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| Week One: |
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| Don't forget to check out the Halloween pictures from the last of October. |
My little runaway, Aries, doesn't get to go on
any more car rides to Jim's house for a while. Instead, I keep him
in the laundry basket, so I always know where he is.
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The Harvest Moon rises over
Canton
(this picture was taken at the end of October) |
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Week Two: |
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| Shrinking this picture, it lost some of
the clarity; but if you look closely near the center, you'll see a
"sun dog". This a relatively common atmospheric optical phenomenon
associated with the refraction of sunlight by small ice crystals
that make up cirrus or cirrostratus clouds. We frequently see these
here in Ohio during the Fall. As it is starting to get colder, those
ice crystals are building up in the atmosphere. It won't be long
till we see those ice crystals on the ground (as snow!). |
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Jim helped me tear down the last of the
morning glory vines. All of my flower beds are now cleared out,
cleaned up, fertilized and covered for the Winter. In another five
months or so
 , I'll be re-planting and watching for the first pants
to emerge from the ground. |
| Once again, little Ella gets a section
in my update. I have to give Tara some extra credit for taking some
really good pictures of her little "pumpkin". Between going to the
professional photographer (for the monthly picture that Tara sends
me) and
her mom's photography, little Ella needs to think about a modeling
career.
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Tara took quite a few
impressive pictures,
even venturing to try some effects, like this
sepia-tone one. |
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Time for a few literary reviews
I recently finished a trilogy of books (The Taken Trilogy)
by Alan Dean Foster. The first book (Lost and Found)
in this humorous science fiction series is about a guy that is
abducted by aliens and finds that Earth is actually out in the
backwaters of a giant inter-galactic society. The only problem is
that these aliens are planning on selling him as a slave, along with
various other kidnapped aliens, including an enhanced dog taken from
Chicago that can now speak. In the second book (The
Light-Years Beneath My Feet), the Earth duo has gotten free,
however since no other aliens know where Earth is, they start on a
long journey to find home. By the end of the last book (The
Candle of Distant Earth), they have befriended many
different aliens, had a ton of adventures, and returned to
Earth leading an armada of alien spaceships.
If you like sci-fi and want a cute, quick read, then I recommend
these books. |
It only took me a day and a half to
finish up one of the newest Dean Koontz novel, The Husband.
If you've never read anything by Dean Koontz, what's the
matter with you?!?
Like Stephen King, Koontz has been a prolific writer of mainly
horror/sci-fi/murder/mystery books. This isn't the best book that
he's written (that would either by The Bad Place, or The Watchers);
but it's a very good read, and definitely a serious page-turner. If
you like Dean Koontz, make sure not to miss this one. If you've
never read his works before, try this one, and then go read some of
the other 50+ that he has out on the shelves of bookstores and
libraries around the country.
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| I've been lucky lately. Some of these
books that I've been reading have actually been really good.
The problem with that though, is that the books don't last long
enough. I was done with the Alan Dean Foster trilogy in about 5
days, the Koontz novel was a day and a half, while the latest book
that I devoured took only 3 days. Just before we celebrate the
Thanksgiving holiday, I read Dan Brown's (author of "The Da Vinci
Code") previous book, Angels and Demons. I enjoyed the
"Da Vinci Code" but never understood all that fuss surrounded that
novel and the movie (which is out now on DVD. We'll probably rent it
soon, as Jim is just about finished reading that book). Demon
and Angels was a much better story to read and I plowed
right through it, staying up until 3:30am to finish it up the other
night. |
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Week Three: |
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| Jim and I took a trip over to see
Carolynn the other day and passed by our "friend" Herman the camel,
to find that Herman has a bunch of new friends now. There are nearly
a dozen camels on the farm now. |
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| One of these days, one of these camels
is going to spit on Jim for sure.
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It's been a pretty warm Fall so far
this year. Usually by this time, we have had a little bit of snow.
For the last several years, we've seen the first snow on
Thanksgiving morning. This year it was just a few days early; but it
wasn't much at all. By nine o'clock, what little had fallen was
gone.
(that's my poor broken down, flat-tired Taurus
maybe some day I'll be able to get it fixed, and get plates for it
again.
) |
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Week Four: |
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Speaking of Jim, I should probably
update some of you on the latest news about him. He's no longer
working at the Nissan dealership and is back to looking for
employment.
After missing a couple of days at the end of last month (from being
sick with that sinusitis and flu-y stuff), he returned to work to be
let go with several other sales people due to low sales (on their
part, and part of the whole industry in this area). Jim has been
going on quite a lot of interviews (one was in Salem, that's why we
recently visited with Carolynn, and Herman & co.
),
so hopefully something will come along soon for Jim.
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| It's no wonder Ohio went "blue" this
last election after being "red" for so long. Our state government is
riddled with criminals (people in several top state positions,
including even the governor, have been convicted of theft and
graft); we have the highest taxes of all of the 50 states; several
major and minor cities have the highest crime rates in the country;
all the major industries that were in Ohio have moved to foreign
countries thanks to NAFTA and TAFTA, leaving the state with almost
the highest unemployment in the nation. In the past election, Ohio
went Democratic to try to bring some change to this area. Something has to give in
Ohio soon, or we'll all have to look at moving to some place else. |
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Now Thanksgiving is upon us, and
it's pretty tough being thankful for very much. Don't get me wrong, I'm
VERY thankful for the real things that matter: my improved
health, Jim, the dogz, ALL of my wonderful friends,
and my family. I'm also thankful that I still have a roof
over my head, water flowing through the pipes, power for my
computers, and gas heating my house.
I would be more thankful if I had money for this month's rent (I'm
very late and trying to see if a local agency can help me with a
house payment), the overdue cable bill, and some bucks for some
Christmas gifts. It's definitely going to be a quiet Christmas this
year with my check cut, and Jim out of work; but we have each other
(and the doggies and kitties) and that's really all I need to make
me happy.
So my advice to you is to be happy and thankful for the things that
you do have - your health (we're all alive today so that counts
),
your friends and your family. All the rest of the stuff in life
(bills, payments, utilities) will eventually take care of itself one
way or another.
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Week Five: |
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| To not leave you on such a
down note, we did manage to squeeze one fun adventure in before
November ended. During an abnormally warm week of Fall, Jim, Gabby
and I picked up DO and her doggies, Rosita and Lacey, and took a
walk through the park. We all had a lovely afternoon, with a little
bit of exercise. Gabby got the most exercise, having to "hop" along
on her three legs; but, don't worry, she really enjoyed her trip to
the park. As always, Gabby took it all in stride and stayed up with
the group as we strolled the path. |
The Girls Go To The Park
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Rosita peeks out the window, while her mