Saturday, August 29, 2009

Diet food

I've neglected to keep you folks updated on the progress of the diet I've embarked upon in an effort to get rid of the 4 year old child that has been growing around my midsection for lo these many years.

When last we checked in the loss had tallied about 14 lbs. I'm pleased and saddened at the same time to report that an additional 4 lbs has been shed. Pleased that it melted away with relative ease and saddened to admit that 3 lbs have suddenly reappeared. (I knew that the salmon patties with biscuits and gravy last night was going to be a bad idea. Of course the cherry turnover a bit later didn't help any.)

So today it was back to the old grindstone. Starting out with a nice 3 egg omelet stuffed with ham, onions, green peppers, mushrooms and cheese. I did manage to pass up the grits with butter.

Lunch was an old pork chop from a couple of days ago with a bit of cream cheese.

This evening was a fetch and carry supper. I was sent to Chicken express to fetch supper and carry it home.

The wife had the catfish fillet dinner while the ol' Grump and I had that fancy French country cuisine... As I like to call it "Red Neck Pâté de foie gras" or fried chicken livers. Of course I did pass on the mashed potatoes and gravy with cold slaw. I guess I could have eaten a bit of the cold slaw... but hey, why take chances.

All of this washed down with a fine vintage of Diet Pepsi (best if consumed by 10-19-2009)

Don't tell me rednecks can't appreciate up town dining.

Thursday, August 27, 2009

Creepy.....


.....crawly little bug
comes wandering by my foot
with only the leaves
and sticks for a rug

Where do you go so fast
scurrying here and there
antenna wiggling like hair
Why so red your ass

Is it to keep my foot
from crushing your green carapace
or to show your awful taste
to those who give a hoot

I let you go your way
asking only that you pause
for a moment and pose
Before you and I get on with our day


make with the clickty-click to embiggen

Tuesday, August 25, 2009

Who do you trust?

After a bit of head scratching and a bit of conjugating on the debate between the media and the two current dominate political parties out there, I find that all my thoughts have already been thunk by those smarter and brighter than I, and if I'm smart I'll do what I have been saying for years.

"Keep your head down and your powder dry"

That being said again, it in no way keeps me from wanting to grab people by the shoulders and give them a good shake while screaming in their ear, "what's the matter with you people? Don't you see that the liberals live in a dream world?"

Ol' Milton Friedman had a way with words and an answer to at least one moonbat.

Saturday, August 22, 2009

Go read this Guy

Especially this post.

Friday, August 21, 2009

Metal chapeau

Taking a lead from the inimitable elisson I have found for myself a new bit of headgear.



Giving new meaning to the term "Metal Head", which term might more aptly apply to GOC on a Sunday I am wearing a platter cover from the early part of the last century which has seen better days.

Found lying in the weeds near an old farm house it has been the object of thrown rocks, whacks from what look to be sling-blades and maybe even a lawnmower or two.

Strange location and treatment for a sterling silver cover from The Gorham Martele Company.

What strange treatment for such an item, and an even stranger resting place tonight.

If I had a brain I might refer to it as my BrainBucket

Monday, August 17, 2009

In the heat of the day

I did get up to cut the Ol' Grumps grass today. It was only 97 degrees by the time I finished.

Finally...after fiddling around most of the morning trying first one thing and then another to get the Murray riding mower to crank.

I finally narrowed the choices down to either just plain cussedness or a bad solenoid. Replaced the solenoid and it still wouldn't crank. But then I asked myself if I'd replaced all the wires in the correct order. Made one change and...it cranked. I had placed one of the small wires on the wrong post on the solenoid. Hurray

The grass at the Ol' Grumps was almost waist high and thick as could be. The Murray was moaning and belts were slipping, smoking and squealing. The blade adjustment was raised as high as I could get it. Next time I'll tell him to hire a bush hog...or maybe buy a couple dozen goats.

Speaking of cutting things.....

