trick or treat report

My first Halloween in Clinton two years ago, I had roughly 75 kids come by. Last year it was around 60. This year the city fathers said that trick-or-treat should be on Saturday, rather than Sunday, and I only had about 25 visitors. I'm going to leave my porch light on again tonight, and see if any people come on the traditional night. Otherwise I'll have most of a bag of Mary Jane molasses and peanut butter candies to eat myself. It was funny, last night this one little girl, a toddler maybe two years old or something like that started to just walk into the house when I opened the door....her mom had to catch her and tell her to just open her bag for the candy, you don't need to go inside.....anyway, the Giants lost the first game in Texas, I forget who is pitching tonight......42 windchill on the sunrise walk, clear and crisp.....french toast and fried ham for breakfast....yesterday I made a chili-cheese-frito omelette for supper.....probably do leftover ribs and a salad today, use up some lettuce while it still looks fresh.....

pretty big crowd

at the Clinton Fall Festival, a couple of blocks from my house....the people with the hash were there, she says they won the trophy for hash at Abbeville the other week....anyway, I asked her for a hot dog with a serving of hash on it, and that was no problem.....one buck for the hot dog, and one buck for dumping the bowl of hash on top of that....and I put on some of their good bbq sauce....lots of booths set up, the usual stuff....I got a fortune cookie at the Confucius Institute booth.....they have lots of old cars, more than at Laurens maybe.....there was a 1957 Studebaker Silver Hawk with a 289.....and a green Gremlin X with a 360....an automatic....and a Corvair Corsa Spyder, the ragtop.....and a bunch more.....cheerleaders were dancing or something, and there were kiddie rides, and the world's tallest pin-ball machine like in Laurens, and the fire dept. has a haunted house on a trailer, etc....every once in a while a freight train goes right through to make things interesting....vendors were still getting there as I was leaving.....it goes on with music and shag dancing into the night I guess.....the Curb Mkt. didn't have today's paper either.....

slept well

nothing on TV, so I went to bed around nine, and got a good eight hours or so.....back didn't feel too bad when I got out of bed.....but I could see my breath, in the house....50 degrees it said in the kitchen.....I haven't fired up the gas pack yet this season.....so I ate breakfast and went for my sunrise walk, 37 degrees outside....they were starting to set up for the Clinton Fall Festival when I walked by there....got to the Gate gas station-store where I get my newspaper every morning, and there weren't any! The newspaper distributor hadn't shown up today.....that's just wrong! So I'll have to read the comics online I suppose.....GoClinton will have it posted as to whether or not the Red Devils won the football game.....later in the day I can walk over and check out the festivities, and see if the newspapers are there yet.....those people from Greenwood who make hash might be there like last year.....there will be some bands and stuff going on....pickle eating contest, etc....the World Series is going to be on at 6:30, and I guess I'll watch it with the porch light off and the living room lights off, to signal that I am not recognizing Trick-or-Treat on the wrong day.....what's the point of tradition if you don't honor it?

cold this morning

feels more like Halloween weather than that warm muggy spell earlier in the week....crisp and clear out walking.....had a bowl of chili for lunch, to warm up some.....got a Guitar Player magazine in the mail today, something to look at for a while.....watched baseball again until the middle of the night, they are moving it to Texas Saturday evening, Giants looking good....

steak sandwich

with mustard and mayo, an imported from Greece pepper, glass of red wine.....Thursday lunch....this afternoon I'll turn on a slow oven and put the country ribs in the iron skillet with apple cider vinegar and a little oregano.....that might sound strange, but it works, I've done it before.....2 hours at 250 or so, then take them out and dump off the fat, put them back in on the other side, and put on the bbq sauce, and then give 'em another hour at 300....this is all uncovered....anyway, the storm passed and I stayed up and watched the World Series Game One, which was entertaining enough .......more again tonight.....got the Occidental magazine, and the AAA mag in the mail this morning, along with the usual offers for life insurance, etc....none of them ever say they will insure that I live.....wouldn't buy that either.....

