This Is My Day Starter Upper

Oh Yaaaa!

Smelling Good

Following Others Shamelessly!

OK. Here's the deal. Family members are getting rich writing about clothes and accessories made from leather and cotton, or about the thousands of ways to buy mineral oil, soap, and perfume with whizbang names like Shazamm 48-hour body lotion or POOF! hair slicker-downer and fake shine oil.

Therefore, since we're overdue to be trendy, (plus my recurring need for cash) it's Father Time's responsibility to start reviewing clothing for men and stuff we can buy in a bottle and use in place of good old fashioned soap. After all we want to look good wherever we are, be it the grocery store, liquor store, or funeral parlor.

Right after my nap! Then I'll invite Brett Farve to join us for a review of jeans featuring a specially designed crotch. Hopefully he can clear up the mystery surrounding the need for such an accoutrement as touted in his latest ad.

Getting Back To HTML

Activating The Ancient Brain

It's been ages since I used HTML codes so I decided to see how many I could remember. Hang in there with me - this will not be interesting or factual. Just me messing with stuff to make sure I'm up to speed before attempting to blog my upcoming vacation. The game plan is to have some photos and commentary about our amazing adventures on this blog. (Hopefully not too amazing.)

Hopefully this will be in italics. If not, well..........

And this should be underlined!

And, this should flash. S...! It won't flash. Research time. There! It's fixed.

How about a link for fun. Oregon Transplant Well, that didn't work! Damn. Back to the HTML cheat sheet.

And let's end this incredibly boring post with a pic. How about this?

Oh ya! Good start. Now we need to learn how to do captions!

So there it is. Time for another cup of coffee!

So the score is Blogger 2 - Father Time 2. Not bad but much work to do. So much time and so little to do!

False Promises Again

Well, it's been awhile since I posted anything so I said to myself, "Self, it's been awhile since I posted anything so let's get back in the water and kick butt! (How bad is that metaphor?) Then I leaned back in my recliner, closed the top of my laptop, and took a nap. So, now that you know I'm motivated to be creative, let's see what's cooking around the place. First off, must mention our pending trip to Kentucky to see our daughter and son-in-law. Originally planned to fly into one of my wife's favorite cities, Boston, for a few days and then spend 10 days with J and J (secret code for you amateur sleuths). Well, looking at the calendar, we realized that three or four days in Boston in March is kinda nuts since we'd probably be snowed in our hotel room for the duration ordering room service! So, it's off to Kentucky and eating home cooked meals with the possible exception of a quick breakfast at Bob Evans. And, since Mrs Time says she doesn't like Bob Evans (I think she was suffering from acute nocturnal grain-induced systemic trauma or ANGST) the only time she was there, it will be a guys-only affair where we can talk basketball, football, mechanical stuff, and Beyonce. That should be enough to get me in trouble for the next 48 hours so I'll sign off and try to do this again sometime. No promises, just the usual good intentions and minimal commitment. Chio!

R.I.P Benjamin Bird

Today was a sad day at Father Time's Place. Here's the story as reprinted (with permission) from Father Time's World Gazette....formerly known as Father Times Times which did not receive good reviews from fellow journalists because it's title seemed a tad redundant. What do they know anyways? But I digress.

Local Bird Dies In Horrific Crash A handsome local aviator, Benjamen J Bird, age 2 or so, died today when he crashed into the picture window of a local residence and suffered a broken neck. A resident of the home heard the loud crash and rushed outside to his aid. Mr. Bird was placed on a clean towel and stroked with a warm hand but to no avail. Paramedics Chuck Daelenbach and Howard Rhoades arrived at the scene within minutes but pronounced him D.I.A. and nonviable. Since the paramedics disagreed, a neutral third party examined the beautiful specimen and said it had expired. Since no clear consensus could be determined, all parties went home in a huff. Benjamen's family was notified by placing a small red stop sign with a notification of a 24-hour fast in his honor placed on the window as well as the residence's bird feeder. Funeral arrangements are being provided by Father Time's Mortuary and Chili Stand.

It's Springtime and I'm feeling energized and ready to start posting again. This on-again, off-again routine has to cease! So let's see what happens now. There are a ton of new projects going on in my life so its time to start putting them in writing (or photos as the case may be.)

Where to start? Back yard remodel once again - it never stops. Then some backpacking stuff with pictures of some really neat areas, like Jefferson Park. Or fly fishing, or building a model of Grandma's House for Jan's Christmas diorama. We'll see....we'll see.

