At the Trade Lot & And the Future of Fat

The Fuzz's Sweetie has been working on this for a while now. This weekend we finally went to the trade lot to try out a Henna Booth. Actually there was no "booth" as such, only a card table and some chairs. But there were actually some takers. Here is an example of what we're talking about.
These are actually the feet of a volunteer used for demonstration purposes.
I am happy to say, that while there was not a large profit, Things did at least break even. And it was a positive experience, even for The Fuzz.

And now a note from the news.

"Feds to Monitor Obesity"

It seems that part of our Heath Care Reform involves sending you Fatness Quotient to the government.

We quote,

"[T]he Obama administration sets its sights on overweight Americans, demanding obesity ratings for all citizens by 2014..."

And,

"... under the stimulus law, health care providers must establish "meaningful use" of electronic health records to qualify for federal subsidies or risk seeing their Medicare and Medicaid payments slashed. The electronic health records must include Americans' body mass index, or BMI, height and weight."

And lastly,

"... a study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that $147 billion is spent annually on obesity-related costs, or 10 percent of medical costs."

It's all about money.

Turtles & Ice Cream

Backtracking a bit.

You may remember that while we were at the beach, The Fuzz, His Sweetie and that Young Daughter payed a visit to the Aquarium.
Outside there was this pond full of Turtles.

It wasn't easy to get good pix of them with the glare from the sunlight. But The Fuzz tried.
Here are a couple Turtles hanging out with one of the Fishes.This next one is just a bunch of them hanging out together.
I suppose they are "Happy Together", but that will probably date the Old Fuzz.

In other news,
They are working on the highway near here. The way this was discovered is as follows.

The other day, The Fuzz's Sweetie made us a mess of Delicious Peach Cobbler. As we were enjoying it, the subject of Whipped Cream, or even Vanilla Ice Cream came up. With only the 3 of us, we still had half of it left, "for tomorrow". With this in mind, The Fuzz decided to grab some on the way home from work. It is about 10 miles from the store to our home in the woods, and The Fuzz was traveling by motorcycle in this 94° heat. But he did have a plan. He carefully wrapped his Delicious Vanilla Ice Cream up in his unneeded vest + a shirt, and hurriedly packed all away in the saddlebag. (right above the exhaust)
He also planned his route. Usually, on his ride home he takes a less traveled, more laid-back route. But this time in the interest of speed, he opted for the main road. You can imagine his dismay when half way home he came upon the road crew. It is one of those repaving deals, with the long wait for the "Pilot Truck" to guide all the unhappy victims along. Bummer.
The good news is, that with all the extra wrapping and all, that Ice Cream did, in fact, survive the trip and was safely stashed in the freezer.
And it was just the thing for our Delicious Peach Cobbler.

Beach Art, 2010

On our recent Beach Trip that creative New Daddy decided to take up Sand Sculpture.

Here is a look at his handiwork.
He drew quite a crowd.
Pretty nice.

Mystery Pix

Another Exciting Mystery Pix
for your enjoyment.

Water Woes

This weekend we were just going about our business. The Fuzz and His Sweetie had been to town for some quick gardening at the old place.
When they got back to their home in the woods, she began working on several loads of clothes for the washer. After about 3 loads, the trouble started.
His Sweetie had just started the 4th load, and was ready for a shower, when suddenly, there was no water! The Fuzz was a bit surprised. He had thought there was plenty of water in spite of the dry weather. So, he went out to the well to check things out. After a short wait, he cut the power back on, and was relieved to see water come from the spigot at the well. At this point, he assumed it was simply a matter of waiting for the well to fill back up. His Sweetie would have to get dressed and postpone her shower. So, they waited. And waited. Then that evening as it was growing dark, it was discovered that the toilet tank was not refilling. Now it seemed like there must be a different sort of problem. Leaping into action, The Fuzz donned his Trusty "head light" (A gift from His Sweetie) and headed out for some further investigation. It seems there was, in fact, a malfunction.
If you study the Pix above, you will notice at A, the contact points being screwed up. They should look like those at B.
By now it was too late to do anything about it, so the Fuzz's Sweetie (and that Fuzz himself) was forced to go to bed without that nice hot shower*.
This morning, The Fuzz called his boss man and explained that he wouldn't be coming in until He and His Sweetie had water again. No doubt he made it to the "Bad Boy List" for this, but it was necessary.
Well, he rode into town, and picked up a replacement pressure switch. He got it installed before the gully washer hit. And as can be seen here, there is running water once again.

And one last thing-
Here is a close up of our little friend who lives on our wonderful well.


*It should be pointed out that The Fuzz's Sweetie did resort to the old "Spit Bath" routine before retiring for the night.

