Popcorn Popping

We have a tree on our place that the kids have called the popcorn tree for obvious reasons.  It only lasts for a week or two, but while it is here we enjoy it.  

El Toro Negro

How's it Hangin'?

Off and on, mostly on, my dad, and sometimes I, grow a garden.  Some years are good and some not so good.  Sometimes the snap beans do really well and other times its the potatoes that do well.  We have had a hard time with broccoli and carrots over the years.  This year we planted both.

Most everything is dead and gone.  Today I saw dad cleaning out the winter stuff in the garden in preparation for spring.  I walked over to talk.  He mentioned that the carrots had done better than expected and we dug some up.  My kids like carrots, especially for after school snack.  

There are times when you need a pick me up.  Something funny that just make you chuckle.  Today I saw something that did just that.  Here it is.  I hope it helps brighten your day too.

El Toro Negro

Ride Baby Ride

This could be an ongoing post, due to the fact that I have so much to say about this subject.

Everyone goes to WalMart, right?  Over the last few years it has become a necessity to cater to every group out there.  Lately it has been fat people.  You have all seen these carts that are in certain stores right when you walk in.  No, not the buggies, but the battery powered scooters.  

Nine times out of ten they are ridden by a fat slob that is in no way disabled, other than the lack of desire to be a tad more fit.  I know, they have a hormone imbalance, it is a disease, etc.  They can't help it.  Just don't ever take a look at what is in the cart that they riding on, and don't look at the "credit card"  they are paying with.  "Just put that on my Lone Star card."  

So I get it that there are a ton of people that are too lazy to walk more that two parking spaces from their car to the store, thus the mandatory 35% of parking lots that are dedicated to handicapped drivers.  I never knew there were so many.  I think AARP sends you a tag automatically when you join up.  And they must coordinate their shopping.  They are never all or almost all full.  What gives?  Now they need the scooters.

What I saw the other day sparked this post.  I was in the shopatorium and saw a woman on a scooter (I wish I would have had my camera).  She wasn't fat, but she was a slob.  She had no bra, hardly any teeth and no shoes.  I guess she didn't want to get her feet dirt.  I am not exactly sure what group she was a part of that caused her not to be able to push a buggy.  The I'm From East Texas group or the Displaced Katrina Parasites group.  

El Toro Negro

Stow Away

A week or so ago my wife opens the back door to the porch and screams.  She was scared by a big fat possum.  He lumbered off and we forgot about it.  A day or so age I was in the garage with my wife.  We were separated by our suburban.  I was working on something and my wife was cleaning.  All of a sudden she screams and squalls, running backwards out of the garage, saying something like there's something alive in there.

There were three or four boxes stacked on one another and in the top one, with the flaps closed, was the possum, asleep.  Apparently he had taken up residency in our garage.  After talking my wife back in the garage to see what it was that was alive, I took it out and sent it on its way.  I only wish I would have had my VDO camera to catch her running for the house.

El Toro Negro

Why did you let her do that!

Three of our six kids are in 4H.  They do different projects throighout the year.  Last night they had an omlet supper as a fund raiser.  They do it every year and it isn't all that bad.  The three oldest kids were assigned to work the event which left me to take care of and help feed the three year old and our one year old.  It is almost impossible to watch them both, and I guess I didn't do a good enough job of it.  My three year old got up from the table and tried to carry her enormous omlet (on a paper plate) around the cafeteria.  It didn't go so well.

El Toro Negro

Move Over, Coming Through

I have to comment on the recent events concerning our friends the Brits and the French.  I heard this on the radio and had to check it out because I could not believe it.  http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7892294.stm

It seem that they had a little accident that they, at first, didn't want to admit.  They ran into each other, WITH SUBMARINES, in the Atlantic Ocean.  

So what is so unbelievable about them crashing into each other?  Well for one they were in the second largest ocean on the planet.  29.637 million square miles.  6.5  times the size of the United States.  And that is just the surface area.  It is over 28000 feet deep in places.  That's 5 miles of clearance.  How in the world do you just happen to run into someone, by accident?  Were they running without radar?  Did one of them forget to blow their horn when passing through?  "Hey buddy, coming through."  How many subs can be in the Atlantic Ocean at one time.  Crap.

The other thing is what are the French doing with a Weapon of War?  Haven't they been looking down their noses at us for being warmongers?  Doesn't seem right.  Maybe that's why they wanted it to be kept quiet.  

In all honesty the article states that quite a few subs use the same areas as "nesting grounds".  What ever the heck that is.

Nuclear engineer John Large told the BBC that navies often used the same "nesting grounds".  "Both navies want quiet areas, deep areas, roughly the same distance from their home ports. So you find these station grounds have got quite a few submarines, not only French and Royal Navy but also from Russia and the United States."

So if  you know there are going to be lots of other subs around, can't you be more careful?  Don't subs have those back up "pings", like dozers and UPS trucks (wait, it's FedEx that has the pings), to keep from hitting each other?  

El Toro Negro

If it tastes good Spit it out!!

