Erin and I went to the Jug yesterday. We hiked around for about an hour and left  only when other people came with their dogs.

I’m not a paranoid, deranged millionaire. I’m a billionaire.                         – Howard Hughes

• This Erinday, I’m going to pick her up. Nina’s busy so it will  be me heading into Dilia.
• Yesterday I left the house as soon as ML got up.
• She was particularly ugly yesterday and I decided to leave.
• I went to SF and bought a new jack for the garage and some screws for Tori’s Jeep.
• At home I installed the screws and assembled the jack.
• By the time that was all finished, ugly was in bed and the house was normal again.
• Now ML is not someone you could call attractive or pleasant looking or plain looking or unattractive, she’s ugly. Yesterday she was repulsive looking. She refuses to let her caregiver comb her hair and it was standing straight up in fright wig fashion. Leaving was a good thing.
• This Erinday, we are going someplace where Erin and I can hike and climb I think. Maybe the Jug or possibly the hacienda.
• Yesterday Tori wanted to stab Will and threatened to do so if she had to pick Erin up today. I handed her a knife.
• I’m very accommodating.
• WOWDOG in SF has Chicago quality hot dogs. If in SF, you should try them. Very good dogs!
• There’s also Chicago Dogs in SF for good dogs, but WOWDOG is more convenient since you don’t have to drive all the way into SF to get there.
• For all that 2013 has sucked the big one, it was a good year for finding hotdog stands in SF for me.

When the white missionaries came to Africa they had the Bible and we had the land.

They said ‘Let us pray.’  We closed our eyes. When we opened them…we had the Bible and they had the land!         – Desmond Tutu

• John got here on time today.
• I slept in until 4 this morning. I feel rested, somewhat.
• Nina and I went to Red Lobster last night.  I saw a RL commercial on TV the other night and decided that was the Friday night dinner spot for this week. We both had a very nice dinner and the portions were huge. I had the Bar Harbor Lobster Bake and Nina had the salmon. Mine had lobster, mussels, shrimp, and scallops on a bed of pasta. Nina’s came with rice and asparagus.
• We’ll do that again.
• After dinner, we went to Denver Mattress to see what they had to offer. We’ve been to Mattress Firm already and I hated the high pressure salesman there. While I usually enjoy screwing with salespeople, this guy was no fun.
• Mattress Firm started with prices for mattresses at around $7K and then cut their price in half because he “liked” us. I called them on that and it angered him. OK that part was fun.
• Denver Mattress came in at a reasonable price, but then they offered me a 52″ flat screen TV, and for an extra $300 they will bump that up to a 60″ TV. On my next visit there I will begin my negotiations  with the TV and the deletion of it from the deal.
• Now I’m going to want a new TV soon, for my study that is, but a 52″ or 60″ is far too large for what I need or want for that room. I need to see what I can get from them and how much I can save. I’m pretty sure that I can get them to pay the sales tax. I do that all the time.
• Nina doesn’t want to go wheeling tomorrow. I may go alone or with Erin, if I pick her up on Sunday.
• I talked to Mom this morning and established that we’d be staying at Casa de Beppe, instead of Hotel Carl, for this visit.

I’m sorry, but I think you’re confusing your right to say stupid shit with me not having the right to make fun of it.

State still last in job growth – The Santa Fe New Mexican: Business.

One of the biggest beefs I have with this state is the apparent pride we seem to exhibit in news like the above linked article from yesterday’s New Mexican. We rank at the bottom and mostly dead last in every list that comes out that talks about our quality of life in general. That can encompass education, jobs, safety and numerous other statistics.

I believe that these lists, with us firmly in the bottom few slots, effects us in many different ways, including tourism. Why would anyone care to do anything here but drive through the state. With the proliferation of nationwide new coverage via the internet and cable news stations, we’re more of a national joke than anything else. We need to embrace the positives of this state and work to fix these negatives and not join in the NM bashing.

