Outrage

I just got off the phone with a very dear friend of our family. She called to congratulate me that our son's name wasn't on the front page of the paper today. We have been having trouble getting our newspapers lately and no one had bothered to go down and get the last one we still subscribe to, so I had to ask her what she meant. She said that she was glad he wasn't one of the ones arrested for burglary....or rather a whole string of burglaries in the town of Glen. (For the record, between college and working when he is home he doesn't really have time to be involved, but I am pretty darned sure he wouldn't be anyhow).

I sent the kid who isn't on the front page on a hurried trip down the driveway to get the paper, which, for a change was actually there.

There it was...or should I say there they were. Thirteen kids, every one of them someone he knew from our school, four of them football stars, arrested for stealing lap tops, ipods, cash, credit cards, car stereos, gps units, and radar detectors plus money out of a church donation box. We had heard weeks back that there was something nasty going on around here, with a lot of break ins, but didn't realize the scope of the ring.

The youngest ones were only fifteen. I am not going to get into wondering how they found unsupervised time to get into that much trouble. What really ticked me off is how the school bent the code of conduct so they only miss four football games.

Same thing happened several years ago when a bunch of guys from the football team blew up a bunch of mailboxes (including ours I do believe) with bottle bombs. There were championships games at stake. Suspensions were reversed just in time for them to play. I am sure they learned a lot from the non-punishment, no consequences approach to enforcement of the rules and laws.

What a way to teach them that stealing is wrong and crime doesn't pay. Sports are supposed to teach cooperation, following of rules, sportsmanship and all that aren't they?

Instead I am sure they feel a sense of entitlement and freedom from social constraints.
Dang it makes me mad. How on earth are you supposed to raise decent law-abiding, caring kids when they have to watch their peers get away with such stuff?

Here is an excerpt from the Gazette story linked to above

"Deputies said the 13 were charged after a month-long investigation by sheriff's investigators, Amsterdam and Johnstown police and state troopers into numerous reports of burglaries, larcenies and vandalism throughout the county, including the city of Amsterdam, the villages of Fort Johnson, Tribes Hill, Fort Hunter, Fonda and Fultonville and the towns of Glen, Florida and Amsterdam. Among the incidents were break-ins at Karen’s Produce, the Auriesville Shrine and a private residence, all in the town of Glen, deputies said."

Plant ID if you can please

My folks just returned from an exciting trip out west and they saw this plant growing at Douglas Creek in Medicine Bow National Forest, Wyoming.




Thanks in advance for your help

Chinese at it again

Melamine, the same stuff alleged to have killed perhaps thousands of American pet dogs and cats, has now been found in baby formula in China. This has led to kidney stones in many babies and at least one death. China is blaming dairy farmers there for adding the chemical to milk, which was also thought to have been adulterated by the addition of water.

Here in the USA you can count on every drop of your milk being thoroughly tested for foreign substances, including water, long before it reaches your table. US authorities are warning people to be wary of infant formula of Chinese origin, which, although not legal for import, may slip into certain ethnic markets.

"

Ethanol too dependent on government subsidies

From the Meatingplace:




One of our farmer friends drove his new car to the Farm Bureau meeting last night. He let me sit in it and it is surprisingly roomy and comfortable.
Is this Smart Car a sign of things to come......?

The best laid plans

Last night's sunset

Of mice and mothers...gang aft agley.
Or to put it more plainly we got everything done that we undertook yesterday except any corn. The weather men sprang a frost warning on us so the afternoon was spent dragging house plants indoors and finding canvases......oh, and saying hasty prayers that the corn would be spared so we can finish freezing what we can and giving the rest away to friends and relatives.

A Mennonite conveyance

We did run up to the Farm Progress Show for about an hour. It is so close it is hard to resist.

A not so Mennonite conveyance

In the end I don't think it froze or is going to between now and daybreak. A fuzzy, wet fog came in and the crickets are still chirping vigorously. I hope I am right! The "new" tractor, which is actually second hand is quirky in its starting. The dealer came down yesterday morning and got it going....just tightened a loose wire. Then yesterday afternoon after starting up fine all through mowing hay and drawing down loads it froze up again. Going to call them as soon as they open this morning. I am sure they will make it right, but it certainly is a pain to be stalled again. Haying, between breakdowns and horrible weather, has gone very badly this summer and we are way, way behind.


