Dear Barry, Yet Again

 Barry, I know I haven't written you lately although I'm pretty sure the NSA keeps you updated on what we in flyover country are up too, but there are a couple of things that seem to have slipped your mind. I know you are busy, what with golf and multimillion dollar vacations so let me remind you of a few things.

 You still claim to be a constitutional scholar so first let me remind you that all spending bills must originate in the House. I'm pretty sure this means that if the House decides not to fund something, that's it. No matter what law has been passed in the past, if the House votes not to fund, that law is dead.

 In the proudest moment since the Democrat Party formed the Klu Klux Klan in the aftermath of the War Between The States The Democrat House voted to deny funding to the US Government to supply ammunition and naval and air power to the Republic of Viet Nam. (And who in spell check world decided that the old two word name would become one word ?) Remember that, Barry? That wasn't just "the law of the land". that was a ratified treaty. And yet, your team shut that down. So, shut up and do your job.

 Further, Barry, those open air monuments are not yours. They are ours. You don't get to run us off our own property. And now you're trying to close the ocean down in Florida. What's next, hold your breatth until you turn blue? Barry, stop acting like a two year old, it's not becoming.

 Last Barry, stop lying so much. That must have been a powerful strong lightening rod over there when you claimed to have bent over backwards to work with Republicans. Barry, I hate to tell you this but you'll go to Hell for lying just the same as if you were stealing chickens.

 Barry, you are not a kid anymore. You don't really have to be a douchecanoe your whole life.

 Oh, and Barry, think what will happen to your pension if you keep jerking us around.

Two Steps Foward, A Step And A Half Back

 I made it back to the VA yesterday , seems as if I'm still alive. Then I drove up to my daughter and her family for a visit. They are nice enough to have put me on their family plan so now I have a new phone and number. Friends and relatives should e-mail me for the number. Not that it will do much good, seems I spend abouut half my time wandering through the house looking for where I left it.

 The VA is sending me all my private doctor records so that I can use them to file for my service connected disability.  I'm not sure what my percentage will be, it depends on how the various problems will build up. Each of my ailments will be a certain percentage. We'll see.

 I was working on the paperwork for my cut of Linda Lou's postal pension when I reached an impasse. Seems I can't find the checkbook or the box with the bazillion new checks so I can't finish that until morning. Well more likely afternoon since I do not seem to do mornings very well. Linda Lou could always find stuff. Each day I remember ways in which I needed her. Of course I always paid for her finding things with many rude comments.

So, Which Side Do We Bomb?

 So Obama and some of the left want to bomb Syria. On one side in Syria are the Ba'athist  bunch of Assad, only a step or two removed from the old National Socialists of Germany. On the other side are the people allied with the alQ bunch. In the middle are the ordinary people trying to live their lives and raise their families.

 So Obama wants to send some of those very expensive cruise missiles over there but has promised to not send enough to really change anything. On May the seventh, 1965 another Democrat decided to send me, and a whole bunch of other people somewhere far away but promising to not really hurt Uncle Ho. Remember how that worked out?

 Pinpricks may work in acupuncture but they do nothing in warfare. Especially when one does not know whom one is to shoot. Assuming we could decide which side to shoot, there is no upside for America. Nor an upside for the ordinary humans of the area. If we should destroy the alQ types fighting Assad that strengthens Iran which helps America, how? If we should destroy Assad that puts the alQ types in charge of yet another area of the world. That helps America, how?

 If we simply degrade Assad's government but not enough to let the alQ types win, that simply lengthens the fighting. That helps, um, that helps, well I just don't know. Maybe someone in one of those seven States of the USA that only Obama knows about.

 The last thing I know about this mess is that if we weaken Assad the Islamist opposition will have more strength to spend on murdering the local Christians, which seems to be their favorite sport.

 Excuse me for not getting really excited. about intervening.

Got My Internet At Home Back

 When I called yesterday to make a (partial) payment on my bill I cried about not having my at home Internet working. They sent a tech and and it's going now.

 In other news I am almost finished filling out the paperwork to get my little sliver of Linda Lou's pension, not a whole lot but it will help. And it's a week and five days before I get up to the kids and pick up my new phone, when I have it and figure out the number I'll pass it on to folks who know me. If I forget anyone, e-mail me.

 At about the end of last month I had my 28th AA "birthday" and then Saturday evening I went to my group's Birthday meeting. It starts earlier than most of the meetings here, with a covered dish supper. I decided to make a big pot of thick chicken noodle soup so I did. Then I loaded a box of crackers, my pepper mill and my shaker full of sea salt in the van, went back in, got the big pot o' soup, set in down on a chair on the deck, closed and locked the door, got in the van and drove to the meeting. When I got home the soup was still sitting on that chair. Foo. Oh well, I froze some, ate some and there are still a couple of bowls left.

 Today is my sister, Carolyn's birthday, Happy Birthday, Sis! She is the reason Mom didn't feel like a total failure as a parent. Me? Mom used to make a few buck renting me out for a bad example.

Bumped The Sat Dish for the Intertoobz With The Mower. Pills In The Mailbox.

I got my mountain of pills in the mail from the VA. The good news is that the poor, long-suffering taxpayer is giving them to me. The bad news is that they've switched a few of the pills and I'm having to re-acclimate to the new ones. So I'm kind of sleepy and unmotivated.

 In other news, either we bumped the sat receiver with the lawn tractor or the ground has shifted, still have to go next door with the laptop to get the Internet. Not so bad, I'm getting some extra reading in. Other than that, nothing much going on.

Sunspots Or Something.

 For some reason I cannot connect with the Internet at home, believe it's some kind of solar flares or sunspots or something.  carried the laptop over here to Patsy's, along with a crockpot full of chili and beans. She's providing the corn tortillas. Not the best I've ever made but not the worst, either.

 I went to the VA Hospital for my vesting physical, my health care will be provided by the US Government. So I win that one. Hopefully I won't be going to that VA Hospital where they use unsterile colonoscopy things.

 Next month I start fighting about a disability pension.

Mind Like A Chicken!

 I had my appointment with the VA for mty vesting physical, the one where I beg and plead for them to take over my medical care as my monthly pills run half of my income.

 Now I had the paper from the VA, I had a postcard from the VA, both telling me the time, place and date. So I took a long nap, got up and stayed awake the rest of the night so I wouldn't oversleep/

 So, I got there a full half hour before the time, only to discover I was there on the wrong day, I should have been there the day before. Now I have been reading for over sixty years, someone please tell me why I cannot read and understand the dates on, not one but two, printed documents.

 They were kind enough to do my lab work, anyway and one of the ladies told me to go up to the clinic I had been supposed to go and talk to them. The receptionist there told me that I had been rescheduled for about two weeks away. I explained that I was out of around half of my pills and had almost no money.I then proceeded to do some world-class begging, pleading and groveling. She put me in a (rare) weekend slot for tomorrow morning. So I'm going to lie down for a long nap and then stay up until it's time to go to Dallas, again.

 Wish me luck.

I'm Just Fine, Except...

 I got an E-mail note from the un-named blogger at Middleoftheright.blogspot.com  wondering how I'm doing. I guess I'm doing as well as one could expect.

 I'm somewhat depressed, of course, lonely and am still fighting to get my money straight. This coming Thursday I report to the VA Hospital n Dallas for the physical where I beg the grateful Nation for my monthly supply o' pills. Assuming this works I'll be okay. As it is, my pills run about half of my disposable income.

