Caution!! Graphic images below!

We'll save those for last.

First, Carol took some more wildlife photos on the golf course, and I thought you'd enjoy those. Here we have three water turtles enjoying the May sunshine on a rock.



Here's anpther kind of turtle you don't see too often. It's a soft-shelled water turtle. Yes, its shell is actually soft and flexible!


Aren't they weird-looking creatures? Of course, they probably think the same thing about us!

This gal had dug a shallow pit for herself and was in the process of laying eggs:


No, we couldn't get an actual shot of the eggs without moving her, and we didn't want to disturb her so we left her alone.

This was a pretty fellow. A Tiger Swallowtail, our book tells us:


Finally, if you read my last post and the comments, you'll have noticed that Jan made a (somewhat snide) reference to the fact that I wear sandals and admit the same on my blog. She had the nerve to mention "manhood," as if the wearing of sandals somehow cast suspicion on that aspect of this person.

WELL!

Although she DID have the grace to state that my manhood was not actually in question, I feel that her comment demands a response.

1. I went to college during the "hippie" era of the 60s, and back then it was quite fashionable for "real men" to wear both beards AND sandals. I forbore those, however, because I found both uncomfortable at the time.

2. To me, my wife's opinion is the only one that matters. SHE has no issues with my "manhood" OR with my wearing sandals.

Here is a picture of my actual sandals on my actual feet. Some of my hairy legs are in view, so ladies, please try to control yourselves!


As you can tell, I wear golf shoes (with socks) and shorts when I play golf. Thus the "golfer's tan" on my lower legs.


Now I ask you: Do THOSE look like the legs and feet of a man who should be ashamed of his sandals?

Of course not.

Busy week

I know, I know -- you keep stopping by and there's nothing new posted. You wonder, "Where the heck is the Dule of Earle, and why doesn't he post some of his clever stuff?"

Or, maybe you think, "I hope he just stays gone this time!?"

Regardless, I'm still around. I was out of town at an industry HR conference for three days. I thought I might have a really good story (like Badabing's Badaboom often does) of meeting some eclectic people in a hotel bar. But that didn't happen. Perhaps that's because Carol came with me, and the two of us didn't visit the hotel bar. You think?

We did get to a couple of good restaurants. Carol spent one afternoon shopping for some sandals. Have you seen the sandals made by "Keen?" They are fantastic! Comfortable as slippers, and can be worn anywhere. I don't typically like sandals and have rarely worn any. But she was made aware of the Keen line by our younger daughter and bought a pair. She raved about them so much I had to try on some. They felt so good I bought a pair (last summer), wore them out of the store, and walked all over Chicago in them with never the first moment's discomfort. I'm wearing them as I type this!

Anyway, Carol found a store that sold them and bought herself a second pair. She bought a second pair for me too. I don't need them, not now at least. But we've both learned from experience that when you find a product that you REALLY like, chances are it won't be made or available in a few years. So now I'll have comfortable sandals for a LONG time.

When we came back home, an item I'd ordered from Amazon.com was waiting for me and I've been spending my time using it.

What is it?

One of these.

I have dozens of old vinyl LPs. Some are over 40 years old, and have songs on them that I grew up with. With this new purchase of mine, I can digitize each song as a .wav file, then convert that to MP3 format and burn them to CDs to preserve the music. My purchase even comes with editing software to let me edit out the pops and clicks and hiss of some of the old records. Cool, huh? Well, I think it's cool.

So, I've been busy.

But not too busy to play some golf. And for all of you many, many readers who are enthralled by my golf tales, here's something for you. It didn't happen to me, but to Carol!

She hit a booming drive on a short par 4 and had a wedge shot to the green. Unfortunately, she had tried to cut the corner on a dogleg and had some trees to negotiate. One of them, between her and the green, was a palm tree. Well, since a picture is worth at least 1,000 words, here it is:




So she rears back and swats her ball with the wedge. It goes up through the branches of one tree and hits this palm tree. Nobody sees it bounce off. We all approach and help her search for her ball in the rough around the tree. No luck.

On a hunch, Carol backs off a way and looks up at the tree. Right about here:



What do you think she sees? Lets zoom in close and take a look:

Shriek! It's a Shrike!

A loggerhead shrike to be precise.

Carol took our digital camera to the golf course today in hopes of finding something photo-worthy.

I think these qualify:

We think this might have been a baby or adolescent bird, from the touch of yellow at the corner of its bill that you can only see if you zoom way in.

Like this:

But we could be wrong.

(Shriek!)

Words

Words, words, words!
I’m so sick of words!
I get words all day, first from him now from you;
Is that all you blighters can do?

Recognize those lines? They were Eliza Doolittle’s complaint to Freddie in “My Fair Lady,” when that smitten young man tried to tell her of his undying ardor. The song was titled, “Show me.” Like the advice given to writers, time after time: Show, don’t tell!

My mother, a high school graduate who was plenty smart enough to go to college but never did (most girls didn’t back in the 1930s even if their families could afford it, which hers couldn’t) never took advanced English courses. But she knew that people formed an important first impression within minutes, based first on a stranger’s appearance; and second on his grammar and vocabulary.

As a youngster growing up I was never allowed to use improper grammar or pronunciation. If Mom was in doubt about a certain word or usage, we’d stop and look it up.

When my daughters were in their early teens, Carol and I fought battles with them about “goes.”

You know—the verb kids used to use before “like” became so pervasive?

Example: “I saw Paula this afternoon, and she goes, ‘Hi, Christina,’ and I go ‘Hi Paula,’ and she goes, ‘Have you seen Star Wars yet?’ and I go, ‘Only three times!’”

Carol and I would ask, “Go where?” The girls would roll their eyes and say (in total disgust), “Okay...(theatrical sigh)... I SAID!”

For the last ten years that same story would sound like this: “I saw Paula this afternoon, and she’s like, ‘Hi, Christina,’ and I’m like ‘Hi Paula,’ and she’s like, ‘Have you seen Spiderman 3 yet?’ and I’m like, ‘Only three times!’”

Anyway, based on all that, I cringe when I hear some words and syntax that are misused repeatedly. Here are a few:

How many times a day do you hear people say “Undoubtably?” (The word is “undoubtedly.”)

How about “perimeters” when they mean “parameters?”

Almost every TV golf announcer says, “There’s a ridge between he and the hole.” HE and the hole have a ridge between them, but that ridge is between the hole and HIM.

When you want to drill into brick you use a masonry bit, not a “masonary” bit. (Were you thinking of “missionary?”)

“I need to orientate the new employee.” No. The employee goes through “orientation.” In the process he hopefully becomes “oriented.” You orient the new employee, you don’t orientate him.

The plural of “matrix” is not “matrixes,” it’s “matrices.” Oh, and not every graph, chart or table is a “matrix” either.

Got some of your own? Want to share? Feel free!

I resist the urge to correct people at work. They wouldn’t appreciate it. Folks become embarrassed to learn they’ve been mispronouncing a word for years.

I would know. I used to say “peculiaralities” instead of “peculiarities.” I think I somehow combined “plurality” with “peculiar.” Carol laughed one day and asked, “WHAT did you just say?” I said it again, like I always had, and was mortified to learn I was incorrect.

She assured me that most likely nobody had noticed (or cared, if they DID notice.) I felt like taking Eliza’s advice,

Don’t talk of spring, don’t talk of fall,
DON’T TALK AT ALL! Show me!

Acclimation

No, that's not acclaim. Acclimation is the act of getting acclimated. As in, to a particular climate. Get it? Ac-climate.

I'm quite thoroughly acclimated to a closely controlled climate. One that keeps the temperature somewhere between 74 and 80 degrees fahrenheit, with a relative humidity down around 50-60% or so. That's the climate in my office and my home; the two places I spend the vast majority of my life.

Since I am thus acclimated, if my environment gets much above 80 degress and/or the humidity rises above about 70%, my body gets damp. Or wet. Depending.