Some farm land....taken through the windshield while going about fifty, excuse the lack of clarity

Another busy day ahead

Farm Side deadline.

Farm Progress Days
Corn
More corn.

So here are a couple of shots I took for a few of you while we were over at the fair last week.

For Steve
(The White is no more, having taken a one way ride on a large flatbed just yesterday. Its spot in the line up has been taken by an actual honest to gosh JOHN DEERE! I have always wanted one.)

For Nita
I loved this calf instantly and asked the girl attending them about her. She was born a week before the cut off for one of the show groups but they were honest enough not to change her birth date. We don't change them either (witness the August 30th calf named Trent) and we get a lot of flack for it. Believe it or not this beautiful baby was sired by a herd bull used for clean up! There were more Guernseys at the show than I have ever seen before and they were really, really good ones. Lots of strength and exceptional depth and correctness. This is not exactly Guernsey country and it was good to see them.

For FC

For anyone who can spell and likes a good laugh

For Teri

And speaking of corn

This is outrageous!

Corn

A Teri chicken...isn't he a cutie? And tame as a kitten (thanks Teri)

The sweet corn is finally ripe...... and there is a lot of it. Thousands of fat, golden, ears, row on row, as uniform as peas in a pod. It is tasty too.( I know because we ate a LOT of it yesterday.) Posting may be a little on the light side as Liz and I endeavor to freeze enough for winter......we like corn....we really like corn. This may take a while.

We started yesterday afternoon and got a few packages done. I even did some after milking last night. I am happy to report, (while still somehow maintaining a certain level of tastefulness), that a time-honored method of raccoon prevention seems to be working. Every day, all summer, while we were milking or the guys were working on our assorted broken down tractors and machinery, when nature called they were called to duty by the evil motherperson.

Make like a dog I told them. Mark the boundaries of the corn as our territory. Tell the thrice-damned varmints where to get off. I repeated the story of Farley Mowat and the wolves and the tea pot in Never Cry Wolf.....And like the yeomen they are, they rallied despite certain misgivings on their part (they are after all guys and although the corn field isn't exactly a porch, it is an outdoor venue). I am sure they got tired of hiking up to the corn patch but there was little complaining.

Nothing else has ever kept the coons away and they got most of our corn nearly every other year. It was like a desperate race trying to beat them to our crop. This year there are a few bird ripped ears, but no coon damage so far so I am real thankful for the menfolk. It was kind of above and beyond the call of duty. Wish us luck today.......

RCMP Musical Ride

An unexpected benefit of our Vermont visit was a chance to see this incredible drill team perform. While we waited for the concert to start they did their various maneuvers right in front of the grandstand. We took pics and video of course.





This video is very short

RCMP Musical Ride


It was interesting to learn that all the riders are full fledged police officers who rotate into the ride for three years, with one third leaving each year and one third beginning their stint. We had great fun watching them. In some formations the inner horses would be barely moving, merely pivoting in place while the next rank trotted and the outer horses cantered. Truly impressive.






This one, taken by Liz is both longer and better

Vermont State Fair concert

The girls got their pictures taken with everybody, I swear. That is Caleb, Trent's bus driver, on top. On the bottom is Emerson Drive's bass player, Arlo Gilliam, who was out in the crowd between shows and was kind enough to allow a photo. I did not get my picture taken with anybody....I was behind the camera (and quite happy to be).


The fairgrounds was beautiful at night and I took some video of the lights of the rides as they moved against the sky.


E-Drive and the night sky

Liz's story

Here is Lizzie's tale of how she ended up with all access passes and getting to talk to Trent.Tomlinson





And here is a picture of the calf she named after him.

Trent Tomlinson and Emerson Drive

At the Vermont State Fair...which is a really neat fair, not at all huge and crazy and intimidating like the NYS Fair.

Froggie pause

During the great laundry epic.....

Spending the week catching up

Last night's crescent moon

And recuperating from the fair. The boss is having serious tractor troubles....again. There is talk of trading the White 2-105 in for something that isn't thirty or so years old. It has been leaking hydraulic fluid into its transmission for the past week or so. They have changed seals and pumps and tightened this that and the other thing to no avail.

Liz has most of her fair stuff put away (hallelujah). The little chickens have been moved to the chicken house so the kitchen smells much better although I miss their cheerful clucking. Alan is over his fair food excesses and is eating again. (It was hard to cook with the main eater off line...that corn dog he bought at the carnival caused considerable consternation here at Northview.) After only one week in archery class Becky has gone from putting arrows in the ground in front of the target to nailing the center ring more often then not. Now if only the horrible bruise on her forearm would fade. Her baby brother is going to take her shopping for an arm guard and loan her his compound bow.