 I'm still wrestling with the government over the $349.00 a month from Linda Lou's pension that I'm supposed to be getting. After I taked to them they promised to get it to me within a month. Instead, of course, they took the deposit from my bank account. Oh well, And then the air conditioner in the front of the house died.

 I do have the bedroom air still going and plenty of fans so I'm still doing better than, say, Wyatt Earp. I'm very pleased that we bought the lot with the big oak tees, they shade the house in the afternoon.

 After I get the VA Medical straightened out then I start fighting about the disability pension from the VA. I'm told that I am an automatic lock for some 20-40 percent disability and I am working with a guy who swears up and down that he can get me a hundred percent.I'm not sure that I deserve a hundred percent but I would be as happy as a pig in clean mud with a big bucket of fresh slop if I could get fifty.

 So, anyhow, it's just a matter of time before the money worries are straightened out. Until then it's just a matter of one foot in front of the other. My mind is a lot easier when I remember to count my blessings and thank the Lord for them.

 Oddly I have much of Linda Lou's stuff cleaned out but the house seems more cluttered than ever. Oh well, that too will come together.

 These are only some of my blessings.

 Update, 8/3/13: The neighbor fellow that is a journeyman plumber and an apprentice electrician fixed my air.  I am truly blessed.

Stupid Bank. Stupid Government.

So Wednesday I was on my way to the VA Hospital in Dallas to apply for medical care, now that my insurance had changed my monthly pills went from around seventy five bucks a month to somewhere north of four hundred. On the way there I had stopped at the credit union to check out how I could keep track of my balace online the way Linda Lou used to. Well I found out that I cannot do that until I can take a death certificate there so I checked my balance while there, seems that I had two dollars in my account, instead of the seven hundred odd I was supposed to have. Seems that although the social security people put both our monthly deposit in on the day Linda Lou died, they have some way of taking that money back. I'm not sure how that works and that is another thing I cannot check until I get those copies of the death certificate.

 Meanwhile, one of the things I cannot pay is the cell phone bill, along with my TV and internet. I'm not sure how long I'll have the online capability and I only have enough gas in the tank ror a half dozen trips to the nearest small town and library. It might be a pang without the intertoobz and the Western channel.

 Oh well, there's plenty of food in the house and my power bill is paid up, along with the water, with food, A/C and water I'll make it. And there's enough food. I'll be digging into the emergency stash of pork'n'beans, Ramen, tuna and rice, along with the hamburger and chicken in the freezer.

 Assuming I get my medical from the VA I'll have my social security and around three hundred and fifty per month from Linda Lou's pension. That's enough to live on a meager diet and no travel. I'm told that I have a couple of ailments that are presumed service connected for Viet Nam vets so I may eventually get a twenty to forty percent disability pension and that might mean I'll have a nice lower middle class income and, since the house, land and car are all paid for, with my income turning fairly comfortable. Until then, though, I'll be throwing around nickles like they were manhole covers.

 The thing that is most annoying about this is that I was getting used to going to meetings again. Oh well, I'll muddke through, one way or another.

Back To Going To Meetings.

 It's been a while but I am back going to meetings, early in sobriety I was told that when one hits a rough patch, one should double up on AA meetings, so, there I was. Of course, some of the folks there don't really believe that someone with nearly twenty-eight years would still need support. Then I drove home at shortly after nine PM, didn't have it in me to stop near the lake and watch the fireworks, just drove home, picked up Bingo T. Pug, aka Lt. Commander Fatboy and went in and got online.

 I have all of Linda Lou's clothes out of the big closet, and dunno what I'm gonna do with all that room. And am slowly moving all my socks and underwear out of the two bottom drawers into the whole Chester Drawers.Funny, I have T shirts that haven't been worn in multiple years. I do need to got to the Gold Toe sock store and pick up some more of those almost knee length boot socks.  It's been almost ten years since I bought two bags of six pair each and the elastic is starting to give out. Those white cotton boot socks are the very best socks for those who wear boots.

 Meanwhile I'm doing my best to load up a bunch of .38 and .357 ammo to send to North Carolina with the kids, they are going to caravan in two cars to see the number two boy and his family. Number two boy already has my old Marlin 1894C .357 carbine and the kids are taking Linda Lou's Model 60 S&W .38. I have five hundred ca'tridge cases cleaned up and primed, now all I gotta do is load 'em up.

 I also have to write to get my DD214 and see if I can get a little help from the VA for the Peter's Semi-Portable Pharmacy. Since my insurance has changed my monthly ton o' pills has gone from around seventy-five dollars to nearly four hundred. For this I thank Obamacare.  I'm kind of used to politicians lying but to have this abortion of a bill called the "Affordable Care Act" is a new low even for Democrats.

Just Numb

 Yesterday I went to Dean and Stephanie's house to meet with all four of Linda Lou's children, my stepchildren and her two nephews and her niece. That was the closest thing the family will have to a funeral for we do not believe in enriching funeral directors. Some day soon we'll have a little get-together of our friends in the Program for Linda Lou died with almost 25 and a half years clean and sober. Someday I will tell some of those stories, I'm not quite ready yet, although I told a couple of those stories to the kids, along with how I threw her number 2 boy out of the house for farting in my face and laughing about it, several times. Only my near-legendary patience and gentleness allows that boy to now have five kids. Note: I only threw him out once, he farted several times, due to my position, and his, he was farting in my face so, out he went.

 Anyhow, I', still pretty numb, I'm not sure how long it takes to process this. I have just barely started to pack up her clothes, took a batch of her house dresses to our neighbor Patsy and am going to be shocked at how much space I'll have in the closet.

 So, don't expect much from here until I'm ready to put out the ad:

 Help wanted: Chubby girl with low morals, must have a passion for housecleaning.

 

Linda Lou Davis. 11/23/45-6/26/13

  Linda went home today, about thirty minutes after they disconnected the ventilator. I discovered that they could not do the tracheostomy because they were sure she would have died during the procedure. At any rate she never regained consciousness and died peacefully. The hospital people did everything they could think of.

 Linda Lou was the daughter of Emit Elmer and Jesse Mae Henderson, sister of Martha Wilson, mother of Andy Romero, Robin Corner, Michael Corner and Stephanie Rosnett. Granny to nine hairy legged boys and two beautiful girls. Wife to a guy who never did deserve her.

Say Goodnight Linda Lou.

 Well it's about over. Linda Lou's Kidneys have failed and her blood count has gone south. The Docs tell me that within five or six hours after we stop life support she'll be gone.

 I'm keeping her on life support for long enough for the twins to get here.

Very Slow Progress

 This morning the hospital peeps lowered Linda Lou's Oxygen* level in her ventilator from 100% to 70% and her Oxygen levels in her blood stayed fine. So they then turned the sedative drip off to see how she would breathe on her own. That's when Stephanie and I went home for lunch.

 We got back and the hospital staff had turned the sedative drip back on, seems that Linda Lou was struggling a little too much to breathe for them to be totally comfortable. Still they then cut the Oxygen level to 60% and her O2 blood level stayed good. So, I'm taking this as some more slow progress. Still I'd take it kindly if the prayer posse keeps at a steady canter.

  * I can't remember, is Oxygen a common noun or a proper noun where the "O" should be capitalised? Lordy it's been a long time since high school English classes.

One Step Forward, One Step Back.