I expect that, and dress accordingly on the golf course. But this afternoon at about 4:30 Carol and I went outside to hang some light plastic shutters. The sun was low in the sky, and this is just the first week in May for Pete's sake.

Nevertheless, dressed in shorts and a tee shirt, within 30 minutes I was soaked. It may not be summer yet in South Texas, but it's darn sure getting close to it! I don't think the temperatures were higher than the mid 80s, but the humidity HAD to be 120%, at least.

When we bought this house (white brick) the front-facing windows had black, wooden decorative shutters. Well, we've lived here over 20 years, and the original shutters were rotting and falling off. We pulled them down weeks ago.

Carol just read that and said, "No, it was months ago. Months and months ago. In fact, it was last summer!"

She's a stickler for accuracy.

Regardless, we were now going to replace them! I am proud of the fact that within one hour by the clock we had new shutters up on all four front windows.

(That makes me wonder: is one hour by the clock shorter or longer than one hour by the sun, or some other measure?)

I am NOT proud of the fact that two of the little plastic devices that secure the shutters to the brick were ruined in the effort, and now have to be replaced. But "stuff" happens, as they say.

Carol says they weren't lined up properly when I tried to tap them into place. I say, "stuff" happens!

To someone driving by or walking down the street I'm sure those missing fasteners cannot be noticed. Nor do they negatively impact the shutters' security to the wall.

But Carol knows they're missing. And until they are properly replaced, I will likely continue to sweat. Acclimated or not.

Cactus Flower

No, not the Goldie Hawn movie, although I'm reminded of that every time I see a blooming cactus.

No, it's the time of year where I live when the prickly pear cactus puts on a dazzling show of bright greenish-yellow flowers. Especially when water has been plentiful and the sun is getting hot. Yes, we've had a very wet Spring.

You've seen the yuccas in out back yard. Well, in our desire to landscape with (mostly) plants native to this area -- which therefore need little special care! -- we planted some spineless prickly pear out at the end of our driveway. Here's what greeted me when I arrived home from work today.


Well, I just had to grab the camera and get some shots of the individual blooms. Here are four, side-by-side, all growing on one pad:


And here's a close-up on one particluarly pretty bloom:

Want to take a peek down inside the flower? Here's what it looks like zoomed in close:


And finally, a shot of a bloom that seemed to have more petals than most and was almost ball-shaped:


Lest I bore you, I'll stop there.

The Giant Bubble Blowing Panda

Illustrated by RobotJam.
(Picture provided 5/04/07)

This morning RobotJam posted a comment on my "Rockin' and Rulin'" post of last Monday.

He asked,"Duke, are you doing requests now? I'd quite like a story about a giant bubble blowing panda."

He didn't say why. But then, that's RobotJam for you.

Well, okay. I thought I'd start in poem style and see what came out. An hour or so later, here's the result. Don't know if it's what he had in mind, but with RobotJam it's often hard to figure out what's in mind. If anything.

The Giant Bubble Blowing Panda

The giant bubble blowing panda
Danced across the stage
While children squealed with stark delight
—A trait that’s lost with age!

Their parents watched with thin-veiled glee
To see the youngsters’ joy.
T’was not a live bear, after all,
But just a puppet toy.

There was no need to fear this show
In circus midway tent.
The cost was but a penny, which
Was surely wisely spent.

Though blazing sun beat down outside,
The tent did shade the glare.
A welcome respite from the stagnant
Hot and dusty air.

Fair bubbles from the panda’s mouth
Did float above the crowd.
Then gently popped, their cooling mist
Descending like a cloud.

As each breathed in that vapor fine
He soon began to yawn.
Then hours later found himself
Awakening in the dawn.

The circus tents, the crowds and noise,
The midway on the lawn,
Along with each one’s purse or bag
Had disappeared. Long gone!

The parents and their children
Stumbled ‘round to find their own.
‘Mid hugs, they learned that each was well,
Then wended their way home.

But in the shire’s next county,
Near another little town
A circus now was setting up.
The people gathered round

To watch the bears and elephants,
The big top rising tall,
The many midway freaks and shows;
They’d want to see them all!

They marveled at the low, low cost.
How could this show make money?
When the giant bubble blowing panda
Tent cost just a penny!

So, Rob, there you have it. Care to illustrate this magnum opus?

"All My Children," chapter 2

I work in a small plant. "Small" is relative, I know. In this case it's defined as fewer than 120 employees.

Like a small town, little that's done by an employee goes unnoticed. Especially those things that involve at least one other employee.

Martha (not her real name) and John (not his, either) were both married, but not to each other. John began seeing Martha after work, and over time Martha decided to leave her husband and take up with John on a more permanent basis. Her divorce recently became final. John, who enjoyed having AND eating the proverbial cake, told Martha he too would divorce but never did.

Last weekend John and Martha had a less-than-amicable parting of the ways. Yesterday at work, little time elapsed before things came to a head.

First Martha was in my office telling me of being threatened over the weekend and subsequently calling the police. Nothing came of the threats, but she now felt vulnerable at the plant and wanted assurances that "we" would keep John away from her.

I asked John's supervisor to bring John to my office next to hear his version of events, and to guage his emotional state. But no; it seemed John had come to work on time, but had then alleged illness and gone home for the day.

This morning though, I had my time with John. He assured me that he was neither angry nor belligerent, and would be happy to have no contact with Martha at the plant for the next few weeks. I suggested to him the it would be a good idea to do just that. I was careful not to take sides, nor to assume that it wasn't really Martha who was playing the aggressor, trying to get John in trouble. You never know!

For now we seem to have a truce. At least, at the plant. What happens off the plant site is out of my control, and none of my business.

Martha wanted me to ask John for her house key, because, she said, "I know he won't give it to me." I did not accept that assignment, but rather advised her to change locks as soon as possible since there was no way of telling how many copies he might have made. I do not intend to be an intermediary nor an arbiter.

No, these employees are not (chronologically) high-school age; they are both in their 40s.

That fact did not stop me from wanting very badly to tell them both to "Grow up!"

Rockin' and Rulin'

I love this simple cartoon!

After all the comments about my last post, concerning whether I'm brave or stupid (and there's a FINE LINE there, sometimes!) and some of you saying "You rock," with reference to my being lucky enough to mess with the computer and live to tell about it, (deep breath...) made me think of it. So I Googled it, and hereby violate some copyright laws to show it to you.

I just wish I'd thought of it first.

Oh, and I think I've made a new blogger friend. Jan, over at "The Poodle (and dog) Blog" (who didn't say, but most likely found my blog through Schnoodlepooh) and I have been exchanging emails after her comment. She says that if I include a dog -- preferably a Poodle -- in my next novel, she will read the manuscript and write me a wonderful review.

Somehow I bet that wouldn't happen if the Poodle died needlessly, or was part of the bad guys' entourage, or wore a pink tam. . . Oh, wait! That's Killer Yapp from over at Miss Snark's blog. Forget the tam.

Obviously I'm rambling with no end in sight. Well, this site is called "Romantic Ramblings" for a reason, n'est-ce pas?

But I think there IS an end in sight.

And I think we've just reached it. Rock on, rule. Rule on, rock. Or vice versa.

"Brave and Talented?"

That's what Schnoodlepooh called me for "tweaking" my new computer. Carol, on the other hand, calls me "stupid!"

Gee! "Stupid?"

Candace, or Chenoah, thinks I should have bought a Mac and I wouldn't HAVE to tweak or learn a non-intuitive Operating System.

But I'm a bit hard-headed (Carol is nodding) and a tinkerer by nature.

Plus I love to save a buck. So I decided to install my OLD computer hard drives into my NEW computer, transfer any wanted files to the NEW hard drive, then re-format the old hard drives and use them for extra storage space.

I didn't really NEED the extra space, but why waste a good hard drive? Yeah, they were older technology, but hey. . . they WORK, right? So I opened the case, stuck them in there and wired them up.

(RobotJam warned me. He made it clear that like Pandora's box, once that new computer's case was opened all KINDS of evil would ensue. But I -- stupidly, says Carol -- pressed on.)