Tomorrow the girls and I are venturing to the Vermont State Fair to see Emerson Drive again. I guess that will mark a fitting end to summer for us.

Is the moon dancing or am I just a tad unsteady?

Google Chrome

I tried out the new Google Chrome broswer today. It didn't take me long to find things that don't work as well as I would like them to. One is setting the font for blog posts. I like the way Ariel and Ariel Narrow look and I type almost everything in one or the other of those fonts.

Chrome is not happy with that and keeps changing the font setting here to "Font". If I wanted font I would leave it in font.
Dag Nab It.

I can highlight and change things to Ariel and after a while it will stay there, but seems to me there is still some work to be done. . .

Now that I have uploaded a couple of photos I discover that I can't cut and paste to move them around in the post. Irritating. After I finish writing this I will edit in Firefox.

Other things that bug me include the tab bar being above the bookmarks bar. I keep clicking the wrong thing.
And where oh, where is the edit menu so I can edit things?
Are there any other skins?
I like skins. I like colors like green.
Blue is boring....just ask Microsoft. They like blue.

I have four tool bars running in Firefox all the time and use them all. Can't seem to find that feature in Chrome if it exist (btw I am editing in Firefox now).

So far I infinitely prefer the versatility and tinkerability of Firefox. It is easy to customize it so it works and looks just like I want it to...not to mention how easy it is to have spell check running all the time. (My spelling needs the help.)





Time will tell how Chrome works out. I will certainly play with it some more. However, so far it seems too weird for my admittedly habit-bound tastes. We will see....

End 'O Fair

Thanks to the incredible generosity of certain dear family members and friends last night I was able to stay home with my feet up rather than trundle over to the fair to truck out cows and decorations and such. Only if you show cattle will you know just how sweet that was.

Anyhow I missed some potentially troublesome excitement. An especially valuable heifer, calf of a costly clone cow, disappeared. Just vanished. She was tied to the side of the huge double-decker trailer that was to haul her home one minute and nowhere to be found the next.

Panic, quite understandably, ensued. Security was summoned. Even Becky was sharply questioned, until someone who knows her well pointed out that she was one of us and they had just helped the kids and the boss load the trailer with only our own cows. I could have told them that she is about as likely to snaffle up an extra cow as she would be to run barefoot through a freshly spread field....Josh Bernstein maybe, but certainly not a cow. Not exactly a fan of the bovine our girl.

It was a worrisome situation and I hope by now the missing calf has been found. Most folks thought that in the hustle and shuffle of trying to load dozens of cows and get them out of there as fast as possible she was probably stuck somewhere in that huge trailer in the wrong compartment or with the wrong family's cattle. Several groups were being loaded at once and it was very dark. Later in the morning I will call the folks who own the farm where she is housed and find out whether they found her or not...

When the boss was just a kid of 15 or so and won junior champion with a calf he bought for fifty dollars, a number of calves at the fair were stolen in the night. He doesn't think the owners ever recovered. I hope this story has a better ending

***Update...the lost is found. Somebody had loaded her on the trailer. Right trailer, wrong section....she was in with another family's cows.

A Marriage 57 Years Young

Happy fifty-seventh anniversary to my folks, who chose to spend this benchmark in their marriage panning for gold quite some little distance from here. I hope when we reach that milestone, if indeed we do, that the boss and I have that much sense of adventure left. Right now dragging myself over to the fair seems like more than I want to undertake. Anyhow..... Congratulations Mom and Dad on making it work in a big way!' Love, from your oldest "kid".

Say it isn't so..Lynn Johnston says goodbye

In today's strip
This has been my favorite cartoon for more years than I can believe.

But we still will be able to enjoy her work.

Here is where everybody's stories are concluded. Isn't it fitting and fun that April ended up as a veterinarian for the Calgary Stampede (we kind of like rodeo here, even if we pronounce it with an "e")?

10 Sarah Palin facts

From Cattle Network

Still another day

Does anyone know this guy?

Cows did terrible...worst show ever. Fonda has always been a tough show, but wow, the judge sure hated our cows. At least Hazel won her class. Ouch.....we still love them though.And after all, we do this for fun, right?