Finally

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The theme changes... sort of... over at R,M&P. It only took a month and a half to post pictures from a trip that was only a few days long. Now we're venturing into territory that's a little different because there are people in some of the pictures. It starts off with a blurry landscape (seascape?), though.
I decided, since I hadn't shot any really recent stuff, I post some from the H.S reunion. A few are from my camera and a few from Grandma Skip's. In most cases I was the one holding the camera.

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Congratulations

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A blog I follow (it's not on the sidebar) reports it Just hit a milestone in page views. I kinda like the way he celebrates.

Baseball season is over... except for a select few teams. Congratulations to the Giants, who set a new attendance record this year, selling out every one of their home games... and for acquiring a Baby Giraffe to go with the Panda.

The closest to a discussion of the weather we will have today is the following:
at 8am

The calendar information for the Lions Club has been submitted to the publisher. As soon as we receive an order confirmation we'll send a check. The results were decent, but probably could have been better with a little more coordinated effort.

At the class reunion they provided name tags for the attendees. Classmates had their senior picture on the tag. Spouses had tags of a different color with only their names. I was one of those students who didn't have a senior picture [that could be an entire post]. Someone found my picture from the junior year:

enough of that
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That was quick

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I've already been to the dentist and back this morning. Being able to drop your teeth off for the needed work makes that possible. I should have them back by 4pm. It's also nice to have spares so I can still give a brilliant smile... whether I want to or not.

I don't know if I've mentioned that I receive The Economist. My only issue with the magazine is the ink smears was too easily. Otherwise I like it.

Have I mentioned I was born in San Francisco? Did I also say I lived there until I was eight years old?
Some time since then the city changed. Maybe it was when those New Yorkers came in 1958?

just kidding, fellas
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Click the Image

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A friend's wife posted this on Facebook. It's sure a lot better than anything I was able to shoot. These guys really rocked the house on Sunday afternoon... probably did, too, on Saturday but we weren't home to appreciate it.

My dentist appointment went so well yesterday that I get to go in again this morning and tomorrow.

An old shipmate emailed me some videos of a ship's reunion in Charlotte. It's almost like they missed me. He said the next one's in San Diego.

My daughter called me yesterday at noon. Actually she called my cell phone, which I couldn't answer because I was in the dentist's chair. I called back, but only got her voice mail. Now I'm concerned.

Follow-up

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I mentioned the other day that I may tell the saga of my last two Doctor visits. Well, I think I will pass, other than to say that combined they took almost six hours, of which I probably spent a total of 15 minutes with the doc. I think I've had better luck taking my car in for repairs and waiting. At least I can get an appointment for the car repair.

I mentioned a fire in southern Trinity County on Saturday. It's about 50% contained at a little over 1500 acres. Yesterday's cool weather and rain helped.

I seem to be easily distracted this morning. I was going to post this on Facebook, but, before doing so, found something totally unrelated and posted that instead.

PBS was good last night - Hummingbirds, Inspector Lewis & Yellowstone Nat'l Park.

Bookwise, I'm on a roll, two in a row now haven't really caught my attention.
Is it possible for an author to have too much imagination?

While not exactly a quote, this is worth repeating:

"The second most popular way people get their news is word of mouth. So it’s too bad so many people talk through a different body part"

Dentist appointment at noon today.

whoopee!
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Look

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What's happened?
Talk about change...

Yesterday morning dawned sunny and clear.
I attended an early morning attitude adjustment hour, went and filled the gas tank, and returned home to lurk on the Internet for awhile before getting ready to drive to a memorial service celebration of life in Trinity Center for a friend from Lions. It's a nice drive through some beautiful country that takes about two hours... barring any delays.
The trip went as planned, though we noticed some large clouds to the north as we drove up highway 3.
When we arrived we greeted friends, some of whom we hadn't seen since Thursday afternoon and a number of others. There was standing room only in the IOOF hall for the attendees and a fantastic potluck meal after the eulogies, where a large number of folks paid tribute.
When we stepped outside again afterward visibility had been slightly reduced by smoke from a wildland fire in the southern part of Trinity County and the smell was palpable. Also to the west, above the Trinity Alps more clouds had appeared, and, as we stood there the wind increased and changed direction.
The weather was changing before our eyes.