"the largest non-tropical storm in recorded history"

that's what they were saying about the weather on the local news when the station went off the air......thunderstorm here now, with a renewed tornado watch......

weird weather continues

they finally lifted the tornado watch about an hour ago.....it was overcast at sunrise, so I put on a flannel shirt for my walk, and got soaked in sweat.....72 degrees and 100% humidity, south wind 6 mph.....it will be clear this morning for a half hour, and then wind and big black clouds will return for half an hour......anyway, went grocery shopping, and got some candy for Halloween, and some country style pork ribs they had a good price on, and some leaf lettuce, baking potatoes, collard greens, bbq sauce, the good unsweetened unfiltered apple juice was half price, and I got O.J., eggs, extra sharp cheddar cheese cheep, and other things.....finished up the meatloaf in a sandwich for lunch..... leftovers today, and then I'll put those ribs in the oven tomorrow I reckon, with a baking potato, and have a leaf lettuce and Harvard beet salad as a veggie side.....there will be ribs leftover.....

tornado watch

until 3 am.....but on the radar it looks like the storms are tracking north of the county.....watching Shaq and his Celtics stomp LeBron and the Heat.....when did Shaq join the Celtics? I haven't been paying attention I guess.....

strange day

blowing hot and cold...had a sweater on earlier in the afternoon, but now it says the heat index is 85....80 degrees, 73% humidity.....been playing around with guitars some today....it's odd, a couple of my more beat up electrics that hum and spit through tube amps sound perfectly smooth through the new Fender Mustang....must be something the digital signal processing does....fine with me.....

warm moisture

coming up from the south....100% humidity, low clouds and fog.....68 on my sunrise walk, 70 on the park walk a couple of hours later.....got some windows open now....fixed myself ham slice, fried taters, and the rest of the squash last night.....I think today will be a piece of strip steak, spinach, and a biscuit.....watched Top Gear last night.....and while I was watching Pawn Stars on the History Channel earlier, they were saying that HC is going to have an American Top Gear show starting pretty soon.....the Celtics-Heat starts off basketball tonight, and then the World Series Wednesday.....these things are something to keep me awake until bedtime.....if I just conk out on the sofa after dinner, I'll end up awake with an aching back at one in the morning, which I don't like.....well, I've still got meatloaf for a sandwich, and a new loaf of Health Nut bread, which makes nice crunchy toast.....right now I'm going to go sit on the front porch and eat an apple.....

storm front went through

and it's 70 degrees getting towards sunset here.....so after a burst of activity early it ended up a lazy day.....fell asleep a while in the afternoon.....watching Pawn Stars after dinner....nothing else on.....

the third place

I went to had the part I needed for my oven, the baking element.....it rained hard the whole time I was driving around, but stopped once I got home.....the used appliance store over near Ford School where I got my washer and dryer is where I found the part, they had one hanging on the wall.....so I fixed my oven for $30....the hardest part of the operation was finding a 1/4" socket in my tool box.....it's not cold very much this morning, just wet, as the weather is coming from the south-west seems like.....I think I'll have a bowl of chili for lunch, because I've got lots of chili, and it's a rainy day.....

clouding up, cooling off

got the Falcons-Bengals on TV, with AC/DC on the stereo.....was jamming along for a while with the amp set to British 60's with flanger and octaver dialed in for twist and crunch.....quiet Sunday afternoon in a small town....decided on meatloaf, mac-and-cheese, and crook neck squash with vidalia onion for dinner.....one of the leftover combo choices.....Falcons are ahead, playing pretty good.....they just got another TD.....makes it 24-3 after the FG......

