Misc Ramblings and thoughts...nothing to deep or intelligent.

 Happy Halloween, almost.  It's not till tomorrow, not that you could tell by the stuff in the stores....you'd think it was already the Christmas season.  I don't know why retailers feel the need to bring out all that stuff so early...other than greed.  I suppose that they cater to the forgetful, hoping to sell stuff to people that have forgotten what they have.  I will say that it is nice for the people that decorate outside, here in the great white north...It would be nice to hang those lights on the gutters and in the trees before the windchills are below zero, before a light hanger has to brush icicles off their nose and can simply climb the snowdrifts to reach the eaves. 

It is nice that we can get extension cords in many colours now....used to be only orange....now you can get yellow, white, green, black, and blue.  I know that they do this so that you can use a cord that blends with the landscaping.  HA!  So you start off with a green cord, but then you have to change it to white once the snow falls.  Oh, I know what you're thinking....the snow will cover that green cord and no one will know that it is green.  Well:  I say to that:  If that is the case, why do you womens wear underwear that matches?

I suppose that the stores put out all the crap to stimulate kids.  One major retailer here is "Fleet Farm", I reckon that they started off as a farm supply store, and their inventory has grown to include hunting, toys, fishing, auto supplies, clothing, some groceries, candy, books, lumber/building supplies, cabinets, plumbing, electrical, appliances, marital aids, and oh yeah, farm supplies.  The point to all that....in the middle of September they wall off a large square in the middle of the store for "Toyland", which they open in the middle of October.  I've heard that it makes Toys r Us look bad. 

BUT!  Mid October???  No one needs to buy all their toys in Mid October, hide them away for 10 weeks.  The kids are going to be snooping and will find them, I promise!

What I find interesting about Americans is this:  everyone says they hate Christmas stuff in the stores so early.   Everyone says that they hate all the political correctness.  If you do....don't participate!  Don't buy the stuff until after Thanksgiving.  Encourage your friends to not buy Christmas related stuff until the Christmas season. 

If you're against the "political correctness" don't participate in that either.  Here's how. 

• Don't be offended by stupid stuff. 
• If someone is an American, call them that.  Drop the African, Asian, native, etc.  ALL of us could have some sort of descriptor in front of American if we insisted.  It's not offensive to call a black person a black person.  An Indian is an Indian....dot or feathers???  Whichever!  Actually I'm surprised that the casino owners are not more demanding...wanting to be recognized for their tribes. 
• Vote republican. 
• Discipline kids

Comments welcome, as always.

Yesterday/Saturday, we went to Val's folks to split wood.  We've gone over before and they wanted to quit after only 2 hours.   That really annoys me...because we had given up the ENTIRE day...because they couldn't decide what they wanted to do until about 10 on that Saturday.  Anyway.  We went over at 1:00, we got to work pretty much right away.  Firstly I installed the new ebay parts onto the old saw, but like a dumbass, I didn't get the nut tight enough, it was lost.  Oh well....I'm sure the nut store will have one.  We cut and split, loaded and stacked 3 loads of wood.  Some was rotten punky box elder, some was really good elm, some was punky cherry, some was maple.  Most of it was heavy.  W/o that splitter, we'd still be working on the first load, I'm sure of that.  I do wish that the engine of it had a different exhaust system, on a day with no wind, the exhaust stays right there, going up my nose.  We worked until almost dark...I think we finished up at about 6:15.  Go in, wash up for dinner...Val's favorite:  peppery sausage.  I don't know if her mom doesn't remember that she doesn't like sausage, or doesn't care.  THIS JUST IN:  a peek at SpeeCo's website shows that the size of splitter closest to Bob's has an engine with the exhaust on the other side.  (Bob is Val's cousin, he owns the splitter, loans it to her folks.)

I've been reading Lee Child's books about "Jack Reacher".  6'5" 220-250# former MP, gets dragged into different scenarios having to solve crimes that current cops can't figger out.  Finally they're going to make a movie...after 15 books, they've decided to start on #9.  The star??? Tom Cruise. 5'7" 77kg.  Oh, I have to do the math for you?  BTW, why would they have his height in SAE but weight metric??? weird.  The runty bastard weighs 170#.  The book and movie will be "One Shot", I just started reading it yesterday.  These are awesome books.  One part Spencer, one part Travis McGee, one part Columbo, one part wikipedia/google;  I tell you...these are hard to put down, these are really good books. 

Congratulations if you made it all the way to the end of this...here I go to read more One Shot.  :)  Sorry I didn't post any pics!