Mountainous Motorcycling

We didn't have any "Big and Evil Plans" for the weekend. So when His Sweetie mentioned that it might be a good time for a motorcycle trip to the mountains, The Fuzz agreed.This is a look at Table Rock from the Blue Ridge Parkway. It has been hot and dry around here but up there it was rather pleasant.
He started out on some of the local country roads rather then heading straight for the main one. He was hoping to avoid that first, relatively boring section. He had some local maps since he was unfamiliar with this area, and had a route planned out. While he was looking for one of his turns, he passed up this old house and decided to turn back for some pix. Then, as he was getting ready to pull off, he noticed the name of that gravel road he was next to. It turned out it had been the road he was looking for. Although he lives on a dirt road, he is not fond of riding his street bike on loose gravel. But this was where he needed to go, so he carefully set off. He made it to the highway with out mishap, and headed off for the highlands.
I am happy to relate, that he had an excellent ride . There was lots of variety. Some twisties to keep him on his toes, and the fairly mellow Parkway. And he made it home safe and sound, and with a rather sore butt.

Fort Fisher

Since we were already there to see the aquarium, we decided to visit Fort Fisher. This is one of the remaining batteries at the historic site. A good bit of what was once the seaward fortifications have been eroded away. There is a museum there that has an impressive display that takes you through the battle step by step with a cool light show.
The fort guarded the port of Wilmington, NC which was the last port open to Confederate blockade runners.

Here is a link to a Wikipedia entry on Fort Fisher.

Something Fishy

We had been talking about going to the aquarium for a couple years now. This year was the year. So we took a day to head off to the North Carolina Aquarium at Fort Fisher.
Here's a look at some of the people looking at the fishes. There were a lot of fishes there. And some other stuff.
Like Luna, the Albino Alligator.










The Fuzz couldn't resist this Photo Opportunity, so here she is!
Yup, that's Luna, alright.
We went on though the place looking at all kinds of fishes. Some of them can get pretty weird looking. And some are just beautiful.
But The Fuzz regrets that it is a little difficult getting good pix in a place like that.
But he did get a shot of this little feller. He kinda reminded us of an insurance salesman.
But you can make up your own mind about that.
We did enjoy seeing all the fishes. Afterwards, we hit the gift shop for a couple post cards.
On the way out Young Daughter and The Fuzz's Sweetie talked him into stopping for some "Mocha Cappuccino Chiller". But that wasn't difficult.

4th of July

In honor of the 4th, (or what's left of it) Here's Old Glory, back there at the beach.
Yes, we did make it back to our home in the woods.
And, The Fuzz will try to get some pix up soon.
But not now, It's, like, midnight, and he is thinking about how good that bed would feel about now.
But there will be lots of exciting stuff.
Like the Aquarium.
And Fort Fisher itself, or what's left of it.
But since it is the 4th of July still, here's a bit of pyrotechnics for you.

Another Mystery Pix

The Mystery Pix has turned out blue

But what it is is up to you 

We made it to the beach.

The Fuzz went out for a walk this morning, around sunrise.

He watched this little bird getting some breakfast.

Yet Another

Here's
an
easy
one
for
ya.

Doggy Henna Tummy

How about this one.

A Doggy Henna Tummy!
Does somebody have too much time on they're hands?
Or is it just for fun.
But how did they get the pooch so passive?
Another of life's great mysteries.

Regarding That Mystery Pix

Well, since everyone is waiting for the mystery to be reveled, here it is.Actually, that Vi seemed to have it.
But, for some reason she wouldn't come out and just say it.
The Fuzz got this shot a while back when we went to hear the Air Force's
Heritage Aire Celtic Ensemble.
They were pretty good, actually, real good.
The people who played were not all the same ones as in the pix on the web site*, but they were impressive. The Fuzz is quite fond of this sort of music. And for an example of your tax dollars at work, we sent off for a free official CD of this great music, courtesy of our Uncle Sam.

*This seems to have something to due with the military's way of doing things, which we won't get into here.

Little Mac

Meet, Little Mac.

Little Mac is the latest addition to The Fuzz's tool kit. He is hoping that Little Mac will help out with his latest project. Little Mac has the advantage of being portable, unlike our Main Mac.

This means that Little Mac can travel, like maybe to the beach, or some other place.
Little Mac is not what one would consider "State of the Art", but should suffice for anything The Fuzz can handle, himself.
It just seemed right to explain why The Fuzz has been a bit slack here lately. So, there you have it. It's hard to believe that only a few short years ago The Fuzz didn't even know how to cut one of these things on. But now he's been dragged into this 21st century, big time.

Latest Mystery Pix

And here it is
Our latest exciting
Mystery Pix!