Yard Work - Part Two: Armegedon

And The Trees Come Tumbling Down

Here's where we started - a nicely landscaped back yard with big silver maples. Granted, they are still wearing their winter coat of barren branches, but when summer arrives, the leaves provide us with much needed shade, especially since this is the West facing side of our home. We knew it was going to be a sad couple of days as these majestic trees joined their friends in tree heaven.

For two days, chain saws sawed, branch grinders ground, while a crazy man in a hydraulic bucket rained heavy chunks of wood down on my neatly manicured lawn leaving mini bomb craters all over.

Bonneville Aftermath
After a crew of 9 "Natural Resource Specialists" (aka unemployed loggers) had finished, a total of seven trees were downed so they would not endanger the precious power lines that pass approximately 300 feet over our property.

Battle Fatigue
Things are quiet now. Sawdust covers my house and workshop. My dog LB looks at me with the battle weary eyes of a tired combat veteran. My other dog Joey is employing a little known stress reduction technique - nibbling his front paws for hours. I'm drinking fermented grape juice and suppressing anarchistic thoughts.

All is well.

Yard Work - Part One: Redesigning Your Property For Free

The title says it all!
Now, doesn't this sound exciting? If you're into piles of wood, stumps, and mounds of duff (wood chips mixed with dirt and chunks of root) then you've come to the right place.
My hope is those who love sawdust don't even know this blog exists. But since our backyard has undergone such a drastic change, those "insiders" whose names begin with "J" will have a permanent record of an exceptional non-event in the life of their mother (whose first name coincidentally also begins with "J".)

The Arrival of Bonneville's hit man.
His name is Carlos and he's very polished and suave. He explains their new policy now excludes trimming branches under power lines and only includes total annihilation of trees living happily underneath. It does not matter their power lines are about 200 feet over our yard and that no tree would ever grow that high. No, no, that's way too logical. Since they have the legal right-of-way, we can only watch as our beautiful backyard becomes the latest clear-cut in Oregon. (Luckily, we have tons of them in our National Forests so we won't have to deal with campers and tourists at all hours!)

To Be Continued
The next installment will deal with the exciting (and epic) adventures of Father Time-Urban Forester as he navigates the eccentricities and mine-bending complexities of a Federal Government Agency. (Note to Homeland Security: I am old, weak, and helpless; a veteran, a true patriot, and devoted centrist. Do not fear me. That's my kid's job.)

Like Daughter, Like Father

So Why Get Back In The Water Now?
1. Daughter Jessica starts her own blog.
2. Copy cat Dad follow suit because he has to do something between rain squalls.
3. Camera is working great and has higher resolution than my old one so photos will be awesome even though the subject will be less than epic.
4. Garden needs a regular progress report to prove that we can actually grow things besides crab grass, wild onions, and poison mushrooms.
5. Dog pics should enliven otherwise drab posts.
6. I get to use cool words like epic, awesome, and lech.
7. Time for wine. Bye!

Friends

There are times when seniors actually have fun. Life is not all about doctors' appointments and getting prescriptions filled. Some of us even drink alcoholic beverages - in moderation. Just enough to insure the next morning is something we can look forward to.

In my humble opinion, this is the best way to start off 2011.

Whoops - Forgot the Annual P-38 Post

Correcting a Grievous Error

My last post, which in essence said "Goodbye", contained a monumental error. I failed to follow though on my long held tradition of honoring the finest WWII airplane that had two engines - the Lockheed P-38 Lightening. I consider that error corrected.

Goodbye From Father Time

No Time Left For Blogging
For the past six months, It's been obvious there were not enough hours in the day to do everything I want to do. When I first retired I was immersed in reading and researching topics and areas of interest I had neglected during my working years. The more I learned the more I realized how little I really knew about things I considered important. Right now with a large home to care for, woodworking projects that never seem to reach the finished stage, Mount Jefferson calling me to come and visit again, and a changing world in general, I finally realized some activities were going to have to go by the wayside. Unfortunately, one of those activities is this blog.

Maybe But No Promises
I may return someday. If my health ever deteriorates to the point that I'm not able to do all this physical stuff, I will probably find my way back to "the place" and start writing here again. Right now this blog reminds me of a home that is half built and then abandoned. (I'm sure some would suggest that it's more like a chicken coup than a house!)

With that half-hearted promise and hat in hand, I'm going to grab my fly rod and head on down the road.