you are now free to move about the country

Southwest Airlines had a two page ad in the Sunday paper about their new Greenville-Spartanburg Airport service.....it looks like there's no direct flights to the west coast, but you can fly to Nashville and connect to San Diego or whatever.....if you had the money and the inclination to do so....Portland is the only place listed in Oregon......it looks like it's $59 to Nashville and then $109 to either S.D. or Portland....or Oakland.....bags fly free, price does not include this, that, and the other thing in fine print at the bottom of the page.....they had an article on the front page about this too, since several regional carriers dropped their price to Nashville, etc.... to match the Southwest price, which is what the local chamber of commerce was hoping would happen.....bright, calm Sunday morning in Clinton.....french toast and sausage for breakfast, bowl of chili for supper yesterday, bowl of popcorn while watching the Giants make it to the Series.....might start raining tonight, 80% chance on Monday, thunderstorms likely by the afternoon ......

that meatloaf sandwich yesterday

was so good I had another one for lunch today....I did go over to Wal*Mart for more emu oil, and they also had unsweetened chocolate cheaper than BiLo, and Health Nut bread 50 cents cheaper too....they have that thing that lets you play YouTube on the TV down to $128 now, maybe it will be half price after Christmas? Probably not. I don't really look at YouTube all that much, but it just sounds cool....you can get Netflicks over it too.....the Jam On station is doing Pearl Jam all weekend? I can turn my new Fender DSP amp to the "AMERICAN 90's" preset and get the grunge tone to play along.....ever evolving wonders of technology.....got a pot of chili on the range....

dead quiet around here

you can hear the train going by, but that doesn't last long.....Laurens and Clinton both lost, so I don't think either one of them is going to the playoffs this year....watched the Rangers win the AL title last night, so maybe it will be a Texas-Frisco world series? I'm thinking of driving over to Wal*Mart for a couple of things.....I've got half of the hamburger meat and half of the sausage left that I need to do something with soon, so I might get chili beans and make chili.....then I'll have a third leftover to work on, might not need to buy much groceries this coming week.....got down below 40 during the night, sunny and calm now......they are saying the rainy front crossing the country now will be in this area Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.......

bill paying day

took care of AT&T, City of Clinton, and Allstate.....paid the gas company a couple of days ago, so I don't owe anybody anything.....watched the Giants get beat last night, but they just have to win one more to advance to the World Series.....San Francisco looks nice on TV, the bay and all.....the meatloaf is delicious, so I'll have a meatloaf sandwich on wheat-berry toast with a little mayo for lunch.....tonight will be leftover scalloped taters with ham.....I took the check in to Allstate in person 'cause it's right on the way to the ABC, where I was headed since I was out of whiskey....so I'm all set to read library books, listen to the radio, torture the guitar, watch baseball games, take walks.....all the usual stuff.....

mild Fall afternoon

It's been a fine day......got meatloaf cooking, with baked potato, probably finish up the lima beans in the fridge too......you could bottle this weather and sell it at a premium.....

more baseball

I stayed up late again watching the Giants game.....maybe they can win again tonight.....this morning when I got out of bed and started doing my crunches and stretches etc....something popped in my lumbar....in a good way! That nagging pain and stiffness I have when I get out of bed pretty much just went away all at once.....usually I have to rub emu oil on it and do my sunrise walk before it loosens up somewhat......chilly and clear today so far, will do the other walk shortly, and I should vacuum.....the ham and scalloped potato dish was a success, enough leftover for another dinner or more.....I had lima beans as the side.....

what you can do

when making ham and scalloped potatoes , start it in the microwave, and then stick it under the broiler in the oven to crisp it up on top....time and temp will vary according to amount and unknown factors.....this works for meatloaf too.....ground chuck and country pork sausage were on sale, so I'll do meatloaf this week too.....oatmeal works in microwave meatloaf.....1/2 lb. ground beef, 1/2 lb. pork sausage, one cup oatmeal, one can cream of mushroom soup, one egg....mix by hand, form into loaf, nuke it 1/2 hr. on 50%, then place under broiler until it looks right....let cool some to firm up so it will slice better.....looking at the radar, the rain front has gone off to the East.....rained most of the morning, but now some sun is coming out.....I stayed up watching the baseball game past midnight, and was awake around 5:30 .....that's no 8 hours sleep, but I feel OK, old people don't need as much sleep.....