Our oldest daughter called the wife while on her way to work this morning. She passed along the news that the oldest grand son had tried to hack his way out of a chance meeting with a spider while helping to get the deer camp ready for the upcoming season yesterday. I guess you could say the spider won since Cody almost whacked off three of his fingers with a machete. Bird finger, pointing finger and little finger of the left hand. Only thirty stitches or so at the Washington, GA emergency room. Fortunately there was no permanent lose of any digit and the damage will heal in time. Hopefully the lesson on not over reacting to things will be imprinted on the appropriate parts of his brain. Next time he might have a chainsaw in his hands. Maybe I'll show him the three scars on my left kneecap where the chainsaw teeth nicked me several years ago just to help re-enforce that particular lesson.

One of my regulars called me as I was bringing the mower home this afternoon. I drove up after supper and picked up a few things.

One was this silver spoon from England. I'll put it next to a couple nuggets I picked up last week.



The other thing I picked up was an almost new 1866 Yellowboy (only fired once) from Cimarron's Repeating Arms. This one has the 24 inch barrel and custom engraving on the receiver. I'm not sure I'll be able to part with this baby. I don't know why as I don't do enough shooting to justify it. But better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it I suppose.

We were hoping to maybe get some rain off the tropical storm down Flordia way, but so far nothing. It's getting along about whirly girl time down that way. Hope any of you down then are battened down and provisioned up.

Ya'll come back. Maybe I'll tell you the story behind the spoon and the nuggets.

Sunday, August 16, 2009

The Muse and I

My muse has been a little quiet of late....well, actually that's not exactly true. It's more like I have been ignoring her. For what reason? Damnifiknow. Probably for many of the same reasons I have been a world class procrastinator all my life.

If it's not a crisis....fuggidaboutit.

Not that there is a crisis going on at the moment...I just felt the keyboard had been a little neglected and decided to apply fingertips to remind them of their original purpose....lest they begin to think that dust and cracker crumbs are their only companions.

Well...actually the cracker crumbs have been replaced by bits of cheese, eggs, bacon and mayonnaise for the last two weeks. Mostly that is.

I have embarked on a determined (as opposed to all the other times) quest to shed the outer child of 4 years or so of age (however old they are when they weigh about 40 lbs) that hangs around my mid section.

Older age has it's benefits I'm sure, but a slower metabolism is not one of them. Of course when I was running a portable sawmill as a business and totin' 2 X 10 X 16's around or 4 X 6 X 16's, and rolling 2 foot diameter logs up the skid poles to be sawn it was a different story. The muscle is still there....it's just marbled with plenty of fat these days. I'm afraid if I don't lose a little weight that when the Obama team starts passing out the Soylent Green I'll be classified as USDA Choice #1.

(Pause to go step on the scale, trembling in trepidation and fear.)

Good.....didn't gain any after todays debauchery at the Chinese Buffet in Dahlonega.

Down so far about 14 pounds. Average 1 a day, but in actuality a couple of days didn't show any lose because I fudged a bit. (Come on...a guy need a bit of biscuit and gravy at least once every two weeks).

What you may ask was I doing in Dahlonega, GA today? Well you may ask.

The better half decided that she was not going to hang around here today and announced that she was going to the hills and if I was going to hurry up and get in the drivers seat. I started to tell her to get in, sit down, strap in, hang on and shut up......but reason won out and I kept my lip zipped.

A pleasant trip to be sure. We took US 441 up to Baldwin and then the back roads over to Cleveland and thence on hwy 115 to Dahlonega, home of the afore mentioned Chinese Buffet (where I manfully stuck to the Mongolial Beef with onions and the Shrimp with Vegetables that I made sure contained no vegatables except onions and broccli), North GA College (still a partly military school for those young men who are hardy enough and quite a few ladies who can snap to attention with the best of them) and the Crisson Gold Mine run by the lovely Tammy with an assist from her husband and Miss Jo Jo. Here I go to pick up panning supplies, the latest issue of Gold Prospector magazine and leave a few business cards since they kindly point those who want to sell any gold they find to me.

It's not a lot generally but I certainly pay more than the local pawn shops.

