. They gave it a try yesterday, but the wind made the work nearly impossible. It took two of them to hold one board in place and that soon became a losing proposition. They are scheduled to be back this morning.
It’s been quite awhile since the fence went down, (January 5th) and we’re both ready for it to be back up. Unfortunately, the way the new fence is configured, some of the old grapevines in the arbor portion had to be cut. I’ll plant new ones but it will take awhile before they have the look and feel of those 20 year old vines.
Surprising New Longevity Research
“’It’s not just luck, it’s not just genetics…It’s lifestyle’ that seems to make a big difference, said lead author Dr. Laurel Yates of Harvard’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital. ‘It’s get your shoes on, get out there, and do some exercise,’ she said.”I’ve finished up with my walking for the day and just in time. The high winds arrived about 9:30 and they have been creating havoc across this part of the valley ever since. When they started I had already finished my cup of coffee at Cal-Java (My reward) and I had scanned the newspaper for any news I might have missed earlier in the day. And anyone walking by my table would have seen a well connected guy. I had my earphones in place as I listened to Fresh Air. I had my
And speaking of the internet; as I was earlier, I’m connected to Usenet (directly related to the first internet) this morning, to download some flamenco music from 1964. Whoa! Good stuff…and there’s more from the 70’s as well. My collection grows. I doubt that I’m in jeopardy of breaking the law; my collection of music is almost completely filled with music from 40 to 50 years ago. Nothing current and most of it is unavailable commercially.
I suppose that yesterday’s early post made it appear as if I were happy, happy, happy about my aging. Not necessarily so. More realistic than happy. Those who know me wouldn’t say that I’m the most upbeat person they know; in fact, I’m quite critical about lots of things. But, those are things that can be, might be and should be changed by complaint and education. Aging is not one of them.
And I sometimes get wistful when I realize that I cannot run a race; that I must walk it instead. Yes, when your body fails you, you can’t help but take it personally! But…your mind can thrive by exercising it, by full engagement with the world. And since I can’t travel everywhere I would like, I use the internet to make that connection.
If you were old enough to remember the first few years of television, you can see some similarities between the internet and early television. And this internet, the one we all use right now, is heading towards gross commercialism. Will it become the ‘television’ of the mid 21st century?
But, the good news is that we’re not stuck with just one internet. Another one could appear. Any time. Here’s hoping!
I must get busy this morning. Lots to do. I have to get in my training time in the park, followed by chores. The longer days are helping, as I can get into the park earlier.
But, on a different note; this morning I was reading Time Goes By and a posting all about aging…surprise! Anyway, I had no great wisdom or advice to give. I think it’s all very simple. You can approach aging (elderhood) with curiosity, or with fear and loathing. It’s a choice. I’ve chosen the former and that works for me. And in my volunteer work I deal with lots of elders that have chosen the latter and they are usually quite unhappy.
Sure, there are wrinkles and gray hair or no hair. There are aches and pains. But, if you can learn to view those things as natural; putting yourself in the role of an observer of life and not as a victim of it, it’s really quite fun! Wow! Look at that face in the mirror! How am I ever going to shave around all of those wrinkles without needing a transfusion when I’m through?
"My opinion is, if the death of 3,000 people isn’t sufficient for a death penalty in this country then why do we even have the death penalty?"
DEBORAH BURLINGAME, whose brother died in the Sept. 11 terror attacks, on the government’s decision to seek capital punishment against six
Let me answer that. One; the death penalty is morally wrong. It’s all about revenge and does nothing to deter crime. But that’s just my personal opinion. Two; it’s wrong because the bush administration has made a mockery of justice with the existence of that prison in a foreign country;
I must get back out onto the trail in Bidwell Park this morning. Gotta get the heart rate up and the burn those calories!
Wishful thinking; as we were driving in
The weekend has passed and it was a beauty! T-shirt weather all day. And that gave me a chance to do some pruning out in the orchard. I’m not through yet, but I do have the remaining trees in a state of high anxiety.
I’ve read books and gone to seminars on pruning and slowly, over the years, I’ve learned to do more than just a light trim. I’ve become bold in my technique, slashing and hacking. Of course I do all of the normal pruning; cutting out crossing branches and opening the middle to allow the sun in. But, if I climb the ladder and a branch gets in my way…off it goes! On the ladder, any branch that tries to get above my 9' height rule is brought down to size. And on the ground, with loppers in hand, I circle the tree as if I were riding my mower; any branch that might spoil my day by removing my hat and a portion of scalp is quickly removed. The ground is soon littered with debris. If trees could talk?