 Linda Lou is still heavily sedated, asleep (unconscious?) almost all day and night, still intubated with a ventilator. The good news is that the MRSA is finally knocked down, little progress with the pneumonia, so far. My hope is that the anti MRSA drug down to a holding level the anti-pneumonia meds might work a little better. Of course they've fed her so many antibiotics that they've killed at the "good germs" and now she's got a fungal infection. So now she gets an anti-fungal drug pumped in through one of the three hundred and fifty-two tubes that enter and leave her.

 Early afternoon: A turn for the worse, she's developed a condition known as B. I. C. or B. A. C., the Doc had a difficult accent. Anyhow she is bleeding from one area and clotting in another. At any rate this has a fairly high mortality rate, in the neighborhood of fifty-sixty percent. That's the bad news, the slightly better is that since they discovered this and started treating it, her platelet count is improving some. We'll know in a couple-three days.

 I'm going to pray some, then go curl up like a sick bear.

Another Bunch Of Straw. Poor Camel.

 S yesterday I was having my first cup o' coffee and the case manager from HealthSouth called and wanted to know how Linda Lou was. I suggested she walk down the hall and ask her, whereupon she explained that LL had been taken to the hospital. So after I told her that the folks at HealthSouth were too durned important to tell me about minor details such as life, death and emergency hospitalization I asked which hospital, of course, being the case manager she couldn't be expected to know such insignificant details. Grr!

 Eventually we found Linda Lou at Medical Center of Plano, the same hospital where all of Stefanie and Dean's Boys were born. Seems she is in the critical care unit with Pneumonia.  I saw her yesterday and she was in a full oxygen mask. This morning they sedated and intubated her. She will be out at least 'til tomorrow.

 While all this was going on I went to a Doc-in- the- box and discovered that the Sinus Syphilis and Lung Leprosy that Linda Lou had given me was really only a bad case of Bronchitis. So I got a week's worth of stout antibiotics and told: rest, fluids and take my pills.

 Anyhow, Bingo T. Pug and I are going to follow the Doc's orders and I'm going to sit around, read the Internet and take naps. I'll go see her tomorrow if she's awake.

Dear Ralph:

 Ralph, I know we don't talk much, you being busy in Congress and all but here is something I don't understand, maybe you can help me here. It's been a long time since Civics class in high school but I seem to remember that the Federal Government can't spend a nickle without that nickle coming through the House of Representatives.

 Yet here we have the Justice(?) Department spying on reporters and we still haven't got to the bottom of the Justice(?) Dept. running guns to drug cartels. We have the IRS treating right of center citizens differently than leftists and, worse, foreign relations of Obama. And we have Obama promoting the woman who lied on national TV about Benghazi.

 Congressman Hall, pardon me for being a" pore dumb redneck" but with all this going on why does the Justice Department and the IRS and the White House still get oceans of taxpayer money? I understand that certain factions of the government hate us but can't we make them hate us with their own money?

 I know there are parts of the IRS and Justice Department that are essential to the country. I'm pretty sure, though, that if we cut the budgets of the White House by some eighty percent and the Justice Department and IRS by a hundred percent until they straightened out this problem of Obama and company thumbing their noses at Congress and, by extension, the citizens of the United States of America, would stop and quickly. 

 Ralph, we haven't much time to save the country, it's way past time for you folks in the House to step up.

Adventures In Suburbia!

 So the other day the medical types decided to send Linda Lou back to the hospital where she got her knee rebuilt. This hospital, Dallas Memorial is right off the LBJ Freeway in an inner ring Suburb on the north side of Big D. I don't remember when they built this road, I simply know that it's been under revision and repair since they opened it. So, first they had to wait an entire day for a bed to open, then they brought the ambulance and took her to the wrong hospital, a place in an outer ring suburb to the east. Seems that one of them is Dallas Memorial and the other Dallas Regional, neither one actually in Dallas.

 I wonder, was this normal idiocy or is Obamacare taking over? Of course turning our entire medical system over to a gaggle of politicians, lawyers and IRS goons if far beyond normal idiocy.

 Anyhow, they finally got Linda Lou to the right hospital at four AM. Sigh. The plan is to go into that ankle Monday sometime and take out all the rods, screws and other hardware, sprinkle liberally with antibiotic beads, insert what new hardware they think should go in and hope like heck that surgery #7 is the magic one.

Friday was Karson's first day of summer vacation. He graduated from Day Care and will enter Kindergarten in the fall. His momma was babysitting a little girl just learning how to walk and so when her afternoon naptime came up I drove Karson  to the Cabellas in the outer ring suburb north of here. We looked at all the taxidermied critters and the fish an the aquarium, then we walked around some. The Great Ammo Panic of '13 is easing, there were lots of various centerfire rifle calibers, handgun ammo is coming back and a certain amount of shotgun, including buckshot. There was no #1 buck in 12 gauge, though, and not a single .22 LR round in the store.

 From there we went to the "Library of Guns" the room where they have the collectible rifles, shotguns and pistols and revolvers.  There were lots of special edition Winchester 94s, a takedown Winchester 92 and something that almost made me cry, an almost pristine Griffon and Howe sporter 1903 Springfield. Then we looked at an old Colt Single Action in .32WCF. Nine thousand dollars. Considering that these were usually a boy's first revolver and one could buy a new one, with a box of cartridges and a holster for a twenty dollar gold piece, well, we've come a long way. Actually one can still buy a new Colt Single Action for a twenty dollar gold piece, what has come so far is the devaluation of our money.

 From there we wandered around some more and ended up at the fudge shop. I got chocolate and Karson got Monkey Business. Then he didn't like it and ended up with my chocolate. I didn't like the Monkey Business, either. If you're ever in Cabellas and wander up to the free samples of their fudge, try the chocolate or the peanut butter.

 We stayed gone until after naptime and then we got home to Karson's brothers who start their last week of school tomorrow. Unbeknownst to me my wife and daughter have decided I will stay here until the Fourth Wednesday of June. In the second bed in a room  with a tenyear old boy. Please kill me.

The Most Fun Since The Bear Chased Uncle Willie Into The Outhouse!

  So Sunday night they decided to transfer Linda Lou to a big hospital in Dallas while they were putting her in the ambulance the big lump on the "healed" incision on her ankle started draining all sorts of blood, pus and corruption, So, eventually they got that cleaned out and got her to a fancy hospital in north Dallas, later Bingo T. Pug and I showed up her at our daughter's house in a Dallas suburb. Nobody much noticed me but the boys love Bingo.

 Yesterday they went into Linda Lou's ankle and cleaned out all the mess they could and started a culture and a couple of days they'll know exactly what bug is causing the trouble. Meanwhile her Ortho Doc is transferring her to yet another hospital, the same one in North Dallas where he rebuilt her knee where he will go in and take the next step. All the docs I've spoken with so far seem to think that will be taking all that hardware out of her leg and replacing it with less that what she has now. Or, perhaps none. Then it will be back to that hospital that deals with Staph infections where they last controlled that infection ad then back to a long term rehab hospital to build her strength back and hopefully, teach her to walks well enough to not be falling down and hitting her head on sinks and terlets and bleeding all over everything.

 The local Volunteer Fire Department is having their annual Boot Drive where they stand and the nearest stoplight and beg for a little money. The sequester has taken the stipend the Federal Government gave fire departments in Red States and transferred it to the Department of Obama Vacations. After all priorities are everything. Anyhow, no VFD substation in our front yard so we really need to stop this falling all over the place.