More Turtle Stuff

We have had a few Turtle Posts lately. So The Fuzz says, why not one more? So here we go again.
The Fuzz's Sweetie found this one digging a hole not far from our Spiffy Brick Patio. We assume it is a she, and she was fixing to lay some eggs.
We did play with her, just a little.
But then, we let her go to finish her business. Which she did. The Fuzz's Sweetie noted the location for preservation, and perhaps, sometime, we may be able to see even more tiny turtles tripping around out here!

Movie Stuff

It seems like the old Fuzz has been getting a bit slack here. I would make excuses for him, how he's been busy and all. But, I mean, not posting since the 6th?
The truth is he has been involved in another project, which we won't get into at this time.We did watch this flick last night, Renaissance. It was pretty good. It was done in an unusual style, as you can see from this pix The Fuzz ripped off.

Here's a couple more pix to illustrate. We did enjoy the change from what you usually see.

This approach went well with the futuristic plot. It's worth watching and comes with The Fuzz's recommendation. How can you beat that?
We got it from that infamous Netflix.

Bambi

The other day, as we were winding down for the evening, the Young Daughter came running in, wanting us to "come quick".She had been down in the woods by the creek and found this little Fawn. The Fuzz and His Sweetie ran down to look and it was still there.
Realizing this was one of those Photo Opportunities, The Fuzz ran back for his camera.The little thing didn't seem to be afraid of us. We were able to walk up to it and pet on it.
We never did see Mommy anywhere though.
We finally went back up to the trailer figuring Mommy would show up to get Little Bambi. And later when we checked on him, he was gone.

Yet Another Mystery Pix

Let's start the month with a nice easy Mystery Pix.

Sheepdog Trials

We went over to see a bit of the Sheepdog Trials Saturday.
It was pretty interesting. The Fuzz's Sweetie saw something about it in the local paper. We had heard of it before, but never thought to go.
As you can see in the picture above, there were a lot of these black and white dogs there.
This was a first for us. The Fuzz's Sweetie brought along a friend who was interested also. The folks out there seemed nice enough. They were willing to answer The Fuzz's pretty basic questions about what was going on out there. We enjoyed it.
First the dog has to run all the way across the field to get the sheep. These shots were taken with a zoomy-type lens so the distance is a bit distorted. It was really a pretty good ways across.
The dog has to herd the 4 sheep back across the field to the handler, who I guess is a sheepherder. On the way they are supposed to pass though a gate out there in the middle of the middle. You can see that happening in that 2nd pix. After they get to the handler, he/she sends them back out to pass though a couple more gates out in the field. The handler is using a whistle to tell the dog where to take the sheep. When they get back again, the dog and handler have to separate the sheep into two groups. This seems to be a bit tricky as the sheep don't seem to like it. That's what they're doing in those next couple pix. After that, they put them in a small pen. All this has to happen in 9 min. The dog in that next pix looks just a little different than the others. The woman said it has a bit of Bearded Collie in it. What ever it was, it seemed to do the best out of the few we saw.And here's a couple of the spectators taking it easy in the shade.

Turtles Of The East

Since we're on this Turtle Thing, The Fuzz thought it might be a good time for this wonderful
Turtle Combo.

This was a collaborative effort by a couple of local unknowns.
Hope you enjoy it.

More Turtles

And since we're on the subject, here's a look at some more Turtles in a rendition by one of The Fuzz's favorite Little Known Local Artists.

Slow Visitor

Things have been a bit slow around here lately. We have been staying busy, but not much of anything new or exciting. Until now.
As The Fuzz looked out the window the other day, (We won't go into detail on what he was doing at the time) he saw this visitor out in the yard by the edge of the woods.As you can see, he's a pretty good sized fellow. And mean. I suppose The Fuzz might have aggravated him a little, but this does seem to be a bit of overreaction.
He couldn't even get along with the Kitty Cats. What a Grouch!The Fuzz doesn't understand why he was so unsociable, but in the end there was nothing left for it but to just leave him to himself. But The Fuzz was thankful to still have all his fingers. We got tiered of waiting for him to leave, so we just went back to our own affairs. Later in the day, he was gone, who knows where.

Alice Packer

The Fuzz took Alice camping this weekend.
His Sweetie and Young Daughter went too. Here is a picture of Alice, his ALICE pack. In this shot Alice has been removed from the frame The Fuzz rides her on. This is a handy feature since it's easier to squeeze her into the tent with His Sweetie and himself. The Fuzz picked up Alice one day at work some time ago. That was back before the New World Order where the trash is never handled by real people.
In that situation, Alice would have been doomed. But thankfully, those were saner days, and Alice was rescued. Still, she had no visible means of support at the time, but that big hearted Fuzz took her in anyway. Just a little modification was all that was needed to make her a match for his old pack frame, and they have gone on to serve together quite effectively.
They did have a fine camping trip. It was short, only 1 night, but the weather was excellent. It was good to get off into the mountains again even if only for a short time.