Ah, but one of them had been "partitioned" (using a program called "Partition Magic") and I needed to UN-partition it so I could access ALL that space. So I fired up "Partition Magic" (One of the programs from my OLD computer) and tried to do so. Unfortunately that program works fine with earlier versions of Windows but has compatibility issues with Vista. I tried anyway. It seemed like it was working. . . at first.

But it never quite managed to "UN-partition" the drive. So I gave up.

But then I had a new error message pop up everytime I started (booted) my new machine. Something about "XMNT2002 Program not found. . . skipping Autocheck."

I Googled that error message and found that it's a product of Partition Magic when the program doesn't work right. (As, when it's not compatible with the Operating System?)

Oh, but there's a fix! It requires going into the Registry Editor and changing your Registry entries.

But all of the "experts" tell you NOT to mess around in the Registry unless you REALLY know what you're doing, or you might permanently mess up your whole computer!

Did that stop ME?? NO!! I'm "brave and talented!" ...or is it Carol's version? (But first I got some advice and a script to follow from my I.T. -- Information Technology -- guys at work. Lucky for me, they DO really know what they're doing!)

And the fix they provided worked!

So I have now uninstalled the incompatible Partition Magic from my computer. Everything is rosy again, and the computer now works just like it's supposed to. It's fast, and becoming more intuitive every day (as I climb that learning curve that I wouldn't have to climb if I'd just bought a Mac. Right, Candace?)

But I think Carol's adjective may have been right (as usual) after all.

Sorry, Schnoodlepooh. (But thanks for the thought!)

Making progress!

With the new computer, that is.

I guess it's like a lot of things that seem different at first -- you just have to spend some time with them and before long you'll climb that learning curve and wonder why the thing was ever uncomfortable. I'm still climbing, and parts of it are still uncomfortable, but I think it's all going to be OK before too long.

I've been inside the case already. Decided to try just taking the twin hard drives I had in the old computer out and installing them in the new box. No, I don't need the storage, but with the drives installed I can transfer files to the new hard drive and keep all my old saved emails and other data. I can even run programs that were loaded on the old drives and so far they work just fine on the new machine -- even under the Vista OS.

I'm still getting my desktop icons set up and finding my way around Windows Explorer. With three hard drives, plus two cd/dvd drives. plus an external drive for backup and a USB flash drive I have lots of drive designations to keep up with. Oh, and don't forget I'm networked through the wireless router with Carol's laptop, so it shows up as a network drive on Win Explorer.

I'm still happy with my new purchase. Mainly because it's FAST! Well, compared to the old machine at least.

But it still doesn't write emails and book pages for me. Maybe someday I'll upgrade to that new wireless headset that picks up your thought patterns and types words on the screen and launches programs when you think about them.

What, you haven't heard about that?

I'm thinking about including it in my new thriller I'm working on. It may be SciFi today, but by the time the book is finished it'll probably be old news.

Since I'm making it up for now, I'll give it a very minimal learning curve. Totally intuitive! That'll put Vista out of favor in a hurry.

There it is, in all its glory. The big black box on the right is the new Dell. It came with the flat panel monitor on the left. I kept my old CRT monitor, and now have a twin-monitor setup.

You've gotta admit I did a pretty good job of hiding the wires.

I'm getting better with Vista. I'm sure it'll just take some time.

A precious commodity, though.

Follow-up

That phone call last Friday? I still think it was legit. The caller just sounded too genuine and sincere. But then, I can be gullible at times.

Our plant is way out in the country, but it IS on the same rural road as (and between) two other (larger) chemical processing plants. So if someone were making the rounds of industrial employers, it would make sense for them to drop in here and inquire.

It's happened before, but this caller -- from his accent, grammar, and overall presentation on the phone -- struck me as one who might be looking for unskilled or semi-skilled work at most.

I hate to stereotype people from their manner of speaking, but hey, remember "My Fair Lady?" Professor Heny Higgins says of Eliza Doolittle,

"It's 'Owww' and "Garn' that keep her in her place. Not her wretched clothes and dirty face!" Then he launches into the song, "Why can't the English teach their children how to speak?"

We all tend to form opinions of a persn's background and education (or lack thereof) from their grammar, vocabulary, and verbal presentation. To me, this man had the stereotypical poor black manner of speaking down pat. And I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that. But when you're looking for a job and calling on a company's Human Resources department, you'll do better to come across as, at least, literate.

Anyway, I DO have an excuse for not posting over the weekend. Or yesterday. And that excuse is...

My new Dell computer arrived on Friday afternoon. And yes, I'm STILL getting it set up! I'll get a picture of it up soon. But it's not the CPU and all the peripherals that are giving me trouble. It's the Vista operating system that's kicking my butt!

I've been around this block before. More than once. My first computer was an Apple IIe. I finally bought an "IBM compatible" machine when the first generation Pentium chips were new and hot. I've moved from Windows 3.1, to Windows 95, to Windows 98, to Windows XP. Yes, I skipped ME and Windows 2000. None of those gave me the fits that Vista is giving me.

I don't mind the new image-based "look and feel," but I can't find the stuff I'm used to working with on applications. I tried to set up Internet Explorer as one of my first tasks. I looked for the "Tools" menu. It isn't there. I right-clicked all over the window and used help until I finally figured out how to put those little "File Edit View Favorites Tools Help" menus up there. Things just aren't intuitive yet. We'll see if they get that way later.

Anyway, there's more to my story of angst. But that's enough for now. Stay tuned for a picture (and more angst) soon.

I get phone calls...

Like the one this afternoon. I was in my Human Resources Manager’s office, working on an email to send out to all employees announcing our first quarter’s contribution to our new profit sharing program.

When the phone rang, caller I.D. showed the number in our Admin Building lobby.

I answered, “John Earle.”

A man’s voice stammered slightly, “Uh, yessir. Uh...God bless you... praise the Lord. Uh...do y’all hire women?”

I couldn’t believe that’s what he really said. I said, “I’m sorry, I didn’t understand. What did you ask?”

“Do. . . y’all. . . hire. . . women?” (Spoken slowly, with emphasis on the last word.)

I actually laughed out loud. “Do we hire women?”

The caller said, “Yes sir.”

I laughed again and said in what I hoped was a friendly, man-to-man tone, “In today’s world, do you know how much trouble I’d be in if I said no?”

At that point he laughed as well. “Yeah, I guess that’s so. Mmm Hmm. Well, y’see, I’s looking for a job for my wife.” He sounded like a character out of Uncle Remus.

I almost asked what her skills were, but quickly decided I didn’t want to go there.

So I explained that my plant currently had four job openings, all of which were listed with the local office of the Texas Workforce Commission. I told him they were: two engineering jobs, and two skilled technician positions.

Not easily dissuaded, he then asked, “Well, do y’all hire men? My brother, he’s lookin’ fer a job too.”

I gave him the number for the Workforce office, and another for a local firm that hires laborers by the week. I told him he could use our phone right there in the lobby if he wanted. Just dial 9 for an outside line.

A bit later I walked past the lobby and looked through the glass door. The room was empty.

I wish him well. And his wife and brother, too. Hopefully he’ll find something for them, because the world can be a cold, dark place if you’ve little money and no job.

But I think that’s the first time in well over 20 years I’ve been asked if we hired women.

For a second I wondered if the call had come from 70 years ago.

The theme from The Twilight Zone began to play in my mind.

Then my phone rang again, and it was Carol. The room brightened. I smiled. Everything was right again.

Flexible...WHAT?

One of the writers on my blogroll with talents I would love to emulate (Kirsten Mortensen) posted a series on her blog concerning Health Care FSAs (Flexible Spending Accounts). She initially had a few misconceptions about them, but through three posts tells her story quite well. Then she emailed me to ask for my "take" on the subject.

Well, I AM a Human Resources Manager, after all!

You might want to read her posts first, staring with the one titled, "If it smells like a scam" and working up from there. After she read my emailed reply, she suggested I post it here. As one who is always open to suggestions, I thought, "Why not?"