 Ever notice that when the politicians don't get every penny they demand they never give up their perks? It's always less for police and fire. And it's never less crap like armored vehicles for SWAT Teams but the bluesuits walking and driving beats in the neighborhoods. We need a new rule, anytime the budgets must be cut, politicians must take a random selection of registered voters in each area where the budgets cut and let the citizens decide, politicians have proven they cannot be trusted. There is always a fire station being shut down, never the fancy furniture in City Hall. Wonder why that is?

 Anyhow I'll continue to be mostly out of pocket for a while. I'd rather be at a Cowboy Action Match.

Hospital Blues

 Wednesday as I was getting ready to do the payday shopping Linda Lou fell again. She hit her head (again) and bled all over. I called the ambulance and she went off to the hospital where I threw an tantrum aking why they keep sending her home without doing anything to fix the problem. Well, the tantrum worked and she's still ther, thi think they converted a storage closet for her room but at least they're finally trying to figure out why she's ending up on the floor all the time.

 We think it's a bad reaction to the mountain of meds she's getting but they are also doing a bunch of other tests, CT scans, MRIs, etc. All the things that would have her on a waiting list for months under real socialized medicine. So far we know it wasn't a stroke or a series of strokes, that's something.

 They are somewhat concerned about her oxygen levels so it may or may not be something more than the meds, I reckon that could go either way. As it is, we're mainly waiting. And praying.

 Funny thing, Steph was visiting and her husband's best man from their wedding showed up, walking down the hall, seems he is preaching someplace in our county seat. He had his twelve year old son with him, wearing one of those fake coonskin caps like we used to wear when Fess Parker was all over the teevee. Anyway Steph noticed them and called them in the room and we got an extra prayer out of the deal. I don't know his exact denomination but if he's ever around at suppertime I'm gonna make somebody else say grace, not being overly fond of starvation. Anyhow, Texas is a big state but it's a small world.

 So, that's one reason I haven't been posting. If anyone has any pull with the main office upstairs, a prayer would be appreciated.

No Royalty

 We found a new home for Cochise' Apache Princess the other day,an older guy with a daughter and grandson living with him on some land not too many miles away. We miss her but she needed a home with a boy to play with. So, no more royalty here, I just wish the Obama regime could figure that out about no royalty.

Forty-Eight Years

It was 1965. The 1964 elections had come and gone with LBJ promising to keep us out of the war in Viet Nam and there I was, on a landing craft on my way into Chu Lai, Republic of Viet Nam. I haven't believed a Democrat since.

 In other news our health problems aren't getting much better. Those stupid holes from the stent procedure still haven't healed and I'm still having some pain. Linda Lou had a cataract removal last week and then yesterday she fell over in the middle of the night and busted open her head. An ambulance ride, a CT scan and two staples to close the wound.  Naturally it was shortly after I took my nighttime pills and went to bed.. I'm not really supposed to be driving to the county seat while full of Trazodone but we survived. Somehow.

 Anyhow the health issues are making it difficult to concentrate, I'm mostly sitting around watching old episodes of Gunsmoke and Bonanza on The Western Channel, along with old movies. If I can ever get my brain working again I've some blog posts percolating.

Happy Easter!

 I haven't been writing much, I've been taking care of a few health issues, mostly minor, and spending several hours each weekday watching old Gunsmoke and Bonanza episodes. We are always amazed that anyone ever let those Cartrights out of the house.

 Saturday night we had my birthday supper, steaks over the Pioneer Woman's butter, blue cheese, cream and onion sauce, this is, obviously not a regular meal. If it was I'd had had my Last Supper a long time ago. Bingo T. Pug and Cochise' Apache Princess loved the scraps. Anyhow, I hope y'all had a happy Easter.

The Incredible Stupidity Of "Our Betters"

 I cannot stop marveling about how all of these "really smart" people are so durned stupid. We have that human(?) gaffe machine, Joe Biden, going around with nothing but babbling idiocy coming out of his pie hole and then all these high priced politicians and journalists, university professors and city folks telling me we should be listening to him about United States firearm policy.

 So, what does "Sheriff Joe" tell a woman about protecting herself? Well, the first thing is that it is incredibly sexist for him to tell her what she needs. Women are not generally too stupid to figure out what works for them." Hello, sweet young thing, you're too silly to know how to aim a rifle so take this shotgun."

 Now it is true that I do not particularly care for the AR-15 platform. I like the .223/5.56mm cartridge but only as a varmint round. That is my personal belief, many people differ. I am not smart enough to know what a complete stranger needs. That's probably why I'm not in politics.

 So, now this paragon of human intelligence tells this stranger to get a shotgun. The truth is, at normal defense distance, a shotgun must be aimed as carefully as a rifle. And, except for the reduced recoil loads it takes a whole lot of seasoning before the averaged-sized women can get aimed repeat shots off quickly from the major bore shotguns. Please note I did not say one couldn't.

 One thing I've noticed in my life is that it is actually easier to get a woman up to a basic level of competence with firearms than it is a man. Other experienced shooters say the same. Theories differ, I believe it is because boys learn how to shoot from those Hollywood idiots. When I was a child it was movies with cowboys holding six shooters with hundred round cylinders and holding full charged black powder .45s so that the recoil from a real round would put that shootin' iron about an inch deep into their foreheads. Along with a lot of other drivel. Today it's more of the same, plus holding the pistol sideways and bullets blowing people 'cross the room, out the window and into parked cars halfway down the block. I'm not persactly sure why little girls don't fall for this, maybe girls really are smarter than boys. Or, maybe women just listen better.

 Anyhow, Sheriff Joe wants a women to go out on the balcony (what if she doesn't have one?) and fire off a couple of blasts. Of course HIS wife can just call the Secret Service. All the other women would have violated the law about firing inside the city limits, plus several other laws, some felonies. Of course Biden's wife, even if he were still a lowly Senator, would probably get off because of the Gregory Rule. And if anyone were injured by one of those projectiles the injured person would be prosecuted for bothering Someone Important. The rest of us would be taken downtown. Assuming, of course, that we survived emptying our gun in the air in face of a threat.

 And, THIS is the fellow we are supposed to listen to?

 And we are supposed to take our tax advice from a clutch of tax cheats. and our economic advice from a President who has no record of ever even running a lemonade stand, much less a business. Unless there is more about that Choom Gang than we have heard.

 We have somehow manged to let a whole lot of very stupid people into positions of power. One thing, the spell checker here says Biden is a mistake. The spell checker is right.

Recovering, Slowly.

 I really need to write about something else but, truth be told, I'm pretty busy. I got my stitches out the other day and the vascular surgeon took me off that extra blood thinner I was on, thank you, Lord. I kept bleeding in odd places. An itty bitty scratch on my elbow would start itching and I'd scratch it without thinking and the next thing I knew, blood all over everywhere. Blow my nose a little too hard and a red mustache. Anyhow, think I need plenty of red meat for a while.

 One of the nearby stores is having a sale on spare ribs, think I'll buy a big rack and a couple of bottles of brown sugar BBQ sauce. Put it all in the crock pot and hurt myself. After all I ate a salad two years ago. Or was it three?

 I, like most decent human beings, am still in a state of shock over this company selling "desensitizing" targets of pregnant women, old men, mothers with small children. They allege that these are to prevent loss of life, meanwhile every one of these targets are of a person who may well be a legitimate armed citizen, with a legal firearm who might well be using that firearm to protect herself, or himself. For instance, that old man with the double barreled shotgun is depicted in what would probably be his own home. Or is there a sudden rash of septuagenarian home invaders I haven't heard about? Meanwhile the company isn't saying which government agency asked for these targets. Seems they're poking a bear with a short stick.

