Today the Texas Supreme Court upheld a rulling by a lower court that stated that the state had overstepped it’s authority when it went in to that RLDS ranch where the people are, admittedly fruity, stupid, brainwashed and polygamist, and stole all their children. I am pleased as punch at one aspect of this, bulldozing power hungry state officials getting put back in their place and the court actually upholding the constitutional rights of citizens not to have to fear their government. On the other hand, I really hope this doesn’t end up giving this wacko cult near immunity to do as they please regardless of the law. They are, in fact, criminals by being polygamists. But in the wake of the California supreme court ruling making homosexual marriage protected I would expect that within a year there is a federal case suing against the federal law prohibiting polygamy.

Perhaps you may have read of my dislike of groundhogs (aka woodchucks, aka whistle pigs) I have perhaps changed that due to the entertainment factor which they have been providing me of late. This weekend Kathy and I were on our front porch when I spotted a groundhog at the far side of the crop field next to our house, a 185 yard shot from the point on my lawn I take a position. I looked through my bino’s and saw not one, but two groundhogs; an adult and a small young one.
I quickly snatched up my trusty Ruger 10/22 and put the cross hairs of the scope on the large one and squeezed off a round. A slight breeze had the round hit just to the left of my target. It popped it’s head up and then started running to the right. I lead it a little and as it slowed I sqeezed off another round and flipped it, barrel roll like, one complete turn. Kathy was spotting with the binos and verified the hit. It was still alive and went into it’s hole followed by the young one.
I assumed that I would see neither again and chocked up my 3rd kill of the spring, but not everything was over yet. A few hours later we were out on the porch again and I spied the movement of the smaller one, not much bigger than a ball cap. I ran for my gun and took up the same position. This time it had ventured about 15 yards in my direction. I put the crosshairs on him and sqeezed off a round. Wind again; I hit just to his left. His head went up and I compensated for wind and fired again. This time I hit the ground immediately in front of him and before he could run I raised the crosshairs slightly and pulled off the third (and last round I had brought out). This one dropped him right there and upon later inspection I had struck him just behind the jaw on his left (my right) and the round had exited the lower abdomen on his right spewing entrails with it.
That makes four so far this spring and I know there is at least one more in the area which I hope to surprise in the next week or so. They are proving to be an entertaining and challenging sport target. Not to mention I hate the buggers for what they do to my yard.

Thee other week I was in a specialty grocer and bought some ostrich meat. It was fantastic. It also makes great steaks. To boot it is also great for you. Now I am seeing that Ostrich Feathers are in style for decorative purposes. I have known some people who have been raising ostriches for years to sell the products from eggs to meat to feathers. There are real cool things to buy from the product and this particular site not only offers product but also help and advice for ostrich farmers. Check it out.

What, that doesn’t sound interesting enough to you? Let me put it this way: Sometimes I place an order for a product and I get it three days later. Other times I place an order for a product and I get it 2 weeks later. What is the difference? Well, to me it is the difference of whether or not I plan to do business with that company again or not. But the difference in the processing time is most likely that one company has warehouse management software and the other is still manually looking up inventory and then searching through racks of crates to find the right one, if that actually have what the paperwork says they do and after my order sat on a desk for two days. But in the end it probably means which one is going to go out of business and which one is going to thrive. With an integrated supply chain through Cadre Technologies, a company can take orders directly from the internet and have them shipped many times faster than receiving orders over the phone and manually filling the order. Automation is just many times faster than the older methods and could mean that your business grows. What; you don’t own a business that uses warehouse fullfillments? Well if you work at one and you would like to have the company you work for succeed and provide you with a good job, then maybe it would be good to pass this info on to your boss. You don’t have to own a company to benefit from that company succeeding.

Last week I went to church in the UP. I was there for grandma’s funeral which was later in the day so I wore my nicest suit. I also had taken some time to match up a very nic shirt and tie that were all perfectly mated to each other. I didn’t mean to attract any attention, I was just wearing a suit for the funeral. What I didn’t realize is that in the church of over 400 there was only one other person wearing a suit, my uncle who is in his 80’s. Even the minister was not wearing a suit. So, while it was not my intent, I did attract people’s attention. Not the best place for that. But there are times when you DO want to attract attention by being the best dressed person in the room and for those times you might want to consider a nice suit and designer shoes from upscalemenswear.com. Some of this stuff is a bit loud for my taste but there are some of those suits that I would really love to have.

What? No, I didn’t get a vasectomy! Why would you even think that? I got my plumbing fixed. Like, my actual plumbing. I am definately NOT the plumber in the family as most things that I touch that have water going through them take four tries to get it so that the water stays inside. So when I returned from up North to find that my toilet was leaking and the shower faucet had (once again) slipped the O ring I put in it, I went to work. The toilet needed a new wax ring but that wasn’t all. It needed a new wax ring because the bolts that hold the toilet to the copper fittings had deteriorated away to nothing. then I found that there was nothing holding the copper fittings to the actual floor. So I cleaned off all the old wax ring (a real fun job) screwed the copper fitting to the floor and then got some new bolts to hold the stool to the copper fitting. I then prayed and put all of that together along with a new wax ring and (insert Gomer Pyle voice) surprise, surprise, surprise it actually worked! Then I took apart the shower faucet and took out the O ring I had put in and replaced it with a sprint loaded gasket (which is what it needed in the first place) and once again, it worked! I have never been happier with the outcome of a plumbing job. I don’t think everything has gone right and had it all work on the first try, EVER before!