Grumpy, Grandfather on my mother's side of the family was a cantankorus old fart who us kids didn't like much. It wasn't that we disliked him, more like we did not like him. It was more of a nuetral feeling we had if that makes any sense. He was just a gruff grumpy old person in our eyes.

Grandfather was a corporate pilot who flew biz jets and various other types of aircraft. One of the clients he flew was Orville Redenbacker, so we ate a lot of gormet popcorn growing up.

When Grumpy (Grandfather) wasn't off somewhere flying he worked for the railroad as a yard dispatcher. Plus in between jobs he was an avid fisherman and hunter.

Now its interesting that although Grumpy did a lot of really cool things we didn't see him in that light. As children, we would set "traps" when we stayed at Grandfathers house in an attempt to catch him when he came home late at night.

What I find interesting today is that I have become very much like Grumpy. In fact, in ways I am exactly like Grumpy. One way I emulated him was I became an avid hunter and fisherman. I spent many years hunting from my scooter, jeep, and truck. Hours of looking at hillside for my prey. Our children grew up on wild game Deer, Elk, Moose and Antelope.

Starring at those hillsides gave me lots of time to think. Lucky for me I came up with this crazy idea. You see, during hunting season you have basically 2 types of hunters. The die hard full time hunter who hunts until he fills his tag all day wandering the woods. Up the hill, down the hill. Constantly on alert for his prey.

Than the part timers would wander out before day break after a night of partying. Than wait for sunrise. However unlike the full time hunter, the part time hunter would return to camp by 9-9:30 AM and prepare breakfast. After a few more beers and a nap than more beer the part timer would head back into the forest an hour or so before sunset.

One chiily October morning I was pearched next to my truck watching a small meadow with a little pond in the center. The meadow was ringed by old growth pines allowing only about 50 foot of vision into the forest. ET could of landed there and I would never had known.

On this morning the air was cool and crisp. A fog had risen from the pond and floated around the meadow. I had arrived in my spot several hours before sunrise. However by about 10 that morning the smell of bacon, sausage, and other breakfast sorts started drifting thru the air. That Antelope jerky I had been chewing all morning was really starting to lose its appeal. A big ol' breakfast was calling.

But, just as I was thinking of heading back to camp the thought hit me. If I can smell all this breakfast fixings cooking so could the animals. This area was hunted very heavily. It was known for having trophy animals. So many Californian hunters, ( more on this in another post ) flocked to the area. So it would make sense that the animals would know that when that maple flavored aroma filled the morning air, most of the hunters had returned to their camps. Now that may seem strange but at that point I became a semi full time hunter. Instead of leaving for breakfast I opted that day to sit it out. 30 minutes later a young 4 point Elk came walking out of the forest, to the pond. And you know the rest of the story. After that day I never failed to bring home dinner.

It was also the solitude that I enjoyed. I mentioned this before about my long periods of being alone during my 5 hitch hiking trips cross country. As I sat on those cold October mornings I had plenty of time to look back and remember friends and family.

So like Grumpy, I too have a rather "grumpy" attitude as I grow older. But I now know its not grumpyness that both Grandfather and I knew.

Its really to bad that we don't miss people before they are gone...........

New York cops fire 50 rounds into unarmed groom and the judge lets them off? Wow, I think New York is off my "I want to be there list". Heck after 10 or 12 rounds you would of thought the cops would of realized no one was shooting back. How do they say it? "Justice Served"

I think I mentioned this a few post back about going past my African American neighbors garage without saying Hi. Well he yelled out that I was being unsociable and of course I responded that I didn't see him, he was in the shadows. Well I got that look. You know the one I'm talking about. Luckily for me my Scandinavian whiter than white friend who was walking with me quickly defused the whole situation by redirecting the focus on something else.

Anyways, the other day he was telling me how when he and his wife first moved into Yuma years ago they were the first black family in the neighborhood. Than he say's "you know, there goes the neighborhood, type thing".

Somehow I got to get this freedom of speech thing figured out. :0

So, we've been having break ins in the neighborhood. Day light break ins in fact. Ring the door, no one answers kick it in. Generally the area is so depressed here that the economy is the big factor that effects the crime rate. Isn't enough that people are forced to choose between food or gas for their cars , but now have to tend with their personal belongings at risk from thief's.