Dear Government

 Well, we had another State of the Union speech tonight, too bad you idiots cannot seem to grasp that there is no way we can keep spending our grandchildren's money. They haven't earned it yet and the debt you are piling on them will keep them from earning it. Oh, and while I'm on the subject of kids and money, you clowns have seen to it that today's college graduates are saddled with so much student loan debt that they cannot work at starting wages.  Do you clowns really think you can live your opulent lifestyles if there is no money? Are you really all that stupid?

 I see that you are still on this "reasonable gun control" kick. Government, you still have yet to explain why it took so long to get to that school in Sandy Hook. If your people are going to fart around so long before going into a school filled with six year old children while some nutcase is shooting them, why should we listen to you?

 Oh, and it seems that this Chris Dorner fellow might be dead in a burned out cabin up in the hills. You government types are claiming that "only the police and military should be equipped with magazines holding more than X number of rounds." Then you hire a nutbag for a cop. He, allegedly, goes on a killing spree after he fails to complete his probationary period. Okay, mistakes happen.

 You hired the wrong guy. It happens and not just in police work. Heck, we have entire government agencies filled with the wrong guys. It happens in private industry, too. And, you did the right thing, you got rid of that wrong guy. It's really rare that the let go guy turns on you, so that's not your fault either. So, let's talk about what is your fault.

 You do not get to have panicky jerks lighting up and wounding two small Hispanic women in the wrong kind of truck when you are looking for one very large African American man. Sorry, that is beyond the pale. Further, you do not get to leave these panicky jerks out in public. What, exactly, would happen to a non police person shooting up two strangers who are not charged with any crime? I do not know about La La Land but out here in Resume Speed, Texas, said panicky jerk would be locked up while the DA's office would be arguing over Ag Assault with a deadly weapon and Attempted Murder. Yet I have read nothing about criminal charges.

 And I have read of yet another truck shot up, this time with no injuries, praise the Lord and no thanks to you government types. Again, no criminal charges. You don't get to do that. Police do not get to shoot up cars and people that only vaguely resemble bad guys, it breaks the contract between citizens and government.

 There is a lot of that going on. And it needs to stop. Our system relies on "the consent of the governed". The last big survey, before your panicky jerks started shooting up people that in no way resembled Chris Dorner, said that some 53% of citizens thought government was endangering their liberty. Wonder what that number is like now?

 Meanwhile, please don't tell us that "only the police and military should have these weapons." Y'all sure don't seem to be able to prove it.

The Home Care Nurse Warning: TMI!

 In my continuing battle with Golden Years My Butt I sat down on the pot for my first dump since my Tuesday surgical procedure. Seems the various pain meds and and the ones that kept me still and quiet while they hacked holes in my groin tend to stop one up. So I sat down on the pot and promply stopped up the terlet.

 So I was fighting that with the plunger and that drill widget when the home health care nurse showed up to check out Linda Lou. The poor home health care nurse just knew I was being eaten by crocodiles or run over by a rhino.

 Well, anyhow the nurse changed the dressing on Linda Lou's knee and did everything according to the book. She was then nice enough to change the dressing on my two incisions and it seems they are healing nicely. Oddly the right side is more bruised up than the left side but the left is a little more painful. It's not unbearable, it doesn't hurt to stand, walk, sit or lie down, the pain is when I go from sitting to standing or standing to sitting. Since nobody planned on cutting the right side, nobody shaved it which makes the daily dressing change an adventure.

 It's not unbearable, though and the Doc says that my activities are "as tolerated". So I told Linda Lou that I can't tolerate her arguing with me. I am doing no major cooking, I fed her a microwave Panini and BBQ Baked Lays chips and then the next night we made a supper out of Chili con queso on tortilla chips.That's the Ro-Tel tomatoes and green chiles and a tad of regular Salsa Picante and Velveeta. Think I'll go back to regular cooking tomorrow.I have some really pretty skinless, boneless chicken breats and a couple of nice ribeyes in the freezer. Sure don't want 'em to be in there long enough for freezer burn.

 Linda Lou is also healing nicely. Her stitches are already out. The physical terrorist came by and she's starting on her routine. The last batch had her riding the bus to the county seat where they had a physical therapy pool and then to the little dorf nearest us for dry land PT.

 In other news the drunken neighbor that insists my German Shepherd is a dangerous attack dog has his big dogs running loose, One of which dug under my fence to get to CAP.I haven't managed to get close enough to him to dust him with the number nine birdshot from a .45 Colt shotshell yet. I would really like to simply sting his butt with no permanent damage but I can't have him teaching Princess how to get out. I'll try again after my morning pills when my hand is steadier. I hate to hurt critters.

 The good news is that I got the pot unplugged and, eventually, the nasty water off the floor in there. I think the next time I have a surgical procedure I'll go use the John at Wally World or Mickey D's.

 Yeah, well I warned you.

Round Up The Illegal Guns!

 Ever wonder why Nanny Bloomberg and the Chicago Pansy Rham and the rest of those clowns are always bothering legal gun shops out of their jurisdictions? If they're so wound up about illegal guns, why don't they go after them on their own turf? It's not as if they care about the Fourth Amendment and, by the time the court case wended it's way up the chain to the Supreme Court the guns would have been destroyed and they would be long out of office.

 No, the reason they don't go after the guns is because the guns that cause all the trouble in the big cities are in the hands of gang bangers who don't give a rat's patootie about what Nanny Bloomberg wants. Nor would said gangbangers give up their illegal firearms, they'd fight. They wouldn't fight particularly well, of course but there would still be plenty of those big police funerals and lots and lots of wounded police eating up the municipal budget.

 To get rid of the gangs would require major battles inside our urban areas. And it wouldn't be won without a very high cost in lives, including citizens caught in the crossfire. More citizens than cops and gangbangers combined, more likely.  And if they really went after the gangs, the gangs would not just go after the police but, also the politicos.

 Let's extrapolate. Suppose Feinstein gets her dream bill signed into law. A whole lot of Americans would be faced with a choise, register or even have to turn them in or become criminals. I would guess, off the top of my head, that at least ten percent would oil their shooters up and hide them. At the rate the politicos are going, it's liable to be far more than ten percent. It is very diffifcult to have much respect for the federal law when the federal government, which is not empowered to spend a dime without a budget has been four years without a budget. If Congress won't obey the law, why should anyone?

 About one third of Americans own one or more firearms. DiFi wants to turn those Americans into criminals.

Itty Bitty Miniature Miners Had To Work Overtime

 The pans all went to the hot place, I was supposed to get the stent put in while Linda Lou was still in the rehab hospital, instead they discharged her the day before I was scheduled for the procedure. So, instead, I picked her up and we spent the night at our daughter and son in law's house. So, we played with the grandsons some and the next morning Dean drove me to the hospital and stayed with me for an hour or so, then he went home.His job allows him to work from home most of the time, except for when it's a face to face thing.

 The next thing I knew I was in the recovery room to find that the procedure took three times as long as they'd planned. I'm a little fuzzy on the details but what they do is make an incision in the groin, then they send in a bunch of itty bitty miners to dig out the blockage and then shore it up so the artery stays open, then the itty bitty miners go to the saloon and chase the itty bitty saloon girls.

 So they went in and found they could not dig through the collapsed tunnel, so they pulled them all out, made an incision on the other side of my groin, worked their way up and found that this tunnel was half blocked. So they dug it out, shored it up and grafted a new tunnel leading to the blocked artery, then they sewed me up and made me stay overnight. I'm pretty sure those itty bitty miners were too tired to chase the itty bitty saloon girls.