raining early on

I was just getting back to my street when it started coming down....it's still raining some about an hour after the newspaper walk......I'm going to go grocery shopping......I figure I can use up some of that ham if I make a dish of scalloped potatoes with it......so I need potatoes, for one thing.....and a jar of Ragu cheesy alfredo sauce, I'm too lazy to make white sauce for scalloping anymore.....and an onion.....I have enough eggs, orange juice, bread until next week I think....I'll try to figure things out as I wander around in the store I guess......

stayed up late

watching the Rangers beat the Yanks, slept pretty well.....50 on the morning walk, as opposed to 40 the previous day.....just got back from walking the park, didn't need a jacket.....they say it will be sunny and get up to around 80 today, and then Wednesday a cold front should come through with a slim chance of showers......Monday dinner was fried ham with bbq sauce, baked sweet potato, mac-and-cheese.....I might make a ham salad sandwich for lunch.....ham ham ham ham; sung to the tune of "Spam Spam Spam Spam".....IFC continues with their Monty Python hours in the evening.....I've seen a couple I don't remember ever seeing before.....

people who walk

I walk about an hour every day, 20 minutes to get the newspaper, and 40 minutes around the park and back.....I talked to a guy this morning who is out walking almost every day too...he lives over by the park....he says he walks for the same reason I do, to work his back, warm it up....he had a spinal fusion in 2000 he said....mine was 2003 I think.....and I talked to another walker today too....this guy walks down to the Bi-Lo shopping center just about every day, which is probably about 4 miles round trip to over where he lives past the mill.....I passed him today as I was coming back from the library, but he doesn't ever want a ride, he says he enjoys the walking....one day in the Winter it was dang freezing, but he still wanted to walk home from the store......we were talking about how many empty houses there are around here, but they are building apartments to rent.....we figured that maybe these old houses aren't good enough for some people....or maybe young people like apartment buildings for social life, almost like living in a dorm maybe.....I had a Marie Callender chicken pot pie for Sunday supper....those things are so big I felt stuffed by the time I finished it, they are not like those little chicken pies we had as kids.....very nice weather continues.....crisp in the morning, warming up pleasantly in the afternoon.....

fried ham

and fried sweet tater slices, and a deviled biscuit.....Saturday supper.....Sunday breakfast of french toast and two sausage links, coffee, orange juice....clear and chilly, lots of sunshine but not very warm sunshine, at least not in the morning.... they predict a high of 79 ......I put a blanket on the bed last night, in addition to the usual quilt and bedspread......there is a new notice on the burned out house next door, it says that on Nov. 2 the property will be deeded to a new owner unless Angela Denise Smith pays the $368 back taxes.....it seems to say there already is someone who has already agreed to pay the tax and thus gain the property for that small amount? Will they require that person to clear off the condemned building? We'll see what happens.

Teisco Del Rey

About all I could ever get out of my Teisco Del Rey 1969 Spectrum II guitar was a sort of Powderfinger tone (red means run son, numbers add up to nothing) which is cool in a grunge sort of way.....but today I started fiddlin' around with various stomp-boxes, and finally got the Spectrum run into a mid 80's Arion Metal Master, on the "soft" output.....and then into a dual amp rig I've been playing with....anyway, the guitar has this slide switch on it that says Rhythm and Solo.....and I could never get much out of the Solo setting, it just seemed to mute the pickups or something.....but I got it working today.....if you turn the volume and tone knobs all the way up, and have it switched to solo, and you've got some gain dialed up on the metal pedal, you can get this bizarre San Francisco hippies-on-acid lead tone going.....I played that for about an hour I guess....I suppose I'm easily amused.....right now I've got the Clemson game on the TV, and Rust Never Sleeps on the stereo, I wanted to hear "Powderfinger".....