I've started another blog on a website I joined. It may effect this one, not sure. Sometimes I just have nothing to say anywhere. If in deed it does effect this one I'll drop the other.

Finally, as many of you know I spend a great deal of time alone. Home bound as they say. So I'm thinking for the fun of it getting a Roomba and putting a wig on it. Could be my new friend...........Wonder if Roomba's come with attachments..................

I suspect I'll be getting another email from Mom after that :)

Been WII bowling been hitting in the high 100's to low 200's. The other day got a 218!! My shoulder feels really lose and does not hurt nearly as much. The WII is serving the purpose well as planned.

My fragmented memory got me in a tad bit of trouble last time. My mother informed me that there was at no time she considered giving me up, at least until now :) Thanks Mom.

Couple years before my father died we semi reconciled our relationship over a fifth of cheap vodka. Well he drank, I was more the captured participant. Way back when I was in Canterbury Grade School, somewhere between Kinder and Junior High I received a really cool tool box with tools. It was either a Christmas gift or Birthday. Don't remember which. Anyways, one day the tool box and tools went to school with me for show and tell. Don't remember the show and tell part but I do remember recess. Normal recess was me standing against the school wall in the playground watching the other kids play. Artificial limbs were not really designed for fun.

However, this recess I had the tool box and a captive audience. I had dropped down to my butt and was smashing small pea gravel sized stones on my artificial leg with my little hammer. Now that's entertainment. Needless to say a pretty decent size crowd gathered around me as I smashed stones. At one point, I swung up the little hammer to pulverized another stone when I felt the claw side hit something.........Than the scream. Another boy had moved behind me and got struck. Forehead wounds bleed so much. Kid looked like he had been shot. After the initial panic the school nurse, Principal and playground monitor all determined it was an accident. And that was the end of it.

So I thought, until my sister ran into the house and announced that I had hit a kid at school with my hammer on purpose. I kept saying it was an accident but between my sister ( who wasn't present at the scene, and my firm father the little tool box was taken away and never seen again.

So that drunken night I told my father he owed me my tool box. This opened a dialog that resulted in a lesser strained, although still strained relationship. I'm guessing the vodka haze blocked out the tool box and that he still owed it to me.

Actually now that I've typed it out I think the real person who owes me my little wooden tool box is my sister.

Catherin are you reading this??? You owe me a tool box!

I won't be holding my breath on this one.............

My sister laughs at us. My wife and I are firm believers that Bird Flu or something is just around the corner. So, we've been stock piling can goods and water. My one corner of the garage looks like a grocery store. Under our bed are more cases of can goods. And sitting in the doorway between kitchen and living room are 4 cases of MRE's.

Of course throughout our married years we've always had lots of food in our home no matter how "poor" we were. This year we're growing our own little "victory garden" We'll have peas, beans, squash, and tomatoes. Probably other veggie matter that I've spaced.

So my sister is laughing because we're running out of room to stock pile our food supplies. Than there is the baby plants to contend with. It can still get a bit chilly at night so many of the yound seedlings are in the house. We've got 56 3 inch tall tomato plants in the bedroom. We're going to be eating a lot of tomato's in the near future.

Actually as the economy continues to decline our stockpiling comes in very handy. Soon I won't be able to buy gas at the rate the prices keep going up. So the stock pile helps to offset the higher gas prices.


Hopefully our preparedness is just an action of our imaginations and not really necessary. And those folks trapped in the dome after Katrina really didn't need food and water............

Winds blowing sand everywhere. Yesterday it was 91 degrees, today 87 and 50 mile per hour winds. Strongest winds we ever been in was 100 mph on the Oregon coast. Oregon does not have hurricanes so we just called it "a lot of wind".

Coldest I've ever seen was a Christmas day in upstate Vermont. A bone chilling -56 degrees. Although dangerous, it was neat to hear the frozen snow as we walked on it. You know its cold when your boots don't slip.

There is not much change going on in my life. Soon the full heat of summer will confine me to the indoor air conditioning. Around here it can be and often is 90 plus degrees at 10 at night. Of course after a day of triple digit temps 90 degrees can actually feel pretty nice.