This morning, once the Sun provided enough light, the change was even more evident. It is overcast... in fact, it has begun to rain and the temperature has actually come down.

run-on sentence
...where?
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I haven't mentioned the weather lately

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I've been too busy straightening out computer issues (twice0, dealing with that reunion, and preparing a calendar order to even look at what the NWS has had to say until now. It turns out we've been up in the 100s since Tuesday. Fortunately, with the evenings starting earlier and daylight starting later, it has been cooling off quite a bit in the evenings.
Today is supposed to be in the low 90s and Sunday will seem downright frigid if it only reaches the predicted 74.

This is an example of what we've been treated to over the last couple of days

The first time I saw the Thunderbirds was July 1957 at Valley Forge. If anyone had warned us they were going to do a demo, most of us didn't get the message and it scared the pie out of us. After we changed our underwear, we enjoyed the show.

I think somewhere in the not too distant past on this blog I may have some video of the Blue Angels flying over my house. The video above is shot from the shopping center downtown next to the freeway.

not gonna look for it
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Temptation

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Did anyone miss me?
Two things kept me from posting... no, make that three.
First off, I use Firefox as my browser. Something happened to corrupt, or otherwise mess up, the cache or the cookies. So the browser was, to say the least, under-performing.
Secondly, there was a recent influx of data for the Lions Club's Community Birthday Calendars. That is to say yesterday was the deadline and most waited until then to turn stuff in. I spent most of the day using another method to input the information for the calendars. It is relatively simple, but time consuming.
And three, I said "Screw it*."

I did, however, clean up the issue with Firefox.

*a euphemism... and about as close to an expletive as you'll find

that and WTF
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For the Brighton Pensioner

This was over on the sidebar this morning.

Where were we

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The noise level around here has increased some since the weekend. Coming up this Saturday and Sunday is the Redding air show. A number of the aircraft participating have begun to arrive, among them, this bird from Canada. In another day or so there is bound to be more noise as the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds arrive.

So I figured a workaround that more or less solves my issues with the Blogger "lightbox." There is a link in the lower left of the images, after the viewer clicks on them, that opens the image in a separate window. The image can then be manipulated to the the individual's content.

So, last Friday Grandma Skip and I drove south to relive a time when life was much more carefree. My high school class held their 50 year reunion. It was the first reunion I've attended since graduation. I hadn't seen but one or two of my classmates since then. We were the largest class (somewhere around 500) ever to graduate from the school up to that time and I only had a passing acquaintance with many of the members.
Menlo-Atherton High School drew students from at least 4 other elementary school districts. So most of us had never met any of the others until high school. If one didn't participate in extra-curricular activities the only time we interacted was in classes and those were fairly large. I saw a lot of folks with whom I'd attended grade school.

The entire weekend was not spent with those folks. I also took GS to see almost every place I ever lived down there and some places where I hung out, some of which are no longer there or have changed immensely.

I also had the car washed.

there'll be more... later
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Someone is bound to ask

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"Gee, Uncle Skip, we thought you were away over the weekend. Are you going to tell us about what you were doing?"

Yep! I will... soon.

Meanwhile I am on a diet.

I went to the Doc to get my blood pressure medication prescription renewed (I may tell that saga some day). While there the Doc suggested... rather strongly... that I should have some tests (blood panel, urinalysis, etc). When the results came it the Doc's office called me and said I should come back in to discuss them (I may tell that saga combined with the first saga). The net result is that I'm healthy, but my Glucose level is a wee bit high. Now I am watching my intake of carbohydrates, which serves two purposes: first - the fewer carbs, the less sugar and, second, I may lose a pound or two. It was onlly a couple of years ago that I was a svelte 13 stone (180lbs.) and now I'm closer to 15 stone (210 lbs). Those numbers fall into the range limit for my height, but that's not necessarily a good thing.

I'm probably going to have to make an effort to get some better exercise, too. I was going to say more exercise, but just about any exercise would be more... and better.

I am certainly glad to have the PC back. The Lions Club has to get the order in for the Community Birthday Calendar this week so I can submit it online at the beginning of next week. It seems I'm the one person in the club who isn't as intimidated by computers as the average individual. Last year I compiled everything on the old laptop (Windows XP), and then submitted it on a disk. Online is better.

I'll attempt to produce a copy so you can see how the calendar appears.

I finished the Truman bio by David McCullough. I enjoyed it. Then I picked up a piece of fiction co-written by a noted author that's less than riveting. It's supposed to be a mystery... and I suppose it is... but the lack of continuity is such that, though I'm 2/3 of the way through the book, I haven't discerned exactly what the main plot is.

Blogger's gone and done something with the photos such that when we click on them they no longer open as they did before. Now I can't enlarge them as I used to. I suppose someone thinks this is an improvement?

if it ain't broke, don't fix it
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Hey kids, what day is it?