Here 'tis:

Kirsten,

At first I wasn't sure if you were talking about Health Care Savings Accounts (HSAs, which I know little/nothing about) or employers' Flexible Spending Accounts, a.k.a. "Health Care Reimbursement Accounts." It now appears you were talking about the latter.

My company through its last 3 owners has offered these FSAs. That's been over a period of 8-10 years. I've signed up for them each year, and each year I INCREASE the amount I set aside. For 2007 it's up to $2,000.

Why so much? Well, you wrote about having to “estimate or guess” how much your family will spend in un-reimbursed health care expenses. In some cases, no guessing is needed. I know how much my plan will pay for my (and Carol's) "maintenance" medication -- those are the pills we take every day. We pay $80 for a 90-day supply of each of three medications. That's $240, four times a year.

Co-pays for regularly scheduled visits will eat up another $100-$200 a year. Dental work has been costly in the past, but I don't project any of that this year. The final kicker is vision. We each see the optometrist annually and usually have to get a new prescription for our specs. My plan pays for some of that, but not all. Anyway, we have no trouble claiming the remainder on over-the-counter pills and sundries. But if, near the end of the year, we still have several hundred left over that we might otherwise forfeit... We simply order a pair of prescription single-vision glasses (Transitions!) for golf.

Bottom line: I have NEVER forfeited a penny, and I'm increasing my purchasing power by whatever my income tax marginal rate is (25%?) Now, if I only spent that last few hundred $$ because I'd otherwise lose it, that's false savings. I realize that. But that rarely happens.

For people on blood pressure medication or other maintenance meds, the program really does offer some savings. I (as H.R. Manager) often advise employees who DO know that their planned treatment during the year will cost them X dollars out of pocket, to set up a FSA for THAT AMOUNT (only!) to derive the tax savings.

As you point out, it's ludicrous to bet on whether or not Junior will break his leg this year.

(Time Passes)

Okay, now I've read your NEXT two posts in which you correctly point out that the employer keeps the money you forfeit. But Kirsten! Take my own example. If I set aside $2000, I derive a tax savings of $500. SO WHAT if I forfeit $100 through poor planning? I'm still money ahead.

Absolutely; the person who sets aside $500-$1000 and forfeits $100 or more is not better off with this plan. But in my role as HR manager I'm only recommending this FSA to a small percentage of our employees -- the ones who KNOW what they're going to spend out-of pocket and are looking for some relief. Those who HAVE no known, recurring expenses I counsel to opt out.

Another prime example is orthodontics. Typically a set of braces and all the adjustments and treatments will set back a parent $3000-$5000 (or higher). My plant's dental plan only reimburses 80% up to a maximum of $1000. If a parent KNOWS what the treatment will cost, and what the plan will reimburse, they're losing out if they DON'T set aside at least some of the difference in a FSA.

We also send out reminders to all those who do have FSAs each year. In July (mid year), October, and mid-December we remind people if they still have an unclaimed balance so they won't forfeit any. My boss uses it. Our Finance Manager uses it. Hell, our company president uses it. These are smart, financially savvy people.

You just have to understand what your KNOWN expenses are going to be (or get pretty close, which isn't that hard), know what your insurance plan will pay, and keep track.

As you point out, betting on what your UNKNOWN expenses might be, is... well, for lack of a more politically correct term... stupid.

In admiration of your talent,

John

Still going.

Like the Energizer Bunny, my old desktop computer is cranking along. Beating its little drum and spinning around as it treks down the road.

My replacement machine from Dell doesn't even ship until April 30, and then it will take another week to get here, likely. Althought the company headquarters is just up the road a piece in Round Rock, the computer is probably being assembled in Sri Lanka. Or maybe Manilla.

But meanwhile the warning signals emanating from the old beast have been recognized, and I think its days are numbered. Perhaps in the single digits! But hopefullyI'll get another two weeks out of it.

I said earlier I was taking this death-watch one day at a time, but now I fear it may be down to one keystroke or mouse click at a time. At least the taxes are done, the files are all backed up, and most other preparations for the imminent demise are complete.

Now, if I just don't get hit with a copyright infringement suit for that picture above...

A repeat

Last night I turned off my suspect computer. After it had finished it's weekly virus scan, and a hard-drive defrag.

I mean, why not? I had turned it off over the weekend and it came back on when I pushed its little button. No reason to think it might stay comatose like after the lightning storm, right? I mean, that's old news.

Besides, I've already ordered my new Dell machine. So if this old one gets cranky again, I'll just have to wait a week or two and I'm back in business.

So I turned it off.

This afternoon, after arriving home from work, I pushed its little button and guess what happened? Right! Nothing.

I spoke a few choice words to it, and pushed its button again. Same result.

My words became a steady stream. I removed the side panel to make sure the little green LED was glowing. Sure enough, it was. AHA!! Snoozing again!

I shook the case, pushed the "on" button repeatedly, and incanted additional invective. (Say, I ought to put those words in a poem... like "paregoric" and "anagesic.")

I pulled the plug, cycled other switches, and wiggled various wires and ribbon cables. Nada.

So I walked away. In fact, I got into my car and ran an errand. About 15 minutes later the machine remained just as I'd left it (imagine that!), so just on a whim I pushed its little button again.

LIFE! Its fans began turning, its hard drive commenced clicking, and it booted up Windows! I'm typing this post on it, so if the post is published and you're reading this, it stayed alive long enough for me to do that much, at least.

And no, I don't think I'll be turning it off again any time soon. Not until the new machine is up and running, at least. What is the mantra? Oh yes, "One day at a time."

Yucca prime time

Here are all the yuccas in pretty-much full bloom.

I say "pretty-much" because although the very top blossoms have not yet opened, the bottom ones are just about ready to start dropping off.

They're very pretty in their stark white-green contrast to the plant's leaves. It's a pity they don't last longer. Within a week there will only be a few white blossoms at the very top, with the rest of the bloom looking dead and brown.

After the last of the blossoms falls off, the brown stalk will remain for months unless someone cuts it off.

Carol always does.

IT LIVES!!

Well, it IS Easter after all.

Carol pushed the "on" button this morning and the computer booted up as if it had never had a problem in its "life." Resurrection!

But meanwhile, at work, I logged into the Dell web site hoping to find some kind of discount offer or special sale or coupons for $$ off the system I had put in my wish list. Alas; nothing.

But I noticed a little blurb offering a live "chat" with a Dell sales professional if I had any questions. I clicked the link and entered my question: "Hello. Are you able to talk about any possible upcoming specials or sales for the system I have in my wish list?"

My sales professional (named Syed) asked for my email address so he could access my wish list and see what was there. I typed it and waited.

His response was simply, "I can offer you $100 off if you order it now."

I thought, gee, THAT was quick! I wonder how much MORE I might be able to get!!

I replied, "Well, thanks. But I was hoping to get the total purchase price down to... (I put in a price about $400 below the list price.)"

He came back with, "I'm sorry. I can't discount the system that much."

Disappointed, I began to type, "Well, how about... ($200 below list)." But before I had finished he came back with an offer to "throw in" for only $100 MORE the 3-year warranty priced at $200.

I thanked him, but told him no. I was trying to reduce my total out-of-pocket cost. I had already selected the standard 0ne-year warranty for that reason. Then I asked, "Is there any way to get the price any lower?"

He typed, "I can discount the system by $150. That's the limit."

I thought about it. I typed, "How about free shipping?"

He said, "OK."

I typed, "Let's do it!"

He wrote up the order and emailed it to me, but said his manager wanted to call me. I said that was fine and gave him my work phone number.

Well guess what the manager wanted to do?

He offered me the FOUR-year, IN-HOME warranty for FREE if I'd pay the original list price!

I explained (politely) that in my experience, most electronic components that fail do so in the first 90 days of operations. If they last a year, they almost always keep running for MANY years. (I did NOT mention or give ANY credence to the "C" word that all of you are familiar with!) So, thank you, but that 4-year warranty does not have any perceived value to me. I just want the one-year regular warranty and the lowest price I can get.