 Anyhow after some hospital trials and tribulations they let me out the next morning, Stephanie and Linda Lou came and bailed me out. Nothing really hurts but the sewn up incisions and those only hurt when I am going from standing to sitting or vice versa. I'm kind of glad Obamacare isn't fully implemented yet, I think if it was they'd have offered me the blue pill.

 Anyhow, we got back to Dean and Steph's and after resting a tad we loaded up the car and drove out here to Resume Speed, Texas. Lat night there was some exciting weather, high winds and torrents of rain, I knew nothing of it because I was pretty well out of it. Poor Princess was stuck in the back yard through it all, Bingo T. Pug was next door.

 We stopped on the way home to pick up Linda Lou's new glasses and then stopped to get our mountain of medications. I'd dropped Linda Lou off at Wally World for her glasses, then put the scripts in at the drive up window, went back and lo and behold there was one of those little electric buggy things right there at the parking spot so I rode around, found Linda Lou and we went back to the pharmacy, I carried my book in and read until the seventeen scripts were filled.

 I'm not quite sure what I've done to make the taxpayers spend so much money on me, they just think I'm lovable I reckon. It's funny though, our health insurance premiums did not go down when the government told them that they are now my secondary insurance, Medicare is my primary. So, thank you, taxpayers. The thing I dislike most about Medicare and Social Security is how few people say thank you and how many say I want more.

 Anyhow, I'm alive and home and now I'm getting off this computer and going into the living room and give Bingo T. Pug the lap he has been missing. While I was gone I recorded some old Gunsmokes and some Bonanzas, as well as Silverado.

God Takes Care Of Children, Fools And Drunks.

 I overslept today, having a three PM appointment at Medical City, Dallas for my presurgery tests and paperwork. So I left the house without eating and scurried on my way to get there, forgetting little details like gassing up the car and getting some cash. I got to Medical City on time and sailed through my tests and paperwork, it took about an hour and a half, by then I was hungry enough to start crying, but I didn't.

 I marched to the ATM in the building atrium and plugged my card in, punched in my P. I. N. and got an error, I'd forgot my PIN. So I called Linda Lou, she couldn't remember my P. I. N., either. So, there I was, with the car in their parking garage, without any cash to get it out, and no, the garage wouldn't take my card.

 So, I called Linda Lou back, luckily our youngest boy works in a bank, not too far away, he slid down with Linda Lou's card and her P. I. N. written down. I marched back to the ATM and HER P. I. N. didn't work.  Shucks, and other comments. Meanwhile, Micheal had driven off, me still broke with the car in the parking garage. So, I called Michel back, got him turned around and got him to take his card and get a little cash. Tonight I do not hate cell phones as much as usual.

 I paid the ransom on our asexual grandparentmobile and went and bought gas, at least I can still remember my ZIP code. To use the card as a credit card for buying gas at the pump requires the ZIP.  The handbook for our car claims a twenty gallon fuel tank. The fill up took a little more than twenty-one gallons.  The car gas one of those distance to empty widgets on it and I've run it down to zero plenty of times. I've always planned on loading a couple of the lawn mower gas cans on and when the D to E  thing reads zero to push the trip odometer and see how far I could go. Well, I was kind of frazzled when I left from home and I think I read like ten or twelve on the D to E. And I drove to north Dallas, about sixty miles.

 God takes care of children and fools.  and He took care of me while I was drunk all those years, not to mention everyone I didn't kill while drunk.

 I finally got to the rehab hospital to see Linda Lou, they're letting her come home Monday. The original plan was for me to get this stent put in while she was still in the hospital. The new plan is for me to pick her up, take her to Stephanie's and spend the night with them, have one of the kids drive me to the hospital, call them when I'm ready to leave, spend that night with them and go home the next day. Bingo T. Pug will spend the night with Patsy.

 Anyhow, that was my big adventure. I'm not quite sure how I constantly get myself into these messes but, there we are.

The Socialist Educrat Taking Over The Service Academies?

 So I was over at the Puppy Blender's Site yesterday and  saw where some kind of Terrorism Center at the United States Military at West Point, the place where they turn promising high school grads into embryo professional Army Officers, put out a report saying that the biggest danger of terrorism is from right wing Americans. The guy responsible for this "report" is the boss of the Sociology  Dept.

 I'm not sure where he got any evidence of right wing terrorism from Americans, Seems the terrorism is coming from Muslims and the left. The NRA has set no firebombs or attacked any research center like the Animal Liberation Front and The Earth Liberation Front. And The Southern Baptists may disapprove of dancing but haven't set off any bombs . The loser Nazis and KKK types are all left wing, contrary to scholarly opinion, since most "scholars" looking into things like this try to excuse the slaughters of Mao and Stalin and claim that if only they were in charge, this time socialism will work.

 I believe it was Thomas Sowell who popularized the saying "an idea so stupid only an intellectual could believe it."

 This clown, teaching the young men and women who will be released to care for the very lives of their soldiers is in the wrong line of work. He should be standing on a street corner somewhere, ranting and raging against the very people who paid the taxes to fund the left wing centers that filled his mind with utter drivel.

 There is no danger of terrorism from the people who go to rallies and leave the parks cleaner than they found them. The State and Federal Governments could actually save a little mone. Simply announce some policy that only a University Womyn's Study Professor could want, the TEA Party folks will show up, when they leave the Capitol Grounds would be squeaky clean.

 Meanwhile the drug gangs have taken over large swaths of our biggest cities, the border security is a lame joke and we are borrowing forty-one cents of every dollar we spend. And we are spending this money illegally, the Senate has stopped the voting on the National Budget. Now I'm just a pore dumb redneck who got his GED in the Service and never finished college but I seem to remember from my high school classes that there must be a budget, continuing resolutions don't make it.

 Yet the right is the danger. Um-hmm. And this clown is indoctrinating our future military leaders. Or trying to. Thank God these kids will all be in the care of long time Sergeants. These ideas will get our soldiers killed. Worse, these ideas will lead to officers who do not understand what the military is for. Of course we already have that with the Generals tamely accepting the "green on blue" murders in Afghanistan.. Hint to the politicians wearing uniforms:  The military doesn't rebuild societies. The military goes in, kills people and breaks things until the bad guys scream' Oh, God! Please stop!" Then can come the State Department and the Peace Corps. And the military goes back to it's best job, standing around looking so fierce that nobody wants to start something. And the military is failing at that job. Our ground troops are worn out from repeated deployments, our ships are pretty much decrepit and our aircraft aging. Worse, we're sending lightly armed infantry where we should be sending tactical nukes.

 We have tried, since at least the Bush 41 Administration, to just kill the bad guys and we try to avoid a war with Islam. Which sounds good but we simply cannot raise enough infantry to kill Jihadis as fast as the Madrasas make them. If we kill twenty of them and they kill one of ours, they win. We simply do not have the young men to fill up the ranks of the riflemen. The days of taking farm boys in and tying a strand of straw to one shoe and hay to the other, teaching them to march by counting out hay foot, straw foot, handing them a musket differing only in cosmetics from the squirrel rife at home and having them march in formation, by the regiment up and fire once and give them the bayonet, those days are long gone. Heck, we don't have many farm boys left.