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That's right!



...and that explains this:

My pirate name is:

Iron William Rackham

A pirate's life isn't easy; it takes a tough person. That's okay with you, though, since you a tough person. You have the good fortune of having a good name, since Rackham (pronounced RACKem, not rack-ham) is one of the coolest sounding surnames for a pirate. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network

A source

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Whenever I can't find something suitable for the other blog, or a better image than I can capture, or some inspiration, this is a good source. Besides his camera has some functions unavailable to me.

can't do lightning
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A drive through the World's smallest mountain range

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Uncle Skip's out galavanting around with Grandma Skip. But he did leave this video:

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The plan was...

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We hoped to load the luggage and be off by now. Circumstance proved to be such that there's nothing in the car as yet, except for an open bag of popcorn and the camera... camera's been there for a week; popcorn since Wednesday.

Friday's wheelie-bin day in our neighborhood. Usually the ginormous green wheelie-bin picker-upper truck trolls the streets between 6:30am and 7:15am, making sure all the school kids and working adults nobody is asleep. Today it must have overslept. Our wheelie-bin is still out at the curb [that would probably be kerb in England] waiting for pick-up.

I can just see explaining I am tardy because, "The garbage truck was late."

no, it's still a secret
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Guess what?

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I forgot to remind everyone that Friday the 13th was on Tuesday.
But that's not what you're supposed to guess.
No, we're going to be away again for a few days and I'm not telling why or where until I get back.
Meanwhile, enjoy the pictures from Oregon posted over here.

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This just in...

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The Governor of California is at it again¹. He's going to be excommunicated from the demoticrat party if he keeps saying things like:

"You've given me 600 bills, and there's not 600 problems that we need those solutions for."

Doesn't he know it isn't proper to end a sentence with a preposition?

or, like me, he likes to
break rules occasionally

¹See here for further edification

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Yes!

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The PC has returned to its normal perch on the right (I had to think about right and left again) side of my desk, which in the absence of the PC started to begin to look like a desk again.
It is so obvious now that it really needed to be gone through. The speed at which it starts up, compared to before it went in, is amazing.
What's really nice though is the folks that built the PC are the ones who went through and cleaned things up (even the dust bunnies are gone).

there might be
something like
what they
did in medicine

Innocent 12-year-old girls

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This post is for Buck.
If the politicians want to take on the protection of innocent 12-year-olds, this issue must be addressed.

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More of the same

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Still laptopping... and waiting to hear from tho computer doc. It's really frustrating because this puppy operates with a few quirks that the PC doesn't seem to have. I'm guessing it's the difference between IE and Firefox?

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It's coming

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On the other hand, when you really don't have nything to post, inconvenience can really be a good excuse.

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I see where Suldog's cleaned up his sidebar. Somehow this blog made the cut. Today's post is a compendium of outtakes from blog posts he has otherwise shitcanned dumped. My personal favorite is one-time-use disposable cats.

really... I like cats
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Day three

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The PC is still at the shop. So I am "playing" on GS's laptop.

It's okay for travel and emergencies, but....

....it doesn't have the stuff I use all of the time.

maybe Wednesday
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T-bangers

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I wasn't prepared to post today.
But Mother nature sent a message starting about an hour ago. It sounds alot like the angels are bowling.
It was about 15 degrees cooler today than yesterday, but still in the 90s. There were lots of high clouds all day and some nasty thunder storms in the mountains to the north and east that the weather guy on tv said would go away as it cooled down in the evening.
So it appears he was right about the stuff in the mountains. There just wasn't any warning about the local surprise tonight. There has been some rainfall... just none here at the house yet.

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GS went to bed so I can play online again. I thought seriously about doing a 9/11 post for tomorrow. Instead I will just post an image on the other blog and do something constructive.

well, no post anyway
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That is just so scary

Plans

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GS is still sleeping so I have hijacked the laptop.

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I had some idea of what I was going to post this weekend. But that's kinda by the boards because as much trouble as I have typing on a regular keyboard, it's compounded on a laptop... even one that's not balky.

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Ya know what really ticks me off?
I missed the opportunity to screen grab the 108 that showed up on the weather site yesterday. On top of that the North Wind was blowing in the teens with some really good gusts. So it felt like someone the blow dryer on. Fortunately, nobody's dropped a match... yet!

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If the opportunity arises, there may be a post about this evening's event, which will now be analog instead of digital.

good thing we have pencils
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Aaaaaaaugh!