driving through the woods

the Fall colors are just barely starting.....wandered around on some back roads for a while, visited the church grounds.....there are sure some nice looking properties you can see driving around.....chilly this morning, I think it said 37 on the dawn patrol.....Laurens won, Clinton lost, which is sort of a switch.....I stayed up until 11 watching the Rangers-Yankees, but when the Texas bull pen blew up and New York tied it in the 8th I got disgusted and went to bed without waiting for the 9th to play out.....dang Yanks......I'm going to fix myself a ham and egg sandwich.....

soup's on

diced up chicken, onion, garlic, added a can of chili beans, oregano, about 1 cup chunky salsa, maybe 1/2 cup nacho cheese sauce, 1 cup fritos, and 2 cups water, in the crock pot early this morning....smells good.....was 39 on the sunrise walk, and around ten the wind chill was still in the lower 40's for the park walk.....just finished my apple on the porch, and later for lunch I'm thinking of a sausage cheese biscuit.....I made some biscuits last night.....don't think I got any mail today, the other day I got a $11 gas bill.....I should get the people out to give the heating system a once over before the real cold weather gets here, make sure I'm not wasting natural gas.....watched old movies until around ten last night, and then slept pretty well.....my back felt better today than it does some mornings......

small chance was a good chance

thunderstorm here and now....doesn't look very big on the radar though, should pass by fairly quickly......

radio radio

In German, "Rundfunk"....the spark that goes around the world.....in early 1950's Carolina, we didn't have a television, just a brown bakelite Zenith.....Buck Rogers, Gene Autry, Roy Rodgers, Jack Benny, Arthur Godfrey, Art Linkletter, "How much is that doggie in the window", "I don't know why I swallowed a fly", Tarzan? was he on the radio, I seem to remember his jungle call before TV.....Tom Corbett and his Space Cadets....cut off a part of the cereal box and send it in for the decoder ring....Dick Tracy? or was that just a comic strip?......on Dog Star radio nowadays they play this spot where a girl is talking about how one of the most important parts of her childhood was when she grew tall enough to reach the radio on the kitchen counter, so she could turn it on and listen to music all the time.....AM top forty through school, and later FM.....KPPC in college, Pasadena Presbyterian Church....that's where that came from, the first L.A. "underground album rock".....they played "Light My Fire" at midnight every night.....KROQ, the "Rock of the 80's", broadcasting from on top of Mt. Wilson.....which brings me to why I started this rant....Sirius XM has switched the DJ time slots around I guess, so I'm hearing the wrong voices at the wrong times of day.....the old DJ's given a new life in their old age on the space radio.....radio is better than TV, 'cause you can read a book and listen at the same time....or you can play the radio while football is on TV, and you don't have to hear the commercials, and the game is better with a rock soundtrack anyway.....

61 degrees, cloudy

100% humidity, wind 3 mph.....but the wind could get up to 10 to 15 mph today, as we are between two fronts....predicted high of 74, chance of showers........not much of a chance.....I think I'm going to add some ham to what's left of the hopping john for supper today, and I need to figure something to do with the remains of the chicken.....soup maybe......or chicken chili....looks good for a walk right now, so I guess I'll get goin'......

another variation

in the walking.....I went shopping, and picked up the weekly Clinton paper, and in the classifieds there was a house for sale at 404 Bailey, so after lunch I walked down there to see how it looked....they don't have any price listed....it didn't look like it has central heat and air. While I was over that way, I noticed that the little thrift shop half a block from my house has closed, and moved to Laurens. But there is a new thrift shop out on the highway now, that I could check out sometime .......I had a chicken salad sandwich for lunch, with a pickle and a pepper and a glass of wine.....I got a three pound canned ham when I was shopping, so I can have ham sandwich for lunch sometime, and fried ham and a sweet potato and mac-and-cheese will be one dinner this week.....I got an American Musical Supply catalog in the mail, so I've got something to look at this afternoon for a while anyway......