Where I grew up there was a very old man that lived nearby and went to the same church as we did.  He was well known, or rather we made fun of him for his health practices.  He was always growing weird crap in his house, wheat sprouts, herbs and stuff I can't spell or pronounce.  Now granted this dude was old, and had lived a long life.  His grandson was in the same grade as me and we were pretty good friends.  One of the things this friend would say about his grandpa was that his health rule was crazy.  "If it tastes good, spit it out".  We all thought it was funny.

I have friends that are always trying to eat healthy.  I think that is a good thing.  One should be smart and attempt to do his best to eat healthy and exercise. And then I have a friend or two that are fanatical.  To me it is dumb.  They never deviate from eating unappealing food.  Not even one doughnut on Fridays at work.  

I told this one friend at work just this Friday that the apple (I like apples) she was eating was going to kill her, or the banana, or the carrot, or the tofu.  She had no idea what I was talking about.  If you think about it no matter what we eat we are going to die.  So in essence eating an apple will kill you too.  

Oh sure, there is the argument that eating healthy ALL the time will add a few years to your life.  But as my buddy at work explained, when would you want those years added to your life.  They will be at the end of your life, when you are senile, slobbering and spilling food when you eat, farting and not knowing it, and likely having to wear diapers so you don't crap yourself.  Wow, we all want more of those years.  

Then there are folks like my wife's grandparents.  They are well into their eighties.  They have always eaten pretty much what they want.  They eat fried food, and sweets as well as plenty of vegetables.  Granted, they take a few pills for various reasons, but for the most part they are very healthy and happy.  

Wouldn't it be more pleasant to live well and happy, eat what you want and then one day die of a massive coronary?  Over and done.  

El Toro Negro

Buzzzzzzzz

You already know that I have a good buddy that works with me at UPS that also is a "Water Man" in the Hallie Nation.  From time to time he does other work like laying water line for folks.  For several days I worked for him putting pipe together, running errands, and doing some digging (he sits on the backhoe or trencher watching).  While playing highway department worker, ie. I stood watching him dig with the backhoe, I felt a sharp pain under the sleeve of my shirt.  I pulled the sleeve up and a bee, or something, flew away, leaving a stinger pumping poison into my flesh.  Now normally, all the times I have been stung be a bee, I have never had any problems with a single bee sting, but this time it hurt like heck.  It left a welt with an outer redness and a scab.  My wife didn't give me much sympathy.  

El Toro Negro

New Ride

You already know that I have six kids and that the oldest is 14.  For the last eight years I have been driving a Chevy S-10 extended cab.  I put over 160k on that truck and it rarely gave me problems.  As life would have it my kids have grown in the last eight years.  They just didn't fit behind the seat anymore.  Therefore I bought a new truck Thursday.  I say new, but it is an 08 model.  I think it is going to be so much nicer.  I already like it much more than my S-10.  The crazy thing is that I found the amount that I paid for the S-10 in 01 and I paid about a grand more for this 08 Ford Crewcab.  Wow.  

El Toro Negro

Epiphany

I came to a realization today while we were cooking supper.  We had one of my favorites, twice baked potatoes.  It is hard to beat and I routinely eat way more than I should.  Then I lay around like a lump.

What came to my mind, or rather I finally put one and one (or two and two) together, is the importance of bacon in a civilized society.  One of the main and most important ingredients in the twice baked potatoes is bacon.  My family loves bacon.  Who doesn't, right?  

This recipe calls for cooked bacon to be broken up and placed in the cooked potatoes.  They are always wanting to eat the bacon before it is put in the dish.  As a result we usually cook a bit extra to snack on.  Tonight we had a situation where the snack bacon was not in sufficient quantity to allow all the kids to have a pre-supper bacon snack.  A fight ensued, which caused me to realize a few things.

Bacon might be the best food ever created for the use of man.  I mean, you can't go wrong when you add bacon to a dish, whatever it might be.  You can eat it alone, or with, well, anything.  Just look at what it does to lettuce and tomatoes.  You don't need a load of ranch dressing to make them palatable.  Just add bacon and put it on slightly toasted bread and you have something really special.  Something more than the sum of its parts.  

Think about how happy bacon makes you, or how unhappy you are when you don't have bacon.  My kids were upset just because there wasn't enough for them all to have more than one piece, and a fight broke out over who gets the most.  "You already had one.  He took my bacon.  Don't hit me, I didn't take your bacon."  And that is the toned down version of what happened.  

But if you think about it, that is the same thing that happens around the world.  Think about how up tight the vegetarians of the world are.  Maybe they wouldn't call everyone who eats bacon nasty names, or look down their noses at us.  Tofu bacon just isn't the same and doesn't satisfy the primal urge for the real thing.  I don't blame them, I guess, for being pissed at the world.  There is no substitute for sliced pork belly.  

And the religions of the world the prohibit eating pork.  How well would we get along if they could just eat some bacon.  No more IEDs, suicide killers, or terrorism at all.  Just eat a pound of bacon and all you feel like doing is laying on the couch and watching Idol or Housewives of Hollywood.  You leave everyone alone and everybody is happy.  

El Toro Negro