After leaving there we took the road up to Suches, GA a valley that is supposed to be above the clouds but today was right smack dab in the middle of them as they dropped some blessed rain.

It rained off and on after that through Morganton, Blue Ridge, Blairsville, Young Harris, Hiwassee and Helen. It pretty much petered out by the time we got within sight of The Classic City once more though. If we hadn't gotten about a quarter inch of rain last week we'd be as dry as a popcorn fart. Need some more for sure.

We stopped a time or two.....once at the antique mall in Hiwasse where we looked around and pointed out that people who would pay their prices were way too rich and moreover were a bit stupid. A for instance would be the fact that they were asking $16.00 for common date, circulated, not graded Franklin half dollars. That's only about three times the value of the silver content. If I could sell mine at that price I could make a big dent in the mortgage on the Kudzu Hovel (KH).

We got home expecting the Ol' Grump to be waiting on his supper but he has (after four years) decided to drive himself up to his rental trailer and work on it himself instead of spending a little of his sociable security to hire someone (NOT my wife, she says, and means it) to do it. So far he hasn't wrecked the car and even goes to Home Depot, where a fifteen minute in and out to grab some screws or some such, takes two hours.

Oh well, it gets him out of the house which is what we've wanted for five years.

Perhaps tomorrow if I can get the lawnmower to crank, I'll take it up there and cut his grass.

Ya'll come back. Maybe I'll tell you about the couple who passed us going south on 441 in a Ford utility van with ladder racks on the top and just married painted on the windows.

I figured it was out of convenience since if the urge struck he could just pull over to the side, move some tools out of the way on the floor in back and knock off a quickie. The wife allowed as how he'd probably won her over by saying he had a big mobile home, but didn't say it had a Ford emblem on the front.

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

A Private Companies solution to Health Care

I've always been of the opinion that private individuals have better ideas than Government for the most part.

The Wall Street Journal has printed a plan put forth by the CEO of Whole Foods.

See what you think.

* The Wall Street Journal

* OPINION
* AUGUST 12, 2009

The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare


By JOHN MACKEY

“The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out
of other people’s money.”

—Margaret Thatcher

With a projected $1.8 trillion deficit for 2009, several trillions more in deficits projected over the next decade, and with both Medicare and Social Security entitlement spending about to ratchet up several notches over the next 15 years as Baby Boomers become eligible for both, we are rapidly running out of other people’s money. These deficits are simply not sustainable. They are either going to result in unprecedented new taxes and inflation, or they will bankrupt us.

While we clearly need health-care reform, the last thing our country needs is a massive new health-care entitlement that will create hundreds of billions of dollars of new unfunded deficits and move us much closer to a government takeover of our health-care system. Instead, we should be trying to achieve reforms by moving in the opposite direction—toward less government control and more individual empowerment. Here are eight reforms that would greatly lower the cost of health care for everyone:

• Remove the legal obstacles that slow the creation of high-deductible health insurance plans and health savings accounts (HSAs). The combination of high-deductible health insurance and HSAs is one solution that could solve many of our health-care problems. For example, Whole Foods Market pays 100% of the premiums for all our team members who work 30 hours or more per week (about 89% of all team members) for our high-deductible health-insurance plan. We also provide up to $1,800 per year in additional health-care dollars through deposits into employees’ Personal Wellness Accounts to spend as they choose on their own health and wellness.

Money not spent in one year rolls over to the next and grows over time. Our team members therefore spend their own health-care dollars until the annual deductible is covered (about $2,500) and the insurance plan kicks in. This creates incentives to spend the first $2,500 more carefully. Our plan’s costs are much lower than typical health insurance, while providing a very high degree of worker satisfaction.
(this money should pass to heirs, if any left at death, tax free, in my opinion)

• Equalize the tax laws so that that employer-provided health insurance and individually owned health insurance have the same tax benefits. Now employer health insurance benefits are fully tax deductible, but individual health insurance is not. This is unfair.

• Repeal all state laws which prevent insurance companies from competing across state lines. We should all have the legal right to purchase health insurance from any insurance company in any state and we should be able use that insurance wherever we live. Health insurance should be portable.