instead of the park

I walked to the bank, and dealt with that CD.....so nothing matures now until next March.....I made an appointment for next week to talk to their financial planner dude when he comes to my branch .....I want to ask somebody about bond funds.....anyway, it got into the high 80's again yesterday here, and they say one more fairly warm day and then the high pressure area will be pushed out into the Atlantic by a low coming from the West, so the temps will go back down to a more seasonable 40's at night and 70's during the day....a few leaves are dropping, but not many yet....chicken last night, so black-eyed peas and rice tonight, in the leftover rotation....I'm down to heels of bread, but a heel will work for lunch, with peanut butter and apple butter? Haven't heard the mail truck yet, to see the Wednesday grocery specials in the Tuesday ads......finished a good book last night, since there was nothing on the 250 channels of TV worth watching, Blasphemy, by Douglas Preston.....more mystical quantum mechanics......

good walking weather

and nice for sitting in the sunshine on the front porch....warmer than average for this time of year....it's a bank holiday? And no mail today, but kids are in school....I had a CD mature on the 10th, but that was a Sunday, and the 11th the bank is closed.....anyway, they give you ten days to decide if you are just going to let it roll over or what.....but they are hardly giving you any interest at all right now.....that CD was making better than 4%, 'cause I bought right before everything really hit the fan two years ago......

saffron john

I didn't want chicken dinner again today, so I looked in the cupboard and found a packet of Mahatma Spicy Saffron Yellow Rice, and a can of "seasoned black-eyed peas".....and I chopped up some onion, and sliced up some link sausage.....and got that boiling, simmered it for a while, and now it's just sitting to mellow and be heated up later for supper.....I figure to garnish it with some parmesan and olive oil....I don't remember canned black-eyed peas in California supermarkets....never looked for them I guess, just bought the dry kind in a bag.....but here they have half a dozen different brands of canned on the shelf....quick and easy, that's for sure.....so, hoppin' john for sunday supper.....

63 fair humidity 94% wind zero

quiet Sunday morning.....french toast and two sausage links, coffee, orange juice....last night Dan called and we figured out how to do a Skype video chat, which was interesting.....technology marches on.....some of the cousins are promoting a Tingle reunion on Nov. 6, at the usual place.....I'm ready to make enchilada pie for that.....watched USC beat #1 Alabama yesterday afternoon, with a leg and a thigh and some stuffing and some green beans microwaved at half-time for dinner....also just about finished off my peanut supply watching the game.....I've got some books to read, but I'll find myself reading a few pages, and then just starting to doze off sitting here......

steak quesadilla?

I have one flour tortilla left, and a piece of steak I saved from last night.....might be today's lunch....did watch the Reds-Phillies last night, which was another interesting game, I only fell asleep for maybe one inning.....Laurens lost, Clinton won, Gamecocks and Tigers both play this afternoon at 3:30, on ABC and CBS.....in HD.....dawn walk today was comfortable with a flannel shirt, park walk around 9 you could do without the flannel shirt.....going to get to mid-80's late in the afternoon, around football time I guess......will probably just microwave a leftover chicken dinner plate at half-time.....

iron skillet

steak and onion, with fried potatoes, and green beans.....so I'll watch the local evening news, and then probably the Phillies and Reds, since their game the other night was a good one.....or maybe there will be some old movie on that's more interesting.....

different walk

went over and looked in the pawn shop a couple of blocks away....he has lots of guitars in there, and they change every once in a while....never any real bargains though that I've seen.....then I came back by the body shops and garage and around back that way.....the NAPA over there closed a while back, that was the auto parts I could walk to.....there's another NAPA over by my insurance agent.....speaking of insurance, I got my auto renewal today in the mail....not due until Nov. 5th.....and I got a letter from GEICO saying I should switch to them, since their customers report an average savings of $500 a year.....hell, I only pay about $360 a year, so if I switch to them they'll pay me? I don't think so......the chicken dinner last night was good, made good gravy....I might have a chicken salad sandwich for lunch today......another beautiful day here, not too hot, not too cold, blue sky, breezy.......

