And the princess can't swim

As some of you might remember, my daughter (the princess) lives on the Mississippi River. More appropriately, she's presently living in the

Mississippi River

.



(Click photos to enlarge)

Nothin like bein able to jet-ski or boat right up to your front door. Keep in mind, however...the front door is on the second floor of the house. While the main living quarters are on the top floor, they have...or had...a spare bedroom, bathroom, washer and dryer and spare fridge on the second. The ground-level part of the house is composed of a huge storage area and a ginormous covered concrete patio.



The Mississippi...under normal circumstances...is about...oh...I dunno. (I'm a piss-poor judge of distance.) A couple hundred feet or so to the right (the front) of the house. This view is from the side.

The kids have to take a boat from the house to higher ground (towards the back of the house) where the car and trucks are parked. At least twice a day. Every day. To and from work. Packing groceries and whatever else they need. 'Course, that entails gettin yourself...and all your packages...from the boat to the house...and climb over the deck rail...without fallin in.

Unfortunately, the other day, Jules wasn't so lucky. Thankfully, she always wears a life jacket on her back-and-forth trips. (No, she really can't swim) A belly full of that nasty river water and a few scrapes and bruises were the result. Luckily, her s/o was just behind her on the jet-ski and he was able to pluck her outa the drink. So to speak.

Gawd bless 'em for havin the balls to stick it out, though. Me? I'd have been loungin in a king-sized bed at the local Holiday Inn long before this point.






But I do understand 'em wantin to stay home. I mean...it's home. And, after livin alongside my own river for a while now, I understand. No matter how many bad days ya have on the river, they can't erase the good ones.

I'll only use one of 'em

Shit.

They have a great sense of timing

Almost exactly a year ago, we experienced our first

Mayfly Bloom

.

They're baaaaaack.





Most of the ones stuck to our neighbor's house are dead. Dried up husks of their former ephemeral buggy selves. I'm not sure exactly why they prefer our neighbors house to ours. We have some stuck to the sides, but they definitely like next door better. I'm assuming it's something about the color that attracts 'em. Their house is cream-colored...ours is light blue.





They also seem to prefer my light-colored plants over the dark ones to succumb upon.



They're kind of a pain in the ass, even though the "blooms" usually only last a day or so. They tend to clog up stuff cause there's so damn many of 'em.

But we've got some of the fattest birds ya ever saw around here.

This is too good to pass up

Peoria is hosting a...um...ah...

Cornhole

tournament.

Maybe it's just my perverted sense of humor, but I can't resist highlighting some of the little gems of the article...like this...

"A growing number of people in the Midwest are now playing cornhole, especially when friends and family get together", Glatz said.

And this...

As Glatz said, the popularity of the game for tailgate parties and picnics is also because of its simplicity and ease. "You can pack it up and take it with you anywhere," he said.

I can't help but think whomever invented Cornhole had a perverted sense of humor, too.

I was bitten by the freak bug

And not in a good way.

I don't know what it was. But I sure as shit don't want it again. It was a "two-fer".

I felt fine when I went to bed Saturday night. A couple of hours later, I was coughin my head off...and I was nauseated beyond description. I tossed and turned all night.

By the time early Sunday morning rolled around, I was....sick. I'm not kiddin. I was sicker than I can remember being in years. I seemed to have some kinda stomach bug and some kinda respiratory bug...at the same fuckin time.

Fever; chills; deep, wracking cough (I'm talkin "cough up a lung" kinda cough); stuffy nose; stomach cramps; vomiting. Smiling upon my fevered head, The Sick Gods spared me diarrhea. That was small comfort.

I'm not shittin ya, (no pun intended) my skin hurt. My hair hurt.

By 8 pm last night, I yearned for death.

Today? Better, but definitely not...well. Every little exertion leaves me shaky and sweatin like the proverbial whore in church. I still have a lingering, deep cough and feel kinda like Tony Soprano beat me with a bar of soap in a sock.

Freaky.

Free with purchase

We made a trip to the local hardware store here in our little town on Saturday. We needed a new kitchen faucet and a few other little things.

Now I happen to love hardware stores. But I really love this particular one. It has a pet department. No kiddin. They have fish, lizards, mice, rats, hamsters, gerbils, birds...mostly small-type pets. On occasion, they've also had ferrets, kittens and puppies. Since the bigger pets aren't always available, I suspect that some are strays. People "donate" them to the hardware store, rather than take them to the local shelter.

Hey...I said it's a little town, didn't I?

So, when we checked out on Saturday, we'd found the perfect faucet, a couple of supply lines, a new scratching box for Stewie....and a bargain...

Honest ta gawd...when I asked how much the kittens were, the reply was, "They're free with the purchase of any pet item."



I mean...who could resist this face? Not me, obviously. And I think Ziggy even kinda likes him.



The jury's still out as far as Stewie is concerned, though. He's not impressed. Luckily, though, he seems to have accepted him pretty well. He hasn't killed him yet, anyway.