The gremlins have left me in pickle. I was going to make a minor adjustment to the PC. When I moved it, it went into immediate shutdown... do not pass go, etc.,etc. I have removed its carcass to the repair shop. They thibk I can have it back on Wednesday.

Meanwhile it is use the ten year old laptop I'm on now and deal with the balky slowness. Or, share Grandma Skip's laptop.

The worst of it is I'am supposed to emcee an event tomorrow and all of my notes are on the big unit.

let's go hide

He said, what?

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"Not every human problem deserves a law."
~ Edmund G. Brown, Jr.

actually he wrote it down
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It's an impulse

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I can't help it. I have to do this every now and again.
BTW the same NWS site reports a trace of precipitation between 2pm and 3pm. There wasn't a cloud in the sky within 20 miles

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Not now

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I casually mentioned a certain accumulation of bovines. There seems to be a little interest in an explanation [one individual]. So, if I remember, I will write something about this collection got started.
Meanwhile there's a picture of the latest addition over here.

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I was commenting on another blog a few moments ago. This was my v-word. The first thing that popped into my mind was "Deer Camp."

Have we mentioned the weather lately?

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It isn't raining... heck, it's not even cloudy... and the wind is calm. Temperatures are running slightly above normal. The weather guys on tv are forecasting it should pretty much stay like this for awhile. About the only changes predicted are for an increased chance of T-storms in the mountains.

There was an earthquake somewhere around here the other day. Nobody felt it. The only reason we know about it is because somebody in a lab somewhere gets paid to monitor this stuff.

Have I ever mentioned the cow collection? I guess it's a collection. I guess I may post something...

some day
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Apology

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I know I promised there wouldn't be any more pictures of flowers. That was before I'd rediscovered the picture I posted today. Heck, if I'd noticed it soon enough, I might have skipped some of the others.

You may have the impression that GS and I are the only folks around while at Crater Lake. Quite the contrary, there were lots of other folks around, but it seems I managed to always point the camera in another direction. I'm fairly certain the only picture, besides the one of GS and me, that has any people in it is this one. They're so far away it's difficult to determine what they are.
There were probably more motorcycles than anything else... or at least they were the most noticeable... and not just because of the noise level.

We made the obligatory visit to the gift shop... actually to two different gift shops, stopped for a cool beverage, then headed to Medford.

There are more photos, but I'm going to save them for some time when I need to fill in over there.

probably next week
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Experiment

This is the same photo as over here... only it's been enhanced and, when clicked on a couple of times, isn't quite so big.



I'm having fun experimenting with GIMP. I can do all of this with Photoshop Elements, too. I just can't do it on this computer.

Pancakes, anyone?

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It's the first Sunday again. So Grandma Skip and I are at the Frontier Senior Center serving at the monthly community breakfast.

I messed around with the camera while we were at Crater Lake last month and managed to take a panorama shot of the lake. The sad news is that it didn't quite come out. The good news is it turned out well enough to post over here.

We're there... or is it here?

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Even when you're right at the edge the lake is a long way off*.
This would have been a great spot from which to view the Perseids. Regretfully, there were no accommodations available in the park. The day (Saturday 8/13) was the optimum opportunity, too.

*that's why there's a fence

I think the cold snap is over

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It was only 93º on Wednesday


This normal.

96º yesterday

Tease

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So over at R,M&P we have finally arrived at the edge of Crater Lake. But before we can show you the lake you have to see how it's almost like being on top of the world.

almost
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I think I may have said something about this before?

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Before I explain today's headline, I promise today is the last day of wildflowers on R,M&P. Not that there aren't any more wildflowers in the pictures: they just aren't the center of attention... not even close.

Every now and again I look at the layout of this blog and tell myself that it is too cluttered and maybe a little disorganized. Then I say I should do something about it. Then I write a post saying something along those lines. Then I move something... or worse, add something.

This time I'm not going to do anything.

I was just over at Suldog's, where he's cleaning house. The sidebar here is still shorter than his.

Hey, we finally got an explanation about August Bank. Sounds kinda like a good idea... fewer holidays, I mean.
It seems to me they're always switching our wheelie bin day because of holidays. That may not sound so silly to you. But our wheelie bin day is Friday. When it is switched, it is Saturday. What's the point of a holiday when you have to work the next Saturday?

I was thinking... no, really, I was.

If anyone sees something they think should be removed from my sidebar, let me know.

write it on the back of a
twenty and mail it to me
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