Monday, October 3, 2022

A further elaboration!

 I orginally started this blog to keep my Mother and Sister updated on what was happening in my world. It was begun to showcase the hidden terrain of the High Desert, also known as the Sagebrush Sea. As time passed others liked the pictures and asked to be added. Some were friends that our paths had crossed at one time or another, the rest just came along for the pictures. The stories varied due to the seasons. Fall was training and hunting of the Hawks, Spring and Summer was different areas that I visited with my plane. I had always felt that my little insights into the Raptors and the terrain were worthy of your time to read them. Things changed with Karen's death. I no longer felt that I could risk my "critters" being left here in case I didn't come back from one of those trips, and of course I had visited all the "beauty spots" before and there didn't seem to be much to add. I quit the long flights, and stayed home. I have comptemplated discontinuing the blog as I didn't feel that there was much that anyone would look forward to reading. 

However there is one subject that could be expounded upon that may interest some of you. Those of you who know me personally seem to be more than a little surprised in my recent acquisition of a new mate. It little matters that it is probably amazement on most of your parts. I share that wonderment as well. Let me see if I can answer some of your questions.

Senior dating can be as fraught with peril as any exercise in human relations. I will explore some of my finding to you.

In the first place, I had a positive marriage to Karen, and the benefits of that was something that I wanted to duplicate if at all possible. The first step towards that was an attempt to find Brenda again. We had known each other since she was about 6 yrs old, and I knew that she had had some bad marriages's and was still interested in me. I didn't remember what her last married name was and the only contact that I had was a childhood friend in the same area that she had lived. He did not know what had happened with her, and was no help. So then the only recourse was dating sites.

I soon found that there was two different goals for women. The divorce'es were trying to relive their "glory years" and experience the things that they had missed by being tied down with their children and boring husbands, and basically looking for their Prince Charming. All were interested in travelling and having fun. 

The widows were looking for a stable life style with a guy that could give them some security and perhaps not be an asshole. However none of them were willing to live in SE Oregon's High Desert. Of course that was what I wanted and needed.

Brenda  knew that Karen had died, but waited three years before she thought it was appropiate to call me. Had she been older when I left WVa, my life would have most likely been different. 

If I had to guess,  I would bet that those of you who know me well are amazed that she would get rid of every thing and drive across country by herself to join me here in the "garden spot of Eastern Oregon". I haven't yet decided if that amazement is due to the country or that they know me so well?

Brenda's last husband died about 13 years ago, and she had lived alone since then. I sense that  those of you who know me well are a bit amazed that a woman such as her could commit to a life in the middle of nowhere with a man such as me, a veritable paragon of virtue and positive thinking. I can only attribute it to the fact that so far she has only experienced males that were the personification of "Masculine superiority" and by comparison I appear as a Loving Teddy bear. Lets hope that I can keep up the act. If all you have ever known is a physcopath, it seems to be normal.



Sunday, October 2, 2022

Rock House ramblins

 Fall has apparently arrived, mornings are quite nipply, but the flies are still with us. They are bad enough that I am praying for a frost, just to get rid of the flies. There is lots to do to prepare for winter. The fifth wheel has only to get the water lines blown out, I am about to blow out the sprinklers. I have one trailer load of wood split. ( 2 1/2 cords). Another load will be ready soon. My wood splitter has blown out its last spark plug, so I have ordered another engine. The poor thing has served me for about 30 years. I picked the engine (a Fairbanks Morse ) out of the Railroad garbage dump. It seems that one can no longer get a "heli coil" that will fit the huge spark plug that it uses. I managed to spend most of the afternoon trying to find one for a 18 MM spark plug. All are now 14 MM. 

I am trying to get Bud back on the wing again. It has been fun, :-/ I of course need to reduce his weight, and the more that I do the more restless he gets. He was getting tangled almost daily, then of course he blames it on me. Its possible that I will need more bandaids soon. I had turned him loose in the weathering area earlier when he was fat, and decided that him hanging on the wire wasn't good, now I have turned him loose again, just to keep him from tangling up all the time. I had been using a total of four swivels on his jesses, and he still managed to tie himself in knots. If he ends the season looking like a feather duster- too bad.




Actually having him loose is a bit easier for me. He still hates the thought of a hood, so weighing him is a real pain in the butt. Now I don't have to weigh him. If he isn't hungry enough to come to the fist, he isn't ready to fly anyway. 

I spent most of the afternoon trying to find out why my drone wasn't working. I finally plugged it into my computer and found that the battery wasn't making a full contact. ( two hours lost) The battery fits so tight that I have to use a knife to wiggle the battery out of its slot. I put it on the sander last night to free it up a bit. :-/  Obviously I succeded! 

Bud wouldn't come to me earlier, but the sight of me trying to get the drone working drove him to distraction. He is somewhat difficult, but he knows that the drone has food. When I finally got it corrected, he came to me. I had set the upper limit to restrict the drone to 125 feet. When I turned him loose he didn't seem to be able to get up that high. Apparently he is really out of shape, so he screwed around at low level until it started to come down due to the battery getting low, then snatched the lure off at about 15 feet. Looks like we are off to a "roaring start".  I am not sure if I am even going to try to fly Hope. I haven't seen a Rabbit for some time now.

Brenda and I are still trying to get our stuff blended, between all the other stuff going on and trips to town its been a bit slow. We went to Burns friday to take my wood trailer to the guy who cuts wood for me, and to take Brenda's dog Charly to the vet. She has some trouble with one of her eyes. I also needed to renew my drivers license. I thought sure that they would want to see me drive since I am turning 78 years on my birthday. Then we had to drive to Eagle Idaho to get a prescription yesterday. Ah the joys of living in a remote area during a Biden administration. Its still worth it! 

We are beginning to get some nice sunsets again.