Time To Get Back Here

I know it has been awhile but spare time has been a luxury for the past six months. Things are a little more calm now and I should have some time to post a few things of interest to those who follow my chaotic life style.

See you soon!

Wherein Father Time Does Manual Labor Part 2

So I prevaricated
Yes, the workload was more than I expected and yes - today is not the tomorrow I promised in Part 1. Please send your Notice of intent to file a tort claim directly to me by e-mail. It will be dealt with accordingly.

The landscape designer arrives
Our co-conspirator on the yard project is an outstanding former horticulture professor at our local university. Upon his arrival we chatted for a few minutes about our ideas for the area which is dominated by a huge silver maple. The spot measures approximately 30'x30' and features some massive Anaconda-like roots (which are normal for the infamously shallow-rooted silver maple.)

Said landscape designer pulls out a 5-gallon pail for a stool and proceeds to sketch out, to scale, a plan featuring an amazing array of shade-tolerant, shallow-rooted plants. Examples - a strawberry tree, blue fescue, hostas, thyme, seddum, and several Latin named plants of mysterious origin.

When he left, I had a master plan and two weeks for implementation.

The root of the problem
The first order of business was digging out a pathway from one side to the other without encountering any mammoth roots. Mission accomplished? Nope! This root (partly visible in this picture) was right in the middle of the sweeping designer curve, so using landscaper terminology, it became a "natural feature." Isn't that special!

So where do we go from here?
Part 3 will feature our attempts at planting scrubs and flowers in the weed infested area. Be assured a good time will be had by all right after we're released from the hospital for heat exhaustion. Just kidding. I hope.

Wherein Father Time Does Manual Labor Part 1

The Set Up
In an earlier post I mentioned my daughter and her fiance are getting married in Father and Ms Time's backyard. Normally, that would be a great idea given that Oregon summers are usually warm and toasty, and contrary to populist myth, are usually rain free. So far, no problem.

The Problem
The area where they plan on making their grand entrance is adjacent to a much-neglected piece of land formerly landscaped with a water feature and a couple of rose bushes. Due to time constraints and my penchant for fishing and hiking, the area was covered in ivy with the water feature buried beneath, and is home to a variety of unsavory pests and reptiles. OK so they're not that bad - a garter snake, two salamanders, and some truly awesome slugs. Yuk!

At any rate, the ivy is now history, or it's at least gone underground, (Hah!) and all animal life transported to new digs in an empty field with a nice cool creek next door. So far so good.

Enter The Landscape Architect.
Those of you who can't tolerate tales from the crypt, or photographs of water boarding, or televised gall bladder operations, should stop reading now and move on to a blog describing Adolph Hitler's last hours. Father Time in his infinite wisdom (see previous post) hired a local landscape designer to share his thoughts on how we should proceed with our now bald and craterd land.

To be continued tomorrow. I promise. I need a beer.

Father Time Dinks Around With The Metaphysical

Time is not finite

Isn't that awesome? I read it in a book for intellectuals. While I was at our local library (the one run by Buddhists), I "borrowed" the book from a shelf marked "Intellectuals Only". It was written in bold gold Sanskrit surrounded by dragons. On second thought it might have been for "Ineffectuals Only" . Actually I'm not sure. My Sanskrit is a little rusty.

What I am sure of is it was printed in Sanskrit, a language in which I used to be relatively fluent. Sanskrit employs an unusual alphabet which makes it a difficult language to master. My mentor was a special forces Sergeant who taught foreign languages at Louisiana State University during the Korean conflict. It was a crash course intended to help us with master escape and evasion tactics if we were ever captured by Buddhist terrorists. There were hundreds of them in the swamps of Louisiana.

But I digress.

Time is an either or proposition

It doesn't get any better than this.

Take, for example, an automobile driving at 85 mph. Behind that car is another car poking along at 75 mph. The driver of the first car is happy knowing he's going to arrive at his destination ahead of the car behind. But the lapsed time difference between the two cars when they arrive at their common 25 mile destination is only 30 seconds.

The moral of this story? Both drivers broke the law and deserve to do time.

Is Father Time losing it?

Absolutely not. In fact, he's just found it!

The Blog Is Not Dead; The Proprietor Is Just Tired

Nothing more, nothing less. Facebook and Twitter may be better for communications but this is my toy and my place to play.

Enjoy!

The Music Critic's Corner

Ever heard Dilmon Ivory play the piano?