Obscure thought; life is always just like life on the school playground. Always! (I don’t know if it’s an original thought, it could be borrowed.)
Before we had a chance to Wii last night, we had our chores to do. We picked up 37 boxes of books from the Chico Library and brought them back to Orland. It looks like the Friends of the Library will have another large Spring Book Sale. I’m always amazed at the number of books that we transport. It’s usually over 20 boxes a week and with about 15 or more books per box. And we see lots of hard cover fiction. I easily identified and pulled two books out of the boxes yesterday that had never been opened; never read. My guess is that a lot of people just buy them at Costco. It’s a habit. I suppose for some people it’s easier to buy a book at Costco than to check the same one out at the library. It baffles me. But…we’ll take the books!
Now that was fun! Last night we were at our Middle Daughter’s house and both before and after dinner, we joined that large crowd of folks who have Wii’ed at least once in their lives. We’re veterans now. And as an elder, I can recommend it for those over 65. Want to get your heart rate up? Do a couple rounds of Wii boxing! Too aggressive a sport? There’s Wii tennis and baseball. And if you’re really sedentary; try Wii bowling. It can be played while seated if necessary. It’s even good for you!
Middle Daughter’s family has the perfect setup for the game; large screen TV at one end of a lengthy living room. You have all kinds of room to throw the perfect strike…baseball or bowling.
The programming is great; I would love to see the logic charts used to control the flow of the games. And I wonder how many lines of code were used to make the baseball player glance upward after hitting a foul pop up over his head? The graphics are good and I can imagine that they will only get better. I can only imagine what they might be with HDD and a High Definition monitor. But, Nintendo doesn’t have it available…yet.
So I started looking around the gaming world this morning, trying to learn a little more about it. Very complicated. ‘Gamers’ seem to control the direction and focus of the programmers and most of the games seem to be of the violent shooter genre. I didn’t spot many friendly games out there. Nintendo seems to have the best of those. For computing power, it looks like Sony (Play Station) has the best going, especially since it can use Blu-Ray technology and that appears to be the winner in the
A slow day. Sure, it’s Saturday, but I’m retired and that shouldn’t make a difference any more. The days of the week should be the same now, but it’s an old habit and hard to break.
I have been wandering about the political blogs this morning, plus the news feeds, and I found this article from the Washington Post. The author has captured my feelings exactly. Well, almost exactly. I have to leave myself some wiggle room if he goes off the deep end somewhere along the line. But yes, I’m a ‘disaffected voter’. He refers to us as, "restless and anxious moderates," or RAMs. Most come from the third of the electorate that identifies itself as independent…”
He goes on to describe ‘change’ and how the candidates seem to miss what that means. Of course that makes me think of how I see change as compared to others my age. And it’s a real quandary for me; I welcome change, I love it, and yet I also love the security that comes with everything being the same. So, I know it’s a battle…sigh.
In my opinion, fear of change is what distinguishes the elderly from the elders. The conservative from the liberal. The bright from the dull. Fear of change cripples you mentally. Think of all of the American ‘heroes’; we don’t revere one that was afraid of change. Who are the movers and shakers in the world? Those who change things! There are no statues of people who wanted to keep the status quo.
I do not know which makes a man more conservative—to know nothing but the present, or nothing but the past. - John Maynard Keynes
Cold turkey. It’s that time; we stopped feeding logs into the woodstove yesterday as the daytime temperatures were back into the low 60’s. We’ll start the fire again if we have a sudden change, but for now the mornings are going to be a little bit chilly without that comforting radiance from the stove. (The cat thinks we’re crazy!)
During the past two months, we probably burned close to a cord of wood (almond). That’s $275 worth of comfort, just memories and ashes now. Lots of ashes.
I have this odd feeling that the Economic Stimulus Package that Washington/bushco have approved will turn out to be a dud. First, it’s a government program. Second, it’s a government program and last…yes, it’s run by the government. And I’m seriously worried that the politicians will use this opportunity to ignore the bloated bushco budget. Like all serious conservative Republicans, this president has grown the government at an incredible rate while sticking the middle and lower classes with the bill. Same thing that
Defense budgets make me think of the F-22. State of the Art. Expensive. Very expensive. $148 million. Each. Buy 100 and get a discount. And not one has made it to the battlefields of
Some good news…Wal*Mart had a sad last quarter financial report for 2007. As did most retailers; except for Costco, which reported a 7% increase over last year’s numbers. Costco=Union workers. Wal*Mart=Non-union workers.