 Today a PFC is probably smarter than at least half of the kids his age on a college campus and is certainly in better shape. Meanwhile the Madrasas churn out thousands of young men who only know the commandments of Jihad. And they are willing to tape explosives to their crotch and get on an airliner. They are willing to put explosive vests on and kill themselves to take out a Corporal. Their leaders are willing to seek out the mentally challenged and tape bombs to them. Funny how those leaders are too important to die themselves.

 We aren't going to win this fight until we take it to Saudi Arabia and to Pakistan, and the rest of those places that teach the killing of Infidels.

 And the Service Academies are teaching the young leaders of our armed forces that Uncle Bill, the deer hunting, tax paying veteran is the real enemy. Somehow I think our tax dollars, not to mention the forty-one borrowed cents out of every dollar the federal government spends are wasted.

Almost Stupid Enough To Believe A Democrat

 So Linda Lou is on her way to the Rehab Hospital, she should be going there later today or on Saturday. Meanwhile, my Neuro Doc gave me a new prescription to help with my shakes. Unfortunately it makes me real sleepy and unambitious, also seems to make me even stupider than normal.

 I cannot seem to get too interested in the destruction of my country due to the clown car administration. Someone please tell me if this batch of inflamed anuses screaming for raised taxes: does even one of these clowns actually pay his or her taxes or do they all screech for higher taxes on the mom and pop businesses while doing everything possible to avoid their own? They all seem to know full well that any tax increase can be avoided by their own little army of lawyers and accountants. does Obama know even one honest person?

 Kind of like gun control, they all know that no matter what laws are made for me, their little armies of gun-toting thugs, er, security will be unaffected. Oh well, it doesn't bother me as mine all went down in that tragic canoe accident. Funny, though, I was reading Rachel Lucas' blog the other day and it seems that, while she was in Italy her family all went out on some kind of hillbilly picnic and barbecue and all HER guns went down in a canoe accident, too. Oh well, it seems that learning canoe paddling is difficult. 'Specially for rednecks like me and hillbillies like Rachel's family. And maybe others. Seems that learning canoe is a big deal these days. And with all these gun grabbin' S.O.B.s around everyone is takin' their iron everywhere they go.

 I read that after that New York newspaper published the names and addresses of the pistol permit holders at least two burglaries have been reported of those houses. Oddly the newspaper reporting the crimes is a newspaper in the United Kingdom. Seems the Brit papers are doing the work American papers won't do. Y'know, it's bad enough we have uninformed voters, do we have to have deliberately misinformed voters? If we only had honest newspapers. Sigh. When the shootin' starts we'll have to burn down all the J-Schools.

 Whoa! Just spilled the brine from the jar, tryin' to get the last few olives out. Stupid pills. I understand the biggest problem of the "homeless" population. There are pills that can make many, if not most, of the mentally ill able to live outside of the big old mental hospitals that were so infamous for their ill treatment of the mentally ill. Trouble is, most of those pills have unpleasant side effects, kind of like this new pill. My Doc says to give these pills awhile, I should, and that is the operative word, should, become accustomed to them. Until then? Well, the mentally ill simply refuse to take those pills, and I'm not sure I blame them if the effects are worse than the ones I'm having. If, as promised, we had the halfway houses and such where the mentally ill could be required to take those pills or, back to the loony bin,  We don't have that, we have the streets. So, instead of people trained to handle the mentally ill, we have law enforcement officers.

 If it were not for the mentally ill and addiction, we wouldn't HAVE a homeless problem. We'd have a few camps on the edge of towns where the bindlestiffs hung out until they found a temporary job and a room, until the next time the wanderlust hit them. They weren't a big problem, a chicken went into the pot once in a while, a shirt off the chothes line but they weren't pooping in doorways like we have now. Nor did bindlestiffs shoot up schools, although there used to be iron in some of those packs. I grew up in a railroad town. We used to go shooting in a gully just outside town and the traveling bums used to camp at the bridge, right where the gully joined The Creek. So, we'd see them all the time, when we got into our teens we'd always bring a couple of cans of something, leftovers from roasts and such, we'd be welcome to eat at their camp as long as we brought something. These men (and a few women) were not like today's homeless, sure, if there was a bottle it'd disappear quick enough but, then see what happens to a bottle at a hunting camp, after the guns are put away and the lies discussions started. No, those men were always with us, in the old west they rode the grubline, in my boyhood they followed the harvests. I dunno what they do today, the harvests are done by illegals, the society is so papered and controlled.

 Anyhow, I'd really like to see an honest study of that pills these shooters of today had taken and were taking . what pills they had been put on but quit because of side effects. Columbine, VA Tech, the Colorado theater shooter, pretty much all of them had mental problems and they all had fathers who were either gone or were very distant.

 I also wonder why Obama had all those kids around him when he was speechifying about guns but that he never seemed to give a rat's patootie about all those mostly black, mostly young murder victims of Chicago, where they have perfect gun control laws.

 Well, anyway, here is the deal, I'm going to keep taking these pills until my next visit with the Neuro Doc. Unless the increasing dose make me unable to drive. If anyone reading this notices me starting to approve of this clown car administration, though, PLEASE come and take those pills away from me. I'd rather shake.

 Well, we went up to the kid's place on Sunday, it started with a belated B'Day Party for William at some place called "Jump Street". You know those bounce castles folks rent out? Well it seems there is this big ol' warehouse like structure with huge "carpets" of those bounce balloon type things and folks pay to let their kids bounce around, lookin' the fool. And no soundproofing.  I am reasonably sure that the place would fail an EPA noise test. I looked, no soundproofing. I ended up sitting in the car, reading No Greater Courage, a novel of the Civil War Battle of Fredericksburg.

 From there we went to the kid's house and, at 5:30 AM, got up to go to the hospital. I made the mistake of not turning on the car radio for traffic reports as soon as we got in, when I was actually on the off ramp/on ramp to the "freeway" the herd slowed to a near standstill. I turned on the radio then and got the word that there was some accident up ahead that had all but one lane closed and we should take an alternate route. Oh, Bother! and other colorful phrases. So it took maybe twenty minutes to the next exit where we bailed. Eventually we got to the hospital, after some more trials and tribulations, did I mention that I don't like cities and don't like traffic, we got to the hospital.

 We had got some calls before, one saying that, due to a cancellations, Linda Lou' surgery had been moved up a couple hours, one saying, no, we should go in at the original scheduled time. Mmmph. So we managed to make it at the time we were supposed to be there, only to find we were at the wrong end of the hospital. We eventually manged to get to the right place and, waited.

 They finally came and got us and put us in a little pre-op room where folks poked and prodded, took temps and pressures and asked the same questions, over and over. Eventually someone noticed that the room was flooding, seems it was a bathroom shared with the next little pre-op room and someone left the sink running with a plugged drain. It wasn't me.

 Then they took Linda Lou away and I went back to the day surgery waiting room. They had one little desk there with an electric outlet so I set up the laptop and tried to read The Puppyblender and Frnak J and all the rest of my routine, just like always. Pamibe didn't have anything new, she's making up for it today, though, and I found that I was too tired and grumpy (not worried, though. Me worry?) to concentrate so I started watching YouTube videoes. I eventually found a string of around a bazillion Pug shorts so that's what I was doing.  Eventually I had around twelve thousand little kids around, watching Pugs. I'm not sure but I think a couple neighboring Preschools let out and sent their kids, too. Oh, well, it kept the kids occupied and let grandparents and wives and husbands sit and worry.