Other Stuff

• Erin is gone for the weekend. She was pretty good this week.
• I have an 8:30 appointment to have the Jeep serviced today.
• I could have had the oil changed when they did the lift, but I figured that I could have all connections double checked a week later by doing the service today. It will give me peace of mind during the drive east.
• Tori liked the lift so much, she ordered one for next week. Poor Erin will need a step laser getting into both our vehicles.
• Justin Bieber? Does anyone give a shit? I thought not.
• Cold and snowing yesterday.
• Cold and calm this morning. 15° when I woke up.
• Warm weekend is predicted. May go wheeling on Sunday with Nina and Erin if I pick her up.
• This afternoon I should jump the tractor and do my lot. It’s been a while and it needs some attention.
• I got a haircut yesterday. My barber’s husband is running for the city council and it turns out that he’s the new chairman of the city’s lodger’s tax board, the same job I do for the county. He also owns the local Dairy Queen.

No man ever steps in the same river twice. For it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man. ~ Heraclitus

httpv://youtu.be/9WoM2bHfr48

Oh the horror, this poor misunderstood, retarded man was put to death recently by the barbarians of Texas. He was not allowed to contact the Mexican consulate and get the advice of the Mexican government and these godless Texans killed him. Of course the fact that he shot a cop in the back of the head is downplayed because I read the story in the liberal Santa Fe New Mexican, the only so called newspaper that we can get out here, but dammit that’s just not as important as killing a COP KILLER, is it? Stupid press corps.

Dennis

Dennis is forcing me to learn things. Yesterday his truck crapped out on him while he was going to Santa Fe to buy a new liberal alternator for that same vehicle that died. He called me for assistance, which I gladly gave him since he’s my buddy, and we towed the truck to a safe location and ran to town for parts. It turns out that changing an alternator is easy to do and it only took us about 30 minutes to do, once we had the part. Gives me pause when it comes to my own vehicle.

The East

Wah! It’s cold outside! It’s global warming! Wah! SUCK IT UP PEOPLE, IT’S WINTER OUTSIDE AND THIS SHIT HAPPENS! Global warming. Stupidest damned thing I’ve ever heard. Weather moves in cycles through time and we’ve had cold before and we’ll have it again. Conversely, we’ve had droughts, mind-numbing heat, and torrential rains in the past and we’ll have them again. Don’t like the cold, move to a warmer place.

Let’s take a poll

With the state of the union coming up shortly, how many of you think that the the big O will lie to us and say things are great? Second question: Do you think this will be another self-serving load of crap designed to make the big O look like the great leader he thinks he is? Last question: If we could hold the last election again, would you vote for the big O or a talking bird?

I wish Google Maps had an “Avoid Ghetto” routing option.

OK, while I was happy with my iPad Mini, it’s come to a point where I’m starting to realize that my eyes need help, even when reading. This calls for the new iPad to give me a larger format and more to read on a page. I love my iPads for reading books and magazines. The Mini was a bit hard with the magazines, but the books were pretty good. The main beef I had was that with the larger font I’m needing, I had less text per page and I was turning pages more often.

Super Bowl Fever!

I don’t have it. Stupid event that send chills down Tori’s spine. If I don’t have a C-note minimum on ANY sporting event, I have no interest in the game.

Chicago

Leaving January 30 and returning sometime in February. Going to move all shit from her condo to our storage room. Letting the pros pack and ship the shit while we supervise and say yay or nay to the shit being packed.

Once the condo is cleaned up, repairs will begin and then we will list the place for sale. Will probably use the same realtor that she bought it from. She’s still working the area and she sold it once, right?

Me

I need to start walking again. Once you start, you should never stop. Stopping has reduced my stamina to my pre-walking  levels. Damned weather was why I quit walking.