The good news here is the fact that the fence is being built once again. The ground dried out enough to support the ‘bobcat’ and the last of the old posts were removed and the new corner posts were set. The rest of the posts will be set in concrete today and then the fencing will go up on Friday. That’s the plan…
And while that is going on this morning, I will be in
Perhaps I should listen to music as I do my racewalking practice. Skipping the news from NPR. I think I overdosed on election news yesterday; I’m finding it difficult to get enthused about much of anything political this morning. Especially after reading that piece about the Decider ‘deciding’ that torture is legal any time he feels like it. No rules. He decides. Where did
And on another note…I was listening to NPR and all of the political chatter from around the nation as the reporters and listeners tried to make sense of the results from yesterday's voting. What I found most disturbing was the number of people who called in and reported that they were staunch Conservative Republicans and that they just couldn’t stand the fact that McCain was so liberal! McCain…a liberal? Please! And from what I could gather, the McCain crowd is going to spend a lot of time in the next week proving to the Conservatives that he can be just as narrow minded and spiteful as any one of them! Yay! Go
OK, that wasn’t fair. What I should have complained about was the fact that so many called in and simply repeated something they had heard in a political ad. They just parroted their favorite candidate. Or better yet; repeated something
By
A sharp decline in the service sector stuns Wall Street. The
The service sector. That’s what Americans do. We used to be a part of the worldwide manufacturing sector. But no longer. We only sell things these days. ‘Would you like to Supersize that?’
OK, Switzerland, Germany and Japan. Economic world leaders. They have a healthy manufacturing base (Unionized) and their balance of payments are on the plus side. They both consume and produce. They even have better health care...but you already knew that. How do they do that? It must be magic! (Or common sense)
More ibuprofen! The pain is with me once again. Lazy muscles rebelling against the assault on their former placid existence. I have to get in shape for the Portland Marathon; again. And I only have about 8 months to do it. That’s actually plenty of time, but I know it will fly by and I will still wonder if I have had enough training, even at the starting line.
I will also have to begin posting again on my marathon blog, Short Laps. I let it lapse (laps?) after the last few races. And I will probably begin using Utterz on that blog instead of this one.
Should I bother to look at the news this morning? I watched a few minutes of ABC and NBC last night via streaming video. The ‘Talking Heads’ were in their full glory, talking a lot and saying nothing and so I turned it off. Our television antenna is still lying on the ground while we wait for the fence to be rebuilt and so we couldn’t have cheated and watched a real television even if we had wanted to. And after watching some of the commercials for the current NBC shows, it will be at least another 6 months before we watch television again. Except for Netflix, of course.
Ah, the fence. We wait and we wait. The ground is still too wet to bring in the small tractor that will pull the few remaining poles and then dig the new ones. There is a chance that it may happen later today. The fence-less wide open vista, seen from our kitchen window, is interesting, but we’re ready for some privacy again. Privacy being relative of course; the closest house in that direction is about 600 feet away.
OK, I’m curious. I must look and see who the leaders are. Oh, %/!#*@&#!!! No winners? We have to endure even more of this nonsense? And Huckabee is still in the race? Are there no limits to ignorance? Obviously not. But I should know that after watching events of the last seven+ years unfold.
But…a thought. Could it be that this particular Super Tuesday finish was engineered by the media and the political campaign staffers? This way they still have a job and the campaign advertising money will continue to pour in. It’s a perfect storm!
Super Tuesday is upon us. Is there any state that won’t be involved? Why? For if it doesn’t happen today for the candidate of your choice, it won’t happen at all. Just an opinion of course. And an idle thought;
I’m almost through with David Halberstam’s book, the Coldest Winter. It has been a great book; one that has held my attention throughout. Yes, it’s a war story, a true one, but it’s also written to reveal the truth about the players in that sad drama. And as you read it, you can see why, 50 years later, that it is truly the ‘forgotten war’. No one wants to remember the criminals or the crimes that killed so many of our soldiers. It’s one thing to die in the defense of your country, but to die for the vanity of generals? I’m afraid I can’t remain objective as I read the book; after an hour or so, I’m simply mad and must put it down.
Other bits of news; once again I was proven to be correct. You only have to watch the final few minutes of any sporting event to learn all that is important about it. And I suppose it’s the same for political events as well…except that they won’t leave us alone! I can hardly wait until Wednesday morning. There will be blessed silence for a day or two while the chosen candidates regroup and focus. Then the attacks will begin in earnest.