He gave up and sold me the system for $150 off list price.

Now, could I have gotten in cheaper? Maybe. But I doubt it.

Did I screw up by NOT taking the 4-year in-home warranty? (Under that contract, if your system doesn't work right Dell will send a technician to you home the next day to fix it!) Well, I guess only time will tell.

But I learned that you can bargain with Dell and get a better price if you just ask for one! And I also learned that their pricey 4-year in home warranty is available for NO CHARGE if you just hold out for it!

So I got what I wanted, saved $150, and got free shipping ($35 value).

Meanwhile, my old computer is still running just fine. But I'm going to turn it off before I go to bed tonight. We're forecast to have a line of possibly severe thunderstorms move through here by morning, and I don't want a repeat of the "big sleep" I sweated through last time.

Taxes, computer problems, etc.

Taxes: It's income tax time in the good ol' USA. Once a year (or four times a year if you're lucky enough to have to file quarterly estimates and payments) we pay our homage and our money to Uncle Sam. It's all a part of citizenship in this great land.

At those times we try not to think of all the waste that goes on, paid for with our money. Or the expenditures we don't personally approve of, paid for with our money. Or the fees we have to pay for either: 1) a professional tax preparer to fill out our forms and render unto Caesar, or 2) tax preparation software that does the job cheaper but with some investment of our time to enter all the data needed.

I've always filled out my own tax forms, and once my daughters began earning money and paying taxes I offered to do theirs as well. As I reported here earlier, this year I opted to buy a copy of Turbo Tax and use it for the three family returns.

When my desktop computer went to sleep and wouldn't wake up I was concerned. Why? Because I had used it and the Turbo Tax software to prepare almost all of my tax return. I was just waiting for one more piece of information to complete the (lengthy) process.

I feared that the computer was fried, and I would have to load the software onto Carol's laptop machine and start over from scratch.

When it roused itself all by itself, I was delighted. But I didn't want to turn it off or reboot it in fear that it might never show further signs of life. Kind of like those movies, in which the star is dying but his/her companions keep saying, "Don't fall asleep! Stay awake! Stay with me!"

Well, I have now finished the tax return and filed it. Tonight I will turn off the compbuter, and tomorrow I'll learn if it will ever awaken again.

(Meanwhile I've speced out a great new desktop powerhouse from Dell, and I'm almost hoping this computer does NOT wake up so I'll have the perfect excuse to buy a new one!)

In the midst of all this activity at home, I've been in the middle of our annual benefits renewal at work. Plus we're interviewing for two engineers and a couple of technician openings. Plus...well, you don't want to hear about all my boring work stories.

Thus I have not been posting here at "Romantic Ramblings." I've not been reading your blogs and commenting. I've just been otherwise occupied.

I WILL let you know the status of this computer. At some point.

Have a great weekend, all!

A great weekend for camping!

Well, Friday was a great day for it.

We went to Kerrville, Texas. That's about one hour northwest of San Antonio on I-10.

Friday was clear with temps in the 60s to low 70s. Really nice golf weather! But that night the front blew through, and Saturday's temperature never rose out of the 30s. Oh, and it rained all day as well. No more golf for us! (I know, we're wimps. What can I say?)

By late Saturday afternoon we had several spells of sleet. The forecast was for snow that night with up to 3 inches of accumulation!

That prognostication turned out to be hype. But here's what we woke up to on Easter Sunday morning:


That's the windshield of the pickup truck parked near our camper.

Once we broke camp, stowed everything in our van, hitched up the trailer and hit the road, this is what we saw looking out the front windshield:


Like I said; we're wimps. We couldn't wait for the van's heater to start blowing hot air out the vents so we could get some feeling back in our hands.

Yucca Progress

Just for Easter, here are the yucca blooms the day before Good Friday.

From left to right you have the triple whammy, size matters, and double whammy. Scroll down to earlier posts on this topic for explanations of the names, if desired.

Triple whammy on the left and size matters on the right, from a different angle. These are the most developed blooms of the group.

The white individual flowers open starting at the bottom of the bloom. By the time the top flowers are open, the bottom ones have begun to fall off. The whole show, from the first bottom flower opening to the last top one turning brown and dropping off is about three weeks.

They're sure pretty after about one week, though!

(No golf today. Where we're staying in Kerrville the high is in the mid 30s today with rain and sleet. Yeah, we're wimps!)

Out of Town

Have a great Easer weekend, everyone. (That's an order!)

Carol and I have taken our camper to a campground somewhere and plan to just relax and play some golf -- weather permitting. If the forecasters are right, we MAY get to play tomorrow (Good Friday), but the rest of the weekend is supposed to be cold and rainy.

I have some more yucca shots for you, and if we don't golf I'll try to post them.

Bye.

(As you were!)

No multiple entendres this time

Bloomin' plants!

(HA! Found my meds!)

The "double whammy."


The "size matters" duo.






And the "tripple whammy."

Looks like they're getting all prettied up for Easter weekend.

I'll show you the full blooms in a few days.

(And no more politically incorrect posts for a while.)

(Uh, maybe!)

An Inconvenient UNtruth?

Wow.

This is going to get me in trouble. I know that, but I’m going ahead. Never stopped me before, right? (Sigh.)

For years I have been a skeptic about the whole issue of global warming being the result of man’s activity. In fact, I’ve pooh-poohed the idea to whoever would listen (not many). My skepticism has been based more on what seemed to me to be inconsistencies within the “evidence” being presented, than on any alternative theory as to the cause. I would point to the hard evidence that the planet has gone through many dramatic climate changes over the eons with no help from man. Earth has seen long ice ages, and periods when the arctic regions were sub-tropical.

But as the weight of scientific opinion has moved further and further toward blaming man-produced CO2 as the culprit, I was wavering. What I lacked was a sound, science-based reason for the (clearly factual, albeit far from catastrophic!) temperature rise we’re seeing, other than man-produced “greenhouse gasses.”

Was it the sun? Was geothermal energy warming the ocean and the ocean warming the atmosphere, instead of the other way around?

Well, I now have my answer!

That answer is simple, meets the common sense test, and (more important to me, of course) it fits my view of mankind’s relative insignificance in affecting immense things; like the way our solar system works. It also explains why “everybody” has jumped on the man-made gasses bandwagon. Finally, it’s presented by credentialed scientific authorities using hard scientific data, not by a bunch of left-field crackpot theorists. Let's face it: the man-made-greemhouse-gasses bunch are not crackpots either! They include a bunch of credentialed scientific authorities.

If you’re comfortable in your view that Al Gore and the IPCC scientists are right, please ignore the links below. If you are willing to at lease consider an alternative view of things, then take a look.

Article

Documentary Film (YouTube)

Yes, I know. This is not a particularly Romantic Rambling. I should stick to bird pictures and humor. If I could just find my meds, I might be all right again by tomorrow.

A sleeper?

Last night a slow-moving line of heavy thunderstorms moved across my part of South Texas. I was shaken out of a fitful, dreaming sleep by the crash of thunder from somewhere nearby. I glanced at the bedside clock. 5:59 a.m. Lightning flickered almost continuously, and I thought about my desktop computer in the next room.

I had left it on overnight, as I customarily do. The rumbles and booms were increasing in both frequency and volume, so I got up and padded barefoot down the hall to protect my delicate machine.

The power had apparently already been off, at least momentarily. The computer had one light on, but was not responsive to mouse movement or taps on the keyboard. I reached behind the metal case, flipped off the power switch and unplugged the cord from the wall.

A couple of hours later the storms had passed and I plugged the cord back in and flipped on the switch. Nothing.

For the NEXT couple of hours I tried everything I could think of to get the computer to start up. I checked that the power cord had 117 volts at the point where it connected to the computer. I took off the front and side panels and looked in vain for any breaker or reset button on or around the power supply inside the case. I recycled the power switch umpteen times, and kept pressing the little “start” button on the front.