 Eventually Doc Buch came in and told be he was all through and her knee had been a mess. I asked him if he thought we'd come all that way to let him mess with a perfectly good knee? He made comments about me making an office in the waiting room and I said I'd take whatever comfort I could find. anyway e told me they'd come get me in a while and tell me where in the hospital they'd spirited my Linda Lou. So, I sat. Then I sat some more. Finally, I went don the hall to pee and then, thinking that maybe they'd come in while I was gone, went and asked. Everyone had pretty much gone home and so they chewed me out for doing what the Doc told me. always ask the nurse, she said. Excuse me, lady. I'm a married man and my Linda Lou doesn't like it when some other woman orders me around, that's HER job.

 So, anyhow, I finally saw Linda Lou, she's okay.

 I waited until past dark and after the very worst of the afternoon traffic had subsided and then I drove home to dogs that were very glad to see me.  CAP was lucky enough that the precip had waited until after I was home, Bigo T. Pug was at Patsy's. So, I got home, fixed a big fat turkey pastrami and cheddar on pumpernickel and a can of Van Camp's  Pork'n'beans with a couple pickle wedges. Then I watched old Gunsmokes and Bonanzas we'd recorded on The Western Channel, went to bed and woke up with snow.

 and so, now I've got Linda Lou's computer hooked up to my broadband, if I had a router, and knew what to do with it I could be in the living room.Instead, Bingo and I are in my cramped and overfull "study/reloading room. Princess is wandering the house, lookin' for her Mama.

 In answer to Pamibe's question, the computer that needs a new video card (whatever that is) is a Dell Studio 435T. The video cards seem to go up in price the more complex the games one plays. Well, sometimes I play solotaire. Mostly it's YouTubes, Blogs, news sites and www.chubbygirlswithlowmorals.org.

 Anyhow, thanks to everyone that said a prayer for Linda Lou. Her knees are both fixed, she's a ways from coming back because her muscles have gotten pretty weak from all this but, they had her on her feet a little. Now, it's off to rehab with her, I hope.

Here We Go! Round Two, Knee Rebuild!

 So we are due up at someplace called Jump Street in Plano, Texas tomorrow for my grandson Williams "official birthday party." His actual b'day was a couple of weeks back but, logistics. We are going up to spend the night at Dean and Steph's, then at ODark-Fifteen or so we drive from there to this hospital in far North Dallas, not the one I'll get the stent in but another one on the LBJ "Freeway".

 Now Dallas has a homeless problem, just like every other city but they seem to handle it differently. What they do is put them all in cars so they drive around the freeways and roads, aimlessly. Rush hour for the LBJ Freeway starts at twelve-thirty-five AM and ends at Eleven-fifty-three PM.  My hatred for Dallas is only exceeded by my hatred for Houston. Dallas was once a pretty nice town, I think that was in 1876. Houston should have stayed a swamp.

 Anyhow, I shall be out of pocket for the next couple of days. Patsy will keep Bingo. T. Pug and poor ol' CAP will just have to stay in her yard. If I don't get back Monday night Patsy will throw a pitcher of water and food over the fence, hopefully into her food dish and water bucket.

 Then I shall be temporarily single until Linda Lou gets out of the hospital and then the rehab hospital (?).  Well, it's got a few docs, lotsa nurses and physical terrorists and the same kind of rules all over but they might call it sumpin' else. Linda Lou says I can bring another woman in while she's gone but she'll have to clean the house.

 In other news the video card in my big fancy Dell computer is dead and I need another one. So, I got online to price video cards and they range from dirt cheap to hundreds of dollars. All I want to do is mess around on the intertoobz and watch the odd YouTube, and of course www.nakedchubbygirls.org.

 So, if anyone at all knows anything about what a video card is, etc. All I know is that it makes the screen show stuff. And it is allegedly replaceable by a computer savvy peep like my SIL, but HE won't take me by the hand and help me buy it.

 Oh well, until I figger it out, there is Linda Lou's desktop as she will have the laptop.

 Anyhoo, wish us luck!

Ammunition

 There are a lot of news stories about the bazillions of firearms being sold these days and how dealers have hardly any "military looking" rifles left in stock. No one seems to be mentioning ammo.

 I, of course, have no firearms left after that tragic canoe wreck I had but I still have some suppliers in my "bookmarks". I had a bad case of can't sleep the other night and so after I read all the blog posts I cared to and after I got tired of www.nakedchubbygirls.org I looked in on my ammo and components suppliers. Folks, there ain't none.

 Go to www.midwayUSA.com and find bare shelves. For instance every single box of .22lr hollowpoint ammo is marked "out of stock, no backorder.  Most of the popular handgun cartridges are gone, and just TRY to find some .223, .308 or 7.62x39.

 Shotgun ammo? There are only two, out of thirty-five choices of 12 gauge two and three quarter inch buckshot loads available and I don't reckon they'll be available for long. So if you want some  call yesterday. Of course the Winchester copper plated double ought buck is kind of pricey and the other load, a low recoil buckshot load is in an eighty round box. I've seen a few gunfights and read of many more, I've never heard of one using up eighty rounds of shotgun ammo.

 I'm kind of curious. With all these folks buying rifles, pistols, shotguns and ammo, just how many of 'em are going to carry their shootin' irons down to the local commissar when the "sensible gun regulation" becomes a total ban? And, just whom will the politicos choose to go door to door to arrest these millions of new criminals?

 Nanny Bloomberg and Swishy Rham (NTTAWWT) know where the gangs are. They have a pretty fair idea of who they are. They certainly don't care much about the various Constitutional Amendments about search and seizure and right to property so why haven't they send their city police out to round them up? Heck, by the time the arrests and confiscation worked their way through the court system most of the gangbangers would be past the most dangerous age and the guns would have been melted down to make Chevy Volts and bird killing windmills. So, why don't they go after the illegal guns?

 The answer is simple, they'd lose a lot of their police officers. And the rest would decide on a different line of work. So, instead of going after the criminals they are going after millions of law abiding citizens and thousands of law abiding businesses. So, what about the millions of brand new criminals? That is what we'll have if DiFi gets her way. And exactly what percentage of these brand new criminals will shoot?

 You smart people in media and politics should consider that question very carefully. A lot depends on it.

A Visit To The Vascular Surgeon.

 I drove up to see the vascular surgeon that is supposed to try to fix the circulation in my leg. To start with, either the nurse at my internist's office misspoke or my Linda Lou misunderstood, the circulation problem is not in my right foot but my left leg. This is great news because in early 1967 that right leg was badly broken with bones going out the skin and Lord only knows how much entering. And if that lower leg and foot were not getting any circulation it would be likely to be from vein and arterial damage, poorly repaired from 'way back then.

 Instead, the problem is some ninety percent blockage of some big artery in my poor fat belly. So the plan is to make an incision in my crotch (careful, there, Doc!) and run a catheter up my femoral artery, when it hits the block to blow up an itty-bitty balloon. They will then shore it up so it doesn't collapse again, kind of like the way the old gold miners used to nail timber shoring up.

 I am pleased that the solution seems simple. I shall go up early on Jan 28th, see Linda Lou in whatever rehab hospital that Doc Buch has her in after her knee rebuild, then spend the night with Dean and Stephanie in Plano. They will roll me out of bed, not give me any coffee or breakfast (grrr!) and carry me to Med City, Dallas to arrive at six AM. Then they'll put me to sleep and I'll wake up, hopefully not gelded.  I'll call the kids, one of 'em will come get me and then, depending how woozy I am, I'll go home or spend the night. Most likely I'll hang out a couple-three hours and then drive home.

 Our neighbor, Patsy will be taking care of the livestock.