chicken in the pot

slowing cooking.....45 early on today, about 70 outside right now, and 60 in the house....so I opened a couple of windows after I finished cutting the grass out back.....they say it might get up to 80 in the afternoon....I noticed that it was about 80 in Coos Bay yesterday....hotter than the Summer there? I saved a little of that steak from last night to make a sandwich for lunch today....I watched that Doc Halliday dude pitch his historic no-hitter on TBS, if not for that one walk it would have been a perfect game.....the Braves and the Phillies had so many games on TV during the season I'm familiar with their team, which sort of makes it more interesting.....the city fathers want to move trick-or-treat to Saturday at the end on the month, instead of the actual All Hollows' Eve on Sunday? Don't quite get the logic....Saturday is when they are having the Fall Festival a couple of blocks from here at the town square or whatever it is....they say kids can get candy there from the vendors and church groups or whatever, instead of going house to house.....so do I expect the t-or-t on Sat or Sun? Or do I just leave the porch light off and forget it this year, since they are messing with the tradition anyway......

no clouds today

so it's warming up faster....still just 61 at lunch time though.....was 40 on the early walk...had a cheesy bean burrito for lunch.....did get a whole chicken at the store, and cornbread stuffing, cut green beans, a couple of marked down pieces of steak, biscuits 2-4-1, link sausage .99 the box, 6 lbs. of Granny Smith apples for $4, etc....anyway, a weeks worth of groceries I hope, should work....going to have some of the steak with leftover mashed potatoes and some veggie for tonight, and then put the chicken in the crock pot in the morning....I'll do the stuffing on the stove top, with fried green apple in it....sounds good already.....can use the chicken drippings as part of the liquid for the stuffing....always thinking ahead.....with it down in the 40's at night, it's good sleeping weather....it's dark when I wake up, but time changes at the end of this month?

by late afternoon

warm enough to sit on the front porch....songbird singing, woodpecker pecking, Old Glory making that flag-flapping sound on Miss Ann's flagpole next door....every once in a while a car goes by, and the folk inside the car wave at the old man sitting on his front porch....clouds coming and going.....I'm low on groceries, so I'm going to just fix a pimento cheese and Frito omelette for supper....don't laugh 'til you try that....in the morning I'll go shopping....the ad says chicken legs and thighs .99 lb., or whole hens the same price...so I'll probably be eating chicken this coming week.....maybe with cornbread stuffing as a side....and cut green beans? I need more butter substitute, and something else....I'll remember what, maybe.....earlier I plugged the Fender dreadnought with the magnetic pickup into the big old Fender amp.....that works great, for a clean acoustic sound.....picked at that for a while.....

ten degrees

above freezing outside after breakfast, 42F.....about 52 inside.....later I was online and the power went out....so I went for a walk around the park, and by the time I got back the power was back on....don't know what happened.....the traffic lights were out down by the highway and the train tracks....I wonder if the railroad crossing arms have their own power, or what happens if a train comes through when the power is out? If the power had stayed off, I could have had a cold sandwich for lunch I guess.....yesterday's supper was leftovers, roast beef, mashed potatoes, peas, with gravy.....the lid from the slow cooker fits exactly over this one dinner plate I have, so you can microwave a leftover dinner that way.....well, I should eat my mid-morning apple, and drink my apple juice.....apples have something in them that's anti-senility.....can't remember what it's called.....

windchill:48 degrees

wore my denim jacket on the newspaper walk, had chicken corn chowder for Sunday supper.....cool weather stuff going on.....Padres did not make the post-season.....Braves will play the Giants, but the games from SF will be on TV here after midnight....I'll read about it in the morning online, because the result will be too late to make the morning paper.....talked to my neighbor Earl some yesterday, he was out fixing the back fence because he says his dog has been getting out in the middle of the night....I thought I heard a dog in my side yard the other night.....the orange cat has kittens under the abandoned house, and the dog will stand there and bark at the foundation.....Earl says that he has contacted the City several times asking what they are going to do about tearing down the burned-out house, but he says they say there is no money for that right now....I guess he got the fence patched up, since I heard no barking last night....well, I'm going to go walk over by the mill.....