The only indication of life was a tiny green LED on the motherboard, labeled with a microscopic “CR6F1.” A trip through the manual revealed that when that particular light was on, the computer was in “sleep” mode. It would appear to be off, but there WAS current to the memory modules and the PCI bus connectors.

Ha! Okay then! Right! There you are!

(Huh?)

I poked around. I prodded. I wiggled all manner of wires and cables and connections. I considered lighting a candle and chanting, “O wake, O wake, O computer,” but forbore.

I turned my back on the machine, leaving it looking naked and skeletal; half-disassembled on the desktop with most of the wires and cables unplugged from the back. Only the power cord, monitor cable, and parallel printer cable remained attached.

I called my I.T. (Information Technology) guys from work to ask their thoughts. Their succinct opinion was: it’s fried.

I turned to Carol’s laptop and navigated to the Dell web site to spec out my new machine, mentally relegating this old one to a recycle container AFTER I removed the hard drives with all my precious data. And yes, I had backed up most of that data on an EXTERNAL hard drive I bought last year for just that purpose. Because "stuff" happens!

I spent roughly 30 minutes alternating between lust for Dell’s “Ultimate Power and Gaming Machine,” and (later) acceptance of their more practical (cheaper) less-than-ultimate-but-still-not-bad desktop model.

I put my choices in a wish list, and yielded the laptop to Carol. Already missing my morning fix of emails and blogs, I trudged off to do something else for a while. Outside activities were precluded by the wet conditions – we had standing water all around, having had over 4 inches of rain during the night – so I picked up a book I’m in the middle of and read.

With no warning, and for absolutely no discernible reason, my computer in the other room sprang to life! Nobody touched it. There had been no input of any kind (all cables were still disconnected except the power cord). Its cooling fans just started whirring and it booted up. All by itself.

I heard the noise and went to see. The machine was happily running, hard drive clicking away like a clock on steroids. I plugged in the monitor's cable and pushed its power button. The screen lit up in time for me to see my “open on Windows startup” applications come online.

Carol and I looked at each other, mouths agape. She offered, “I guess it knew you were going to replace it, so it decided to run a while longer after all.”

I don’t know. It would be easy for me to just blame the “C” word and see what THAT stirs up. But I thought back to that little green LED, and I wonder if maybe the machine was, simply, asleep. It may have just decided to take a little nap. And when it was sufficiently rested, it awoke.

Regardless, it continues to run and I am typing this post on it. But I think I will leave that nice, new, fully spec-ed out Dell machine in my wish list for a week or two. Lest this older model tends to become complacent again... or just terminally tired. (decides to take the long sleep.)

My excuses

Busy at work, and busy at home.

The yuccas aren't quite ready for the next round of photos yet. Soon, though.

Carol's been doing spring projects and hasn't been using the camera.

I'm lazy.

Yeah, basically that's why I haven't been posting much anything for the last few days.

Most of those excuses will expire eventually.
The last one, though, is in doubt. Serious doubt!

No doubt about it.

Yuccas, updated

Here we have the original "Double Whammy" stalks, five days after the last photo. These are growing up nicely, but haven't spread out much yet.







In contrast, here is the original "Triple Whammy" plant with all three blooms spreading out in fine fashion and preparing to put out actual flowers.

Same "Triple Whammy plant but from a different angle.

Finally, here's the "Size Matters" duo. No longer resembling asparagus, they are standing straight and tall, ready to burst forth with white, uh... blossoms.

(More to come.)

A bit of doggerel

I thought I’d sit and write my post—
Might even take the time,
To type it out in metered lines
And try to make them rhyme.

I sometimes have good luck with this,
Sometimes it turns out well.
But then again, at other times,
You couldn’t even tell—

I’d tried to make it rhyme, because
The meter was so force-ed,
It sounded more like something that
A donkey, or a horse-said.

But not today! No, THIS will be
A poem for the ages.
I feel a groove. I think I might
Go on and on for pages!

My muse is here to spur me on.
I feel her gentle urging,
Like paregoric given to
A child, who’s sick and purging.

You see? With words and rhyme like that,
This simple little poem,
Might turn into an epic, huge,
That fills a mighty tome.

(But Carol read that verse above,
And said it made her seasick!
Her head began to throb with pain,
She took an analgesic.)

I guess my rhymes don’t always please
The folks who view their splendor.
These words might make some turn to drink,
And send them on a bender.

But though some see these lines as dreck,
(They love to laugh and mock)
To write them helps a hack like me
Get past my “Blogger’s Block!”


(I could have continued, but ran out of time. And I STILL don’t have any pictures to share. Won’t be long, though...)

Birds? Captions?

Since I am apparently somewhat renowned for writing captions to photos of birds, and since I am, sadly, lacking any new bird photographs because Carol FORGOT to take the camera to the golf course today—a fact that she now blames ME for (I mean, isn't THAT amazing, that she would blame ME for failing to remind HER to take the camera?), in spite of the fact that for the roughly thirty minutes we spent getting ready to play golf, including: preparing our lunch and our ice water, changing clothes, and getting all the gear in the car—when during that entire time she was relating to me a story—and I didn't DARE to interrupt her, break her train of thought as an interruption would certainly have done—in spite of ALL THAT she still thinks I was responsible for the lack of bird pictures. (DEEP breath!)

Because of all of the above, I have chosen to shamelessly plagiarize the snippet below from the Pointmeister's blog.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This Is AMAZING!!!

Until now I never fully understood how to tell the difference between male and female birds.

I always thought it had to be determined surgically.

Until now.

Which of the two birds is a female? Below are two birds; study them closely... See if you can spot which of the two is the female. It can be done. Even by one with limited bird watching skills.

(If I wasn't already in trouble with Carol for forgetting to remind her, I am NOW!)

A challenge!

Karyn doesn't think I can write captions for pictures of yucca (NOT "yucky!") blooms.

We'll just see about that. First I have to get the pictures, though, and all we have so far is the beginnings of the bloom stalks protruding above the yucca leaves like... Well, like the yucca plant has become...uh... aroused.

Hey, guys! It's spring. Time to start thinking about reproducing, y'know?
After that long winter layoff, I'm ready to give it a DOUBLE-whammy!

Double whammy? With THOSE little stalks? HA!

You guys got nothin' on ME! I'm gonna give it a TRIPLE-whammy!

Triple...double...who cares? Everybody knows: SIZE MATTERS!

Yuccas, and my golf buddy

Stand by for some yucca bloom pictures. We've had lots of rain and the air is warm. Our four yuccas in the patio/swimming pool area are all putting up multiple bloom stalks.

The back yard promises to be picturesque this spring.

Maybe I can talk Carol into getting some more good shots of birds so I can write captions. Since both of you seem to appreciate those, it's the least I can do.

We'll see.

Meanwhile, I'll share with you something I wrote last year as an entry to a golf magazine's contest. The idea was to describe "your golf buddy" in 200 words or less. This was my attempt:

My Golf Buddy

The best thing I ever did was marry her. Smartest thing I’ve done since then was giving her six golf lessons one year for Christmas. She’d always said it looked like a dumb game. “Chasing a little white ball...” etc.

Skeptical and a little apprehensive, she tried the lessons. By the end of the second one she was hooked. Unlike me, she learned proper techniques and habits from the start and thus has developed into a much better golfer than I am.

Now on Saturdays it’s, “What time are we going to the course today?” instead of, “You’re golfing AGAIN!?” Same on Sundays. Sometimes evenings after work for nine holes.

Our best golf trip? Well... Kapalua? Paradise! The Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail in Alabama? Wonderful! Scottsdale? Fantastic! But... maybe... it was that round at our home course when she watched me break 80 (just that once!) with a birdie on the 18th hole.

Yeah, she still shoots lower than me most rounds. And yeah, guys we get paired with sometimes ask me with a snicker, “Does your husband play?”

I just retort, “No, but I get to sleep with my golf buddy. Do you?”