• Repeal government mandates regarding what insurance companies must cover. These mandates have increased the cost of health insurance by billions of dollars. What is insured and what is not insured should be determined by individual customer preferences and not through special-interest lobbying.

• Enact tort reform to end the ruinous lawsuits that force doctors to pay insurance costs of hundreds of thousands of dollars per year. These costs are passed back to us through much higher prices for health care.

• Make costs transparent so that consumers understand what health-care treatments cost. How many people know the total cost of their last doctor’s visit and how that total breaks down? What other goods or services do we buy without knowing how much they will cost us?

• Enact Medicare reform. We need to face up to the actuarial fact that Medicare is heading towards bankruptcy and enact reforms that create greater patient empowerment, choice and responsibility.

• Finally, revise tax forms to make it easier for individuals to make a voluntary, tax-deductible donation to help the millions of people who have no insurance and aren’t covered by Medicare, Medicaid or the State Children’s Health Insurance Program.

Many promoters of health-care reform believe that people have an intrinsic ethical right to health care—to equal access to doctors, medicines and hospitals. While all of us empathize with those who are sick, how can we say that all people have more of an intrinsic right to health care than they have to food or shelter?

Health care is a service that we all need, but just like food and shelter it is best provided through voluntary and mutually beneficial market exchanges. A careful reading of both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution will not reveal any intrinsic right to health care, food or shelter. That’s because there isn’t any. This “right” has never existed in America

Even in countries like Canada and the U.K., there is no intrinsic right to health care. Rather, citizens in these countries are told by government bureaucrats what health-care treatments they are eligible to receive and when they can receive them. All countries with socialized medicine ration health care by forcing their citizens to wait in lines to receive scarce treatments.

Although Canada has a population smaller than California, 830,000 Canadians are currently waiting to be admitted to a hospital or to get treatment, according to a report last month in Investor’s Business Daily. In England, the waiting list is 1.8 million.

At Whole Foods we allow our team members to vote on what benefits they most want the company to fund. Our Canadian and British employees express their benefit preferences very clearly—they want supplemental health-care dollars that they can control and spend themselves without permission from their governments. Why would they want such additional health-care benefit dollars if they already have an “intrinsic right to health care”? The answer is clear—no such right truly exists in either Canada or the U.K.—or in any other country.

Rather than increase government spending and control, we need to address the root causes of poor health. This begins with the realization that every American adult is responsible for his or her own health.

Unfortunately many of our health-care problems are self-inflicted: two-thirds of Americans are now overweight and one-third are obese. Most of the diseases that kill us and account for about 70% of all health-care spending—heart disease, cancer, stroke, diabetes and obesity—are mostly preventable through proper diet, exercise, not smoking, minimal alcohol consumption and other healthy lifestyle choices.

Recent scientific and medical evidence shows that a diet consisting of foods that are plant-based, nutrient dense and low-fat will help prevent and often reverse most degenerative diseases that kill us and are expensive to treat. We should be able to live largely disease-free lives until we are well into our 90s and even past 100 years of age.

Health-care reform is very important. Whatever reforms are enacted it is essential that they be financially responsible, and that we have the freedom to choose doctors and the health-care services that best suit our own unique set of lifestyle choices. We are all responsible for our own lives and our own health. We should take that responsibility very seriously and use our freedom to make wise lifestyle choices that will protect our health. Doing so will enrich our lives and will help create a vibrant and sustainable American society.
—Mr. Mackey is co-founder and CEO of Whole Foods Market Inc.Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page A15

Copyright 2009 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved



Permission has been given for seven days to pass this around. Lets make sure it gets wide publicity and all our congress people have a copy and know if we think it is better than Obama Care.

I'm giving it to all my liberal democrit friends. I worry that I may have to draw crayon pictures to explain it to them though.

Monday, August 03, 2009

Will you be deemed a USELESS EATER

I guess that depends on who is asked the question.

Take 7 minutes out of your busy day and watch this.