I have a March doctor’s appointment. Schedule this stuff with plenty of time in advance and you can almost guarantee the time frame you wish. I like the first appointment of the day. The doctor is well rested and his hands are still clean. Dr. Green is my doctor and he has a lot of experience with male related stuff since he was a prison doctor before going into private practice. Turn your head and cough!

OK, if you don’t like my Jeep stories, skip this part. Last week I had my Jeep lifted. A couple of days ago I tested the lift in an arroyo on the way to Arrow’s Ridge. The arroyo has some difficult portions including a 2 foot stone step that needs to be climbed. The Jeep took it all in stride and I am a happy camper.

Nina

Still alive.

I have kleptomania, but when it gets bad, I take something for it.

. . . he had no idea how to use it. Someone came by to remove a truck from my property yesterday. Big trailer, big truck, ramps, winch, come-a-longs, and tie downs and he couldn’t get the truck on the trailer. Hours spent trying to do it his way and when we did it my way it was done in 30 minutes.

I am so sore and I was sore yesterday too. Lifting and moving items that were heavy and awkward and so unnecessary. Combined he had a dually 350 pick up with a 40 foot 5th wheel flat bed to haul a dually 550 dump truck off of a flatbed truck. It didn’t work well and the 550 fell partially off the truck. This happened just before I got there.

My Jeep was the workhorse of the rescue project. It pulled all rigs that were connected straight. It pulled the 550 sideways to further straighten the combination. Lockers and 4 wheel low did the trick.

I have to apologize to Dennis. when he came to chat, I was too sore to stand and talk. Had the table been free of debris, a.k.a. Sam’s Club shit, I would have loved to sat and chatted with you.

It’s 3:15 a.m. as I type this. At 2:30 a.m. the phone rang. Another crank call, the second in a weeks time. It’s kinda fun when this happens, other than the lack of sleep that occurs, because I immediately use the block call feature on my phone system and the dumb ass can’t call the store anymore. When the idiot complains about not being able to call, I explain the system to them and tell them that they were blocked due to phone abuse and I never take people off the blocked list. One complained “that’s not fair, we were just having fun” so I asked him if I punched you in the face for fun if he’d understand and just shrug it off? He didn’t get it.

America is the only country where a significant proportion of the population believes that professional wrestling is real, but the moon landing was faked.   – David Letterman

“A man sat at a metro station in Washington DC and started to play the violin; it was a cold January morning. He played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes. During that time, since it was rush hour, it was calculated that 1,100 people went through the station, most of them on their way to work.

Three minutes went by, and a middle aged man noticed there was musician playing. He slowed his pace, and stopped for a few seconds, and then hurried up to meet his schedule.

A minute later, the violinist received his first dollar tip: a woman threw the money in the till and without stopping, and continued to walk.

A few minutes later, someone leaned against the wall to listen to him, but the man looked at his watch and started to walk again. Clearly he was late for work.

The one who paid the most attention was a 3 year old boy. His mother tagged him along, hurried, but the kid stopped to look at the violinist. Finally, the mother pushed hard, and the child continued to walk, turning his head all the time. This action was repeated by several other children. All the parents, without exception, forced them to move on.

In the 45 minutes the musician played, only 6 people stopped and stayed for a while. About 20 gave him money, but continued to walk their normal pace. He collected $32. When he finished playing and silence took over, no one noticed it. No one applauded, nor was there any recognition.

No one knew this, but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the most talented musicians in the world. He had just played one of the most intricate pieces ever written, on a violin worth $3.5 million dollars.

Two days before his playing in the subway, Joshua Bell sold out at a theater in Boston where the seats averaged $100.

This is a real story. Joshua Bell playing incognito in the metro station was organized by the Washington Post as part of a social experiment about perception, taste, and priorities of people. The outlines were: in a commonplace environment at an inappropriate hour: Do we perceive beauty? Do we stop to appreciate it? Do we recognize the talent in an unexpected context?

One of the possible conclusions from this experience could be:

If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in the world playing the best music ever written, how many other things are we missing?”