(No, it didn't win a prize. I think it got a few snickers, though.)

Did we have Pfun?

In Pflugerville?

In a word, yes. We also had pfun getting there. (Btw, "pfun" is pronounced "puh-fun," or "puffun" with the accent on the second syllable. That's for you purists out there.)

Carol was navigating while I drove. She had all the high-tech tools at her disposal: laptop computer plugged into the car's electrical system for power, a GPS antenna, and a copy of Microsoft MapPoint installed. The problem wasn't in not knowing where we were, but rather in thinking we knew where we were going.

You see, our first stop was to be at the Golfsmith store on the north side of Austin. It is just off I-35, about two miles north of a big spaghetti-bowl intersection of I-35 and US 183. Then we were to proceed to Pflugerville, which is east of Round Rock. That's about 8 miles farther north up I-35, and then turn east at another big spaghetti-bowl intersection at I-35 and Texas Toll 45.

Now Carol and I have become basic rural or small town Texans, to whom all of those big spaghetti-bowl intersections look pretty much alike. Carol, in planning our route and visualizing our destination, was directing me to the Pflugerville area first, thinking that was the same BS-BI (I'm getting tired ot typing out that whole phrase, so I'll abbreviate) as the one near Golfsmith.

From Victoria we headed north up US 77 toward Hallettsville. About half way to Hallettsville (y'know, that sounds like a good title for a book or movie... "Half Way to Hallettsville." ... Um, nah), I asked if we weren't going a bit out of our way? Carol gave me one of those looks and said, "No."

I thought about it a bit more and ventured again, "But the toll road is going to bring us out onto I-35 at Round Rock, isn't it? And that's well north of Golfsmith. I think..."

With a bit of a huff she went to the computer. Understanding dawned. She realized she had confused the two BS-BIs; actually thinking they were one and the same.

For the next 20 miles we discussed our options. They were many. Continue north to LaGrange, turn west on Texas 71 through Bastrop to Austin. Go even farther north to Giddings, turn west on US 290 to Austin. Or, at Hallettsville (just ahead now), turn northwest on Alt. 90, proceed through Yoakum to Gonzales, pick up US 183 and follow it to that BS-BI near Golfsmith.

She left the decision to me. I opted for the last choice above, simply because I hadn't been through Yoakum for years and had forgotten what that route looked like.

It worked out OK. The Texas wildflowers are beginning to bloom along the roadways, and it was a pretty day for a drive.

We arrived, shopped, had lunch, played golf, and made it back all in one piece. Well, not all of my golf balls made it back; a few of them seemed to feel the need to go swimming. But the new club is good, and RobotJam (comments on my last post) gave me some new excuses to use, which I appreciate. . . And will have many occasions to use, I fear.

So yes, pfun was had by all.

Winter?

The radio newscaster this morning (during my morning commute) mentioned that winter was still alive and well in the Northeast, with wet heavy snow expected as far south as Maryland.

Here in my neighborhood in South Texas, spring has definitely sprung. The ash trees are in full leaf, the cottonwoods are turning green, and the redbuds are glorious!

We're off to Austin tomorrow to shop at the Golfsmith super center headquarters location, and maybe play a round of golf in Pflugerville.

What's Pflugerville, you ask? It's a town just east of Austin. And yes, that's really how the name of the town is spelled. Pronounce it? Well, the "P" is silent. In fact, there used to be a billboard on Interstate 35 near Austin that said, "Have Pfun in Pflugerville!"

I thought it was cute, but my daughter who used to live near Austin said it drove her crazy. Whatever.

What are we shopping for at Golfsmith? Oh, I need a new 3-wood; the old one is developing cracks in the graphite shaft. I bought it used a long time ago anyway. I could always replace the shaft, but I'm lusting for a new model.

Trouble is, I've been using the old, cracked shaft as an excuse for bad shots. But once I get the new one, my only excuse will be that I'm not used to it yet. That will only stand up for a few weeks, if at all, and then I'm back to just saying the bad shots are due to a low skill level.

--Sigh--

Oh, Carol wants to look at golf bags since the handle is literally falling off of hers.

Then on Sunday I'll probably do yard work, since the grass and weeds are growing apace. Why no golf on Sunday? Well, recent heavy rains have caused the Guadalupe river to rise, and part of our Riverside Golf Course is liable to be under water. It'll be soggy at best.

A good day for yard work. Spring having sprung, and all.

30,000 hits?

Sounds like a lot.

But compared to some it's not that many.

Still, I appreciate the friends I've made and the folks who drop by and comment.

(Clink!) Here's to 30,000 more!

I'm feeling juvenile, so...

1) King Ozymandias of Assyria was running low on cash after years of war with the Hittites. His last great possession was the Star of the Euphrates , the most valuable diamond in the ancient world. Desperate, he went to Croesus, the pawnbroker, to ask for a loan. Croesus said, "I'll give you 100,000 dinars for it." "But I paid a million dinars for it," the King protested. "Don't you know who I am? I am the king." Croesus replied, "When you wish to pawn a Star, makes no difference who you are."

2) Evidence has been found that William Tell and his family were avid bowlers. However, all the Swiss league records were unfortunately destroyed in a fire, and we'll never know for whom the Tells bowled.

3) A man rushed into a busy doctor's office and shouted "Doctor! I think I'm shrinking!" The doctor calmly responded, "Now, settle down. You'll just have to be a little patient."

4) A marine biologist developed a race of genetically engineered dolphins that could live forever if they were fed a steady diet of seagulls. One day, his supply of the birds ran out so he had to go out and trap some more. On the way back, he spied two lions asleep on the road. Afraid to wake them, he gingerly stepped over them. Immediately, he was arrested and charged with transporting gulls across sedate lions for immortal porpoises.

5) Back in the 1800s the Tates Watch Company of Massachusetts wanted to produce other products and, since they already made the cases for watches, they used them to produce compasses. The new compasses were so bad that people often ended up in Canada or Mexico rather than California . This, of course, is the origin of the expression, "He who has a Tates is lost."

6) A thief broke into the local police station and stole all the toilets and urinals, leaving no clues. A spokesperson was quoted as saying, "We have absolutely nothing to go on."

7) An Indian chief was feeling very sick, so he summoned the medicine man. After a brief examination, the medicine man took out a long, thin strip of elk rawhide and gave it to the chief, telling him to bite off, chew, and swallow one inch of the leather every day. After a month, the medicine man returned to see how the chief was feeling. The chief shrugged and said, "The thong is ended, but the malady lingers on."

8) A famous Viking explorer returned home from a voyage and found his name missing from the town register. His wife insisted on complaining to the local civic official who apologized profusely saying, "I must have taken Leif off my census."

9) There were three Indian squaws. One slept on a deer skin, one slept on an elk skin, and the third slept on a hippopotamus skin. All three became pregnant, and the first two each had a baby boy. The one who slept on the hippopotamus skin had twin boys. This goes to prove that the squaw of the hippopotamus is equal to the sons of the squaws of the other two hides.

10) A skeptical anthropologist was cataloging South American folk remedies with the assistance of a tribal brujo who indicated that the leaves of a particular fern were a sure cure for any case of constipation. When the anthropologist expressed his doubts, the brujo looked him in the eye and said, "Let me tell you, with fronds like these, who needs enemas?"

(Sorry.)

OH! And for those of you who commented that you did NOT think I was never wrong (... how many double negatives does it take to make a positive?), thank you. I feel great relief. The burden of a reputation for continuous, inerrancy was getting to be a strain. (Uh huh. Believe THAT one too!)

A Monopod

Okay, is WASN'T Jonathan Swift in Gulliver's Travels who wrote of the Monopods. My daughter Christina corrected me. The most notable reference to the legend was from C.S. Lewis in Voyage of the Dawn Treader.

But the picture above, "borrowed" from Wikipedia, is captioned, "A monopod. From the Nuremberg Chronicle (1493)." So the legend has been around a long time. In fact I also found reference to the writings of Pliney in ancient Greece that are supposed to mention monopods.

