Picture Sunday

Hello, end of weekenders! And welcome to another edition of Picture Sunday.

I must admit, most of my pictures are of the "catching up" variety.

First of all, this weekend was the first weekend of Oktoberfest. Yes, I know, it seems way too early for that, I thought it myself. But up the mountain I went. It was a fair night, small and enthusiastic crowd, my knee hurt so much I was of a very foul demeanor, and you know, I'm worried about this knee thing. I'm afraid it's going to ruin Oktoberfest for me this year.

Didn't even take my camera up the mountain, but you have all seen a lot of Oktoberfest pictures, so you're not missing much.

So let's get to the old business.

Well, how about this!

Last weekend, Sherman completed his vegetable stand selling. You know he grows vegetables all summer, then sells them at his stand at Mr M's. He makes lots of money, then gives it all to charity. He's such a good boy.

Of course, you know that every year he grows his own "special plant." He's had the Shermanhead peach, Shermanhead melon, and several others.

This year, it was the Shermanhead celery.

























Also last weekend, Mr M, who owns the Assmobile and has for some 14 years, bought a new car! A new Assmobile, Assmobile2!

It's a Hyundai Genesis, which, I must admit, I'd never in my life heard of, but it's a very pretty car. Last weekend he called upon me to drive it from the dealership home, with a couple of stops on the way, and I have to tell you, I was nervous. I mean, driving someone else's new car. It was raining and foggy, and I probably waited about ten minutes to pull out onto the highway, because if there was a car within 100 yards, I wouldn't pull out.

Here's the new Assmobile.




















Sherman and Huckie wanted to get into the act, too.



















And of course, if he'd let me drive it, he'd let Sherman drive it.




















Mr M loves his new car.

On Thursday, the dear nephew came by and gave Milo a new haircut. Wonderful, more so than usual. We decided to cut him a little shorter, since The Nephew's back at school and cuts will be farther and fewer between.

After it was all over, there was a lot of hair around. So much, in fact, that we could make a second doggie. Another Milo!




















By the way, I didn't snatch Milo's nose. It's a piece of dog food.

Now, to more current matters.

I cleaned out my refrigerator today!

It was a chore. My refrigerator needed a major cleaning. But trash day is tomorrow, so the time was right. After a couple of hours and a lot of throwing away, I got everything all spiffy.

And when I say "a lot of throwing away," it's a shame how wasteful I can be. Olives. I bet I threw away 1000 olives past their sell-by date.

Anyway, after everything was all spiffed up, I took a picture.




















That's Chilly Willy relaxing in the fridge. He gets hot a lot down here in the south. We let him relax in the coolness.

Happy week.

Betland's Olympic Update:
* My God, "Mad Men." Mrs Blankenship!

Picture Sunday

Hello, end of weekenders, and welcome to a very sad Sunday for me. Because, my friends, not only is it the end of the weekend for me, it's the end of a nice long vacation. Tomorrow it's back to the grind.

However, let's dwell on the good. I have pictures.

Well, let's see. Mr M and I went up to Cleveland for the big air show last weekend, which I mentioned in this week's blog. I took no pictures of the air show action, I spent all my time manning the Flip camera. I have air show footage up on my Facebook page, but not You Tube, because it was too long for acceptance.

But first, the bad news.




















Yes, Sokolowski's was closed for the weekend. That was how we were going to begin the weekend, with a nice meal at the restaurant Anthony Bourdain and Harvey Pekar went to on Anthony's show. Not to be, though. Bummer.

Now, to the good.

I met a rubber Air Force Man at the air show!

























Loved the Big Rubber Man. Mr M said it was Otto from "Airplane!"

Hey, and here's a nice new state-of-the-art passenger plane.




















Pretty, but unfortunately, here's me on the inside of any plane.




















You know, it's odd I like air shows, and being in airports, as much as I hate flying.

And sadly, for any more air show stuff, well, Facebook me is all I can say.

Oh, except Sherman's souvenir aircraft.




















Then after my return I headed off for an overnighter in North Carolina with my cousin Jacob. It was fun, we watched TV and ate and drank and giggled way too much, then the next morning we did a little bit of shopping.

I found some Skull Candy ear buds for my pink iPod.




















Then we hit a doll shop that was chock full of stuff. Their dolls were extremely expensive, but that didn't bother me, I don't buy dolls anymore. However, they had some accessories, furniture in particular, that were great and really cheap. I couldn't resist a few things for the gang.

First, Sherman got a new school desk!

























Huckie got a very tasteful parlor chair.

























And finally, Peabody got a luscious reading chair.

























So there you go. Now back to reality.