I'll hafta have the vet check him out...and get him fixed...but he seems to be pretty darned healthy. I have no idea how old he is, but I'm guessin around 8-10 weeks. And he's a lover, unlike Stewie, who could care less if anyone ever loved on him again.

"Just gimme food and water, bitch...oh, and keep my shit-box clean. That's all I want from the likes of you." Just think of Stewie on The Family Guy. Same attitude.

Ziggy, not exactly a cat person in the first place, says we're well on our way to becoming "the crazy, old cat people." I disagree. Cleanin a cat box that two cats use is as far as I wanna go, thank you very much.

We haven't named him yet. But a hardware-associated name seems appropriate. Zig suggested "Geiger"...because that's the name of the store. He also suggested "Bogo". (But one, get one...) I always wanted a pair of cats named "Wingnut" and "Deadbolt"...but Stewie is already...well...Stewie. Not that he'd know it if we changed his name. He doesn't come when we call him, any damn way.
"Smokey" or "Puff" is just too...trite. Every other grey, long-haired cat in the world is named Smokey or Puff.



I dunno...I guess we'll wait and see what kinda personality he develops. For the time being, he's "FuzzButt".

Foreskin or no foreskin.....

...that is the question.

Whether 'tis nobler to have been circumcised....ah...nevermind. Got a little carried away with that.

I've heard more about

Jeff Pelo's penis

, not to mention his porn-viewing habits, than I ever wanted to know.

I think he's guilty...of somethin. Whether or not he stalked and raped those women is beside the point. I like a little porn, but anybody that gets off on bondage and torture porn has a screw loose, somewhere, IMHO. He's just...shifty lookin, ain't he?


* * * * * * * * * * *




Caught The Spirit of Peoria crusin upriver the other day. Though it's surely not the first time it's been out, it's the first time I've seen 'er this year. Watchin her majestically cruise by makes me feel like Huck Finn. heh
* * * * * * * * * * *

Our old Toshiba Satellite laptop finally bit the big one the other day. It wheezed and choked and finally just died. It was a dandy, though. Gave us very little trouble...and no problems that the Zigster couldn't figure out on his own.

We'd had it for...oh...I dunno...at least 5 years...and dragged it all around the country with us. I have no idea what the lifespan of a laptop is, but it seems to me that 5 years might be pretty good. We kicked around the idea of gettin a Mac, but wound up buyin another Toshiba...same model, too. Ya don't mess with success, huh? I was a little worried about Vista, but as far as I can tell, it's just kinda...clumsy. Maybe it's just me. You'd think though, fer chrissake, with all the technology they have they could make it...simple. Ya know? Like those Jitterbug cell phones for us old fucks?

Now we've gotta figure out a way to destroy the old hard drive. So nobody'll find the porn we've got saved and think we're perverts. Ooook. So nobody can prove we're perverts. heh

Meandering...

...in more ways than one.

Went to our...well, it was supposed to be our annual "Buffet Party" in Springfield this weekend. The DJ played exactly one Buffet song. He did, however, play a lotta...um...how shall I put this?...hip/hop/rap?...shit.

(Buffet? Ha! Buffet this, bi-otch.)

I guess I've officially turned into an old curmudgeonette. I mean, I hafta listen to that boom-boom-boom shit every day at work while I'm out, runnin the town. I don't wanna hafta listen to it on my time off, too.
It was nice to see some of our pals that we haven't seen in several months, though.

And the drive down and back was awesome. It's the first nice weekend we've had a chance to get out in the 'vert with the top down. It was glorious. We decided to take the "scenic" route on the way home Sunday...we ditched I-55 and picked up 136 into Havana.

We cruised the old hometown once. Good gawd! That place is gonna dry up and blow away. I swear...it was pretty much like the last 10 years I've been away never happened. Everything is exactly the same. Except there's less of it. Soooo sad. Pitiful, really.

About halfway between Havana and Peoria, we drove into a big, ole black cloud. The temp dropped from 86 to 69 and we laughed and giggled like a coupla idiots as the cold rain started beatin down on our sunburned faces...but we didn't pull off and put the top up. Oh, no. That's for pussies. Besides that, we figured just about the time we'd get pulled over and get the top up, it'd stop. And it did. Finally. heh



I love gettin out in the converible, top down, wind blowin yer hair. Ya get a much better view of...well...everything. Unfortunately, ya get a much better smell, too. It's especially...fragrant...now that the state can't afford to pick up the roadkill. Fuckin lovely.
*********

We have a red-winged blackbird that evidently has a nest in one of our trees. And he/she's very territorial. Though he/she's never swooped me, he/she has gone after Ziggy. Several times. And he/she came after the neighbor with that jihadist suicide bomber look in her eye yesterday evening. I KILL you! He'd been out washin his windows and he started runnin through the yard, swingin a towel around his head, tryin to keep him/her from peckin him on the head. Pretty funny stuff.

As long as it's not me. hehe