There. I was wrong. But I've set the record straight, I think.

For those of you who thought I was never wrong, that was just a test. (Ha!)

Gulliver, NOT Woody, more...

Remember Gulliver's Travels? More specifically, remember the Monopods? The Monopods were a race of people with one leg and one very large foot.

They hopped about on the one foot. The foot was so large that it was very buoyant and the Monopods were able to row about on a lake floating on just their foot... er, feet

Anyway, Carol just bought a monopod for her camera and it brought to mind those characters in Guliver's Travels.

What's a monopod, you ask? Well, it's a tripod with two legs missing. It's designed to hold the camera steady (especially when the photographer is using a long telephoto lens), but allows the photographer to rotate the camera and pivot it up and down.

Using her new monopod Carol captured the shots below of a woodpecker in a tree in our front yard.


I figured for sure this was a red-headed woodpecker, right? For obvious reasons. But no, that was wrong. Here's another view. . .

No, that one doesn't help much, does it? Well, how about this last shot. . .

It turns out that our handbook identifies this bird as a red-BELLIED woodpecker. Who knew?

But as I mentioned in the title, he/she doesn't look much like Woody.

Oh, and the monopod worked great!)

A Serious Post

Not funny at all.

Read this, if you wish. It may make you angry, or it may make you think. It makes sense to me, which makes me wonder what that says about me. On my monitor it's best viewed zoomed in to about 150% size.

This article gave me a new perspective on the mindset of the radical islamic terrorists. It's short, but insightful.

Come back tomorrow for humor or photos or my normal fare.

Not to raise B.B.'s Blood Pressure, but...

I just finished doing my other daughter's taxes with Turbo Tax.

This one lives in Chicago and thus has Illinois state taxes to file. Her husband had two jobs last year, plus a brief stint as a self-employed counsultant.

But, no problems! Both the federal and the state returns were finished in about 2 hours total -- and that included a couple of phone calls to her to ask questions.

The bad news is that, unlike the other daughter whose taxes I did on Monday, today's couple was under-withheld for both federal and state and will have to pony up a significant check for taxes due. As best I can figure, that is mostly the result of husband's multiple jobs and self-employment tax.

Well, I'm still a fan of the software.

I just like it better when the outcome is a refund!

Taxes

(For my overseas readers, this post may not make much sense. It's all about our American Income Tax system. Sorry.)

Each year I do my own federal taxes. I have done so ever since I started earning enough money that I was required to file a return. When children came along in our marriage, I started doing their taxes as well, so now I have three returns to prepare.

Although I've long been a computer enthusiast ("nut," Carol would say), I've preferred to do my taxes the old-fashioned manual way. Oh, I download forms and instructions from the IRS web site. But then I read through the instructions and fill out the forms with a pencil, review everything carefull to make sure it "looks" right, and then sign and mail in my return.

Until now I have avoided tax preparation software. Not any more!

I was talking with my company's accounting firm auditor a few weeks ago about a recent complication in my tax situation. He recommended that I buy Turbo Tax. He called it "idiot-proof." Told me all I had to do was answer questions on-screen, like an interview, and the program would offer explanations and then put all my data on the correct line of the correct form.

I thought, "Yeah. Right."

I loaded it onto my computer and started with my daughter's return (the simplest of the three I have to do.) Well, the accountant was right -- it's just about idiot-proof. The software steps you through the return line by line, but you never fill out a form. It starts with name, address and Social Security number. Soon you're at the part where it asks for W-2 information. Depending on whether or not your employer or their payroll company (ADP, Paychex, and others) subscribes to the service, the program CAN go to an internet site that will match up your Social Security number and import all your payroll W-2 data automatically! Now that's slick!

But it gets better. My daughter had a statement from an investment broker (1099-B) with a number of transactions that had to be reported on a Schedule D (capital gains). BUT, if I entered her username and password to that broker's web site, all that 1099-B data was also automatically imported to Schedule D. Date of purchase, dates of sale, proceeds of sale... everything!

Now THAT'S REALLY slick!

The software walked me through the entire return in about 2 hours. It wouldn’t have taken me that long if I hadn’t gone through every menu and sequence even though I knew they didn’t all pertain to this return.

So, I’m a fan of Turbo Tax.

Tomorrow I’ll start on the other daughter’s return – the one that also has STATE income tax and a more complex set of federal forms to deal with. We’ll see how long that one takes.

Then, when I’m REALLY sure I know what I’m doing, I’ll tackle my own taxes.

Hey, I've got MY priorities straight!

Chill

As in the verb, not the noun.

That's what we're doing this weekend -- chillin'. Carol's fighting cold symptoms, and I'm fighting lethargy in general. Today the sun is shining in a clear blue sky and we could be out playing golf. But it just feels better to be sitting around the house with no ambition. There are lots of things I/we could be doing, but instead we're chillin'.

Here are a few random thoughts to brighten your Sunday, however:

1. Christina steered me to a blog authored by a 107 year old woman in Australia named Olive. It's actually typed by her helper Mike, but Olive is the source for most of the material. It's complete with lots of pictures, and is a treasure. Check it out here. When you do, scroll down to the first post (there are only 4 so far) and read them in sequence.

2. Can you believe that one week from today we (here in the United States) switch to Daylight Savings Time? It's true! it happens this year on March 11, two weeks earlier than usual. Get ready to lose that hour of sleep as we Spring Forward.

3. Finally, here's a picture of one of Ruth's creations. It's a groom's cake for a wedding. German chocolate. The groom works for... Well, guess!

Pretty slick, huh?

Meanwhile, Carol and I are still chillin'.

I am NOT political...

Yesterday I spent the day at our State Capital in Austin. I was part of a contingent of about 45 men and women sent by the Victoria Chamber of Commerce to "Victoria Day at the Capital."

Our task was to visit the offices of every single state senator and state representative handing out gifts (mementos of Victoria) and invitations to a reception that evening at the Austin Club.

Why me, you ask? Good question! The Chamber had requested a member of the local Workforce Development Board to go along, and I foolishly volunteered. I mean, how bad could it be, right? One day in the capital, listen to some briefings by people like our state comptroller, education commissioners, Department of Transportation (TXDOT) representative, etc., see the legislature in session, and have free food and drinks for 2 hours in the evening. Sounded OK.

And I could tell that some of the group were right in their element. They seemed to really "get off" on rubbing elbows with the power people (elected folks and their staff members), showing innocents like me around the buildings and offices, shaking hands and slapping backs, smiling and talking at the speed of an auctioneer the whole time.

I essentially did what I was asked to do, and otherwise just watched all the activity.

The entire capital area was awash with people. Many, like us, had large brightly-colored identity tags. It wasn't their names that were prominently displayed, but rather their organization.

Planned Parenthood was there. The Texas Association of Builders was there. The Texas Association of Interior Design was there. And literally dozens more groups. They came by the busload. Oh, and so did thousands of school kids.

All of these people and groups (except maybe the school kids) had an agenda, and were trying to get their voice heard regarding their agenda. At several of the legislator's offices I had to stand in line behind other groups as they made their pitch to the staffers in the office.

Why to the staffer? Because the representative or senator was out on the floor of the chamber, in session! The staffers were polite, listened, nodded, made vague noises about being sure that their boss got the message, and turned to the next group or person. That apparently went on ALL DAY LONG!

When my turn came, I told them I didn't have an agenda or a message, other than, "Come to our reception tonight if you can. The whole office is invited, including YOU." A few actually showed up!

One staffer told me at the reception that he could eat and drink free every night the legislature was in session if he wanted to, as there were receptions like ours every single working day!

Did we accomplish anything? I doubt it. Did we spend a bunch of money that various business and companies put up to sponsor all of this? You bet we did.

Was it fun?

Well, I told my Administrative assistant in the office this morning that if, two years from now (the next time our state legislature will be in session), I even mention that I might go again, to please SLAP ME IN THE FACE! It seemed to be fun for some, but...

I told you, I am NOT political!