My quest for an outdoor wheelchair apparently has sunk in the muck. The church without so much as a letter gave up. My request here have gone with no response. Even my own family did not respond to my email. You would of thought that a reply would of been the least they could of done. You know, "gee I'd like to help but........" type thing with the obligatory "hope you get it and good luck" ending. Nope, none of my family felt a need to respond.

Well last year I was stuck 7 times in sand in the heat of summer. Lucky for me, strangers had no problems replying to my need of help. Perhaps this year it will be number 8 that gets me. Stuck in sand, no stranger to rely on and 109 degree temps. Probably die out there, but that way the family won't need to worry about replying. Not that I suspect they were that worried/concerned with to begin with.

Oh last week I had a colonoscopy. I'm sure that is not how it is spelled. I fought against this procedure since the mid 90's. However since my Doctor retired, and I wanted to start off on the right foot with the new Doctor I finally agreed. This is a rather humiliating procedure. The night before you get to clean out your system. Once started don't get to far from the toilet. Morning comes and you do it again. This made no sense to me. I had nothing to eat since 8:30 am the morning before. After the night time cleaning out how in the world could there be anything left the next morning? I think the 2nd dose was Doctor revenge. After all, he'll be in the target zone soon :)

I told the receptionist at the time of the procedure that I tried sending in a surrogate asshole but I couldn't catch the cat. The young girl didn't seem to get it. Funny I'm here to get a steel shaft shoved up my you know what and the receptionist has no sense of humor.

The Doctor had the sense of humor. As the Anesthesiologist was making sure I was well doped up the Doctor came in saying: "Hello everybody". Just like Doctor Nick from the Simpsons.

Than all went black.

Memory fragments, Ever have those? Piece of an old memory pops into your head. Not really whole, just a section. Since my earlier years of abuse of alcohol I seem to have lots of these fragments. Most of the time they are not important little tidbits from a drunken haze. But some seem to pop out and hit me like a ton of bricks. One such fragment was of a time when I was very young and my mother leaving me in a hospital. Don't have much to go on, just little fragments of her leaving without saying goodbye. Being visited by my Grandmother Smith who gave me a big orange or red plastic train. Possibly a visit from my father or some male, and finally being taken from the hospital by I think my mother and having to leave the big red or orange train behind.

I think at some point my mother had considered giving me up. Or maybe she's planning on that now?

Later in life came the tonsils and adenoids. We had an ice cream party the night before. Must of been 8-10 of us kids in the hospital room for the procedure. The next morning, as we all played the nurses would come in and remove a child. A few minutes later the child would return but very quickly fall asleep. Being my young mind was as sharp as a baseball bat I just knew they were killing us kids! When I got my shot I fought against the drug. Even as they put the mask on me in the operating room I fought them. I was told to count backwards from ten. Not only did I cunt backwards from ten but back up eight. Don't remember much after that must I must of won cause I'm still here.............

Wii, would like to play. I've never been much into games on the computer or those over priced game boxes like Xbox or the PS2. They all seemed like a really big waste of money to me. But, about 3-4 years back give or take we were meeting with our Grandson's teacher and talking about his fine motor skills and the under development effecting his writing.

So I came up with this idea of getting him an Xbox to work those skills. My wife, in her usual education first fun much later attitude was leaning in the area of more hand writing practice. Fortunately for our Grandson I won the debate this time. And yes the motor skills and handwriting did improve. Also his story retention and problem solving skills developed. Plus he flies a pretty mean UFO.

So there I was sitting as usual in my wheelchair the other day staring at the hand weights I'm supposed to be using to exercise my shoulder thinking I should blow the dust off to make them look like I've used them. Lifting weights over and over is kind of like Dr. Phil. They are both boring and over stated. We could use the city pools but that requires effort and gas to get there. Plus generally during the school year the public pools in the day time are filled with either over weight women or old wrinkled ladies. To much for my eyes and feeble mental abilities to handle.

So I started reading up on the Wii. Way before Christmas I thought, Hey, this could be fun plus good for my shoulder. 6 months later and lots of saved pennies we bought one.

So far it has been good for my shoulder. In fact I hear a bowling game therapy session calling...........................................