Happy week.

Betland's Olympic Update:
* Hey, remember my triumphant parachuting with the Golden Knights at last year's air show? Well, Mr M got me involved in another act this year. He's keen to tell you all about it (with pictures), and that will be coming very soon.

Learning to Like It

Hello, blogees. It's been a while.

I'm taking a much-needed vacation this week. It all started with a trip to the big air show in Cleveland this past weekend. Well, actually it began on the Friday before when I had to drop Milo off at the boarding place. Boo hoo.

The trip to Cleveland was quick, but still fun. We did in fact go to the big air show, and it was fine, lots of flying aces and derring-do. We saw the Blue Angels, who were excellent, even though I actually liked last year's headliners, the Thunderbirds, better.

The disappointing part of the trip, well, besides having to leave so quickly, was that on our arrival, Mr M was going to take me to Sokolowski's, a local diner with great ethnic food and the added plus of being where Anthony Bourdain took Harvey Pekar when "No Reservations" went to Cleveland. We got there, and it was closed for the Labor Day weekend.

Anyway, there will be a picture of the closed Sokolowski's, and a few others, later this week. I didn't take a lot of pictures on the trip, so don't get all excited, and I can't upload them tonight.

And the reason I can't upload them tonight is because I'm not at the Poderosa. And it's kind of the reason for tonight's blog. I'm doing my first-ever remote blog via netbook. Betland has picked up and moved, for this blog, one state to the south.

It's a bit of a story, me and my netbook. I don't think I've ever mentioned it here.

See, it all started when I came into a bit of a windfall around Christmas. I'd decided that I would bank most of it, but keep enough out to get myself something special. Something I wouldn't normally buy for myself. I was thinking laptop or netbook. And after realizing what I'd be wanting out of the machine, a kind of secondary computer, something to take on the road to Mr M's and surf the net, I realized that the netbook would be the way to go. So I ordered one.

And when it came I was very excited. I immediately named him Neddy Booke, opened him up, and looked around a bit. They keyboard was small, the screen was small, well, Neddy was a small guy all over. I despised the touch pad method of navigation. Of course not much was loaded into Neddy, so I basically just played a game of Freecell and called it a night. And it stayed that way for a while.

I soon got the networking system I needed to be able to access internet in other parts of the house, like from the Comfy Chair. I downloaded the chat program the Poundsqueeze gang chats on, but I never once joined chat from the netbook. Mostly because of the small keyboard and screen, and the fact that, to me, Neddy always seemed a bit slow in the performance department. A lot of url links fly around during chat, and I just imagined myself being mired down in them, all the while hitting the backspace key over and over again from all the mistakes I'd be making on the tiny keys.

Oh, sure, I've lugged Neddy to Mr M's every trip, and I spend a half hour or so on Facebook, and every once in a while I'll open it up in front of the TV and Mr M and I will chat a bit. But I just don't use it like I thought I would. Certainly not like other netbook users seem to be working theirs.

And so finally I came out to the world. I was just not that happy with having a netbook, and wished I'd have gotten a full-fledged laptop instead.

A couple of weeks ago an opportunity presented itself to me to buy a used laptop at a very good price. I was seriously considering it. Still am, to be honest.

Then I stopped and took stock. I'm not really in a position lately to be throwing money around, even the very good price I was offered.

And it wasn't really fair of me to chuck Neddy overboard when I really hadn't made a concerted effort to like him. It was the electronic equivalent of dismissing a possible friend with a wave of the hand because he has crooked teeth. So I tried a few things.

The first was to install Firefox. I hate Internet Explorer, and why I didn't install Firefox the very first day Neddy arrived, I have no idea. Surfing around in Firefox is a great improvement.

The next thing, I got a wireless mouse and put that damn touch pad to bed. And that really helped, even though as I type this, sitting on a hotel bed in North Carolina, said mouse keeps moving and rolling all over the place and I can't catch it.

Then I downloaded an email program. It always pissed me off that Neddy didn't come with one already included, but why I didn't install one till now, I have no idea. I guess I forewent lighting a candle so I could curse the darkness. I'm not sure it's the best program in the world, but I have gotten emails on it, and can send an email without having to go to my provider's website.

And the other stuff, the smallness of the keyboard and screen, not much I can do about that. The only thing that'll get me used to that is more usage, which is precisely what I'm trying to do right now. Remote blogging from Neddy, which is one of the advantages I'd imagined of this thing at the very beginning.

So I'm trying. We'll see how it goes. Maybe once I've loaded a few more things in, like Text Twist, Neddy and I will become even closer friends. But we're working on a relationship.