He is absolutely amazing. In fact, "amazing" is far too mild an adjective to describe Ivory's music. In fact, there are no words to adequately describe the way this man plays the piano.

For starters, let's break down his repertoire. He plays the music of one composer - Dilmon Ivory. It's as if there's an unrestricted flow of music from his brain to his hands. Nothing is written or planned in advance. He starts playing and the music ends when he's too tired to play anymore or that part of his brain that spawns (or maybe "regurgitates") the music finally runs out of gas.

Basically, there's no harmony or rhythm to be heard

Let's talk about the melodies incorporated into his compositions. There are none, absolutely none!

How about key and time signatures; what key is it written in and how many beats per measure? Zero, nada! None whatsoever.

So what do we have?

Technique. Unbelievable, unimaginable dexterity and speed.

When it comes to technique, he's on a par with great pianists like Rachmaninoff, Beethoven, Chopin, or Mozart. In every other category however, he couldn't water for them. He possesses no knowledge of composition or music theory. What he hears in his head he somehow transmits to his piano keys. Whether this is some kind of mental illness, or he just possesses a weird skill is open to question. No one to my knowledge has ever demonstrated this kind of unearthly ability; what he does is hard to classify. He just makes his fingers fly over the keys in ways that are impossible to describe.

All I can say is you need to hear it once. You'll never forget it!

WOW - Father Time In Hyperdrive Is Killer!

Putting on the brakes

My absence is not deliberate; maybe semi-deliberate is more accurate. I keep forgetting to put make sure to update my blog on my priority list. More accurately, I consider finding my priority list the #1 item on my priority list. Yes, I know that makes no sense unless you're Father Time. But hey! Retirement is about living life at a less hectic pace, right? For example, priority lists are not shown as an ingredient in relaxation recipes. Go to the Food Network web site and look it up. I kid you not!

Other stuff for relatives and friends

[If you're looking at this blog for the first time, pass on this part. It will make no sense whatsoever.] As if it ever did!

Item #1 - Daughter and prospective son-in-law have decided that fiscal conservatism makes more sense than spending money foolishly. Note to Fly. This is not a capitulation or subscription to your wayward political views in any way shape or form. It's just another use for the word "conservatism." You can stop jumping up and down on your Cabela camouflage camping stool now.

So the marriage in Las Vegas, and the honeymoon in Jamaica have been canceled. The new plan is having the wedding and reception at Father and Ms. Time's palatial estate. Note to those who've visited my home before - "palatial" is a classic example of the concept of "using inappropriate bogus adjectives to cover feelings of inadequacy." See Freud's Gone With The Wind, Chapter 13, Par. 12, Line 11.

And there we have it!

So, in one short post, the latest chapter in the life of Father Time. In our next post, we cover item #2 - "Father Time converts the back yard from a forest to an idyllic sight for a wedding." It should be great and will probably be written from a hospital bed using my laptop!

Checking In

Pant, pant!
I have reached a point in my life where every day is a whirlwind of activity and it HAS to cease!

Fellow retirees have warned me that energy sapping stress replaces fun when one lives a "hurry-hurry rush-rush" focused lifestyle. Being arrogant by nature, I ignored their warnings.

What a horrific price to pay for being bull-headed!

So?
As of April 1st - and that's not a joke - I'm restructuring my life so that more time becomes available for me to do the things I enjoy, like fly-fishing, backpacking, woodworking, reading, and cooking.

Accordingly, some activities will disappear from my life. Sadly, one will be my board role for our local developmentally disabled housing non-profit. My conscience bothered me when I first made this decision, but looking back over almost 35 years of non-profit boards, I feel I've earned a break. Secondly, my Hospice volunteer role will be limited to only one client at a time. Refer to the third sentence in this paragraph for my feelings on that!

And what will I do with all that time?
Well, let's talk fun! For instance, I added a enjoyable task to my To Do list - getting the back forty ready for our daughter's wedding reception in early September. Now that's something I will take on gladly. And as a side benefit, it will feel great to work my butt off while simultaneously getting these old bones in shape for some awesome fall backpacks.

Plus, a hidden benefit is buried in the whole package. For my birthday in about six weeks, I've dropped about a hundred hints on why I need a new small, light-weight camera. It will take great "wedding reception" pictures (and even better backpacking shots.)

Who knows? I may even get a pic or two of some trout to torment my relatives in Michigan and friends in Las Vegas. Yummy, fresh caught, and cooked over an open fire with a little butter and wild onions.

Wouldn't that be evil? Heh, heh!