If I were to bet on Super Tuesday, I would say that
I think the Clinton/Obama race is far too close to call. But what a shame it is that the
Which makes me think; what is the motive for these presidential hopefuls? Same question for either party. Do we really believe that they are only interested in doing good for their fellow citizens? That they are altruistic to a fault? Over achievers in the field of human relations?
Of course not! They are greedy for power. It wasn’t always so; back in the days of the ‘smoke filled room’, some presidential candidates were offered up to us as sacrifices for their party. ‘Accidental’ candidates. And some became ‘accidental’ presidents while the party retained control. But now that the stakes are higher than they ever were, the lust for power is ever more blatant. And definitely more expensive!
Every once in awhile the Daily Quotations are arranged in such a way that, in whole; they are pretty interesting; not just one or two of them. And they were this morning.
The one I really like? That would be the one by
It’s quiet once again. The winds were howling last night and so it’s a relief to wake up and hear…nothing. And since it’s still dark, I can’t tell what has happened out in the orchard.
The good news is that the power has remained on overnight and I have no clocks to reset. Plus, the power stayed on for our dinner last night; right in the middle of the storm. (The pot roast was a hit, or so I was told.)
Once I had the pot roasts in the oven and simmering, I was free to watch the snow at various points near Tahoe, courtesy of CalTrans and their live video system. The camera at
And, after our guests had gone, it was time for some reading. More of The Coldest Winter by David Halberstam; a fascinating book. After putting it down for the evening, it occurred to me that I had been extremely blessed. Too young for the Korean War by just 6 years and my discharge from the Navy happened about 3 years before the war in
I know it has been over fifty years since the time of the Korean War, but if you want to understand what we are doing in
Darn! More stormy weather today. We have the usual wind warnings and the results of that could be quite dramatic, especially as the soil is so saturated; I will expect to see more trees down. And power lines? I hope not! We will be cooking the pot roasts at the same time the winds will be ripping.
Speaking of power lines; as I was. The News and Review had a good article/comment about the recent power outages. And they echoed my thoughts exactly. I have been looking at all of the old photos on the Shorpy website and I thought how odd it was that 100 years ago we were using wooden poles to support electrical wires and we still do that today. Is that because the pole and wire technology has never been surpassed? That they discovered the ‘perfect’ way to move electricity 100 years ago and there is no sense in looking any further? Or…perhaps it’s all about money?
Big day today if you like pot roast. I’m going to be cooking four of them for a crowd of 16 elders. I’ll be using the recipe I found on The Pioneer Woman Cooks! Website; I think it’s a winner. I will be using egg noodles and/or mashed potatoes as a bed for the roast. And at only $1.98 a pound for boneless chuck roast, it’s really a bargain meal.
We did this a few months ago and had a Southern Style Fish Fry with Hush Puppies. But that was back when it was warm; now a pot roast sounds pretty good, considering the current weather conditions.
I’m on to a new book, The Coldest Winter by David Halberstam. It’s both fascinating and timely. If you ever thought that American generals didn’t have time for politics, you will be disabused of that thought right away after reading the first few chapters.
Oh, no! There goes the stock market again…
U.S. Economy Unexpectedly Sheds 17,000 Jobs
Today,
The decline in jobs across a broad spectrum of professions marks the most striking evidence yet that the
But, wait! Here’s the good news!
Exxon Mobil Profit Sets Record Again
Today,
Exxon’s $40.6 billion in net income in 2007 exceeded the company’s own record for profits at a
Of course it's all good news. If you lose your job, you won't need to buy any gas. Take that, Exxon!
The day begins in the usual manner. Coffee and news. Except that this morning I’m listening to the news via my new Clip at the same time I’m reading about it. News junkie. On a new level.
OK, that doesn’t work as well as I thought it might. So I’ve turned off the radio and removed the ear buds. My brain doesn’t multi-task all that well anymore. I can listen to music (no vocals) while reading but I can’t listen to the
The news is certainly focused on the two Democrats as Super Tuesday looms ever closer. I wonder if either one will make it to the Planet Orland before that day? Somehow I don’t think so. Not that it would make much difference for us as our ballots are already sealed and mailed. Election is over.
It’s definitely a historic moment; race and gender making a statement for the first time. But isn’t that a shame? What has taken us so long to evolve? But, I have heard terrible stories about what might happen to either one of the candidates if they should win. Obviously not everyone has evolved. I know from my travels in the South that racism is alive there. And it’s alive on the Planet Orland as well. I can say the same thing about patriarchy; it’s far too prevalent.
From what I read this morning, the focus at last nights debate was on experience;