chilly, north wind

sunny and clear, but not warm enough out to sit on the front porch without a flannel shirt or a sweater or something....Fall has really fell I guess.....got Breakfast with the Beatles on the space radio.....had french toast for breakfast....had Boston butt pork steak with mashed potatoes and early peas smothered in white gravy last night.....watched old movies after watching the Braves get beat by the Phillies.....they showed the Padres beat the Giants on a split screen in the last inning of that game.....so the whole season for the Padres, Giants, and Braves comes down to today.....consult your local newspaper for the various possible outcomes, or check online I suppose.....Clemson lost, Hosers lost, Laurens won, Clinton won.....over in downtown Laurens the other day, two of the stores were going out of business this weekend they said.....the recession is over?

wanted to also mention

the barefoot buskers doing old-timey music on one street corner, with fiddle and a parlor guitar like my Stella....also with harp, jug, kazoo, etc....lot of music from two guys....they were getting quite a few bucks tossed in the guitar case, and people taking pictures.....last time I saw that guitar guy he was just by himself, but it's better with the fiddle guy, 'cause they were getting some of that high lonesome harmony going vocal wise.....

for example

six Q-puns cost six dollars, and I got a pulled pork sandwich for six, but the town takes 25% of the six, which is $1.50....so the vendor gets $4.50.....and I bet the town charges the 7 cent tax on the whole six....plus the vendor pays for the space....but I guess they still make money or they wouldn't come from all over to do it.....at 4.50 I would call it a very good sandwich....I poured on some of their homemade honey mustard sauce....and of course got some dripping on my jeans....oh well...there were two bands playing at once, set up a couple blocks apart, the Deadbeats were a bunch of high-school kids it looked like, playing R&B and blues.....the guitar kid was tearing it up.....the Shrimp Shack Band had the big stage, and they were a middle-aged bar band, pretty slick, could probably play any song you asked for....both local bands.....I saw Cindy and her kids there, and met Matt's mom....it started to get crowded by late morning, so I left because the Clemson games starts at noon I think anyway.....the world's tallest pin-ball machine was a strange contraption.....4 Q-puns to make it run, but "everybody is a winner!"

rib report

First I stopped by the new sportsbar-pub, which looks like more sportsbar than pub....but a very nice clean new place....got a pint of Guinness for $4, and then went to the Square and got two samples.....a $2 sample bowl of hash, which was pretty good....the same people from Greenwood who were selling hash last year at the Clinton Fall thing....and a "two bones" rib sample from a stand called Baloney Joe's....lots of meat on two bones, done with a rub, very tasty.....that was $2 also, so with the $1 tip I left at the pub it all came to under $10, and I still have a $1 "Q-pun" I can use tomorrow when I go back.....

10/01/10

adds up to three.....or twenty-one? Cool enough to cut the grass out front without working up much of a sweat.....the new pub and sportsbar in Laurens is going whole hog for the Squealin'.....drink specials, bands, and direct from Ireland, the "Jameson Girls".....celtic women pushing whiskey.....the only bar in Clinton closed, The Study Club over at College Station....I never did go there, it was open strange hours.....but what happened I guess is the people who had the Study Club let the lease expire and went in with another couple and opened the bigger place in Laurens, at what should be a better location I suppose....it's right next to the River Walk Park....the Squealin' starts in an hour or so....I'm still thinking of checking that out and also looking into the pub this afternoon.....I'll eat a sandwich before I go over there, because those fancy BBQ dudes want too much for their ribs or whatever, in my opinion.....beautiful day for festivities.....up in the NC mountains there is a little town that, when the lumber mill closed, positioned itself as a Bavarian village.....put up false German-looking store fronts, and runs a big beer-bust mit lederhosen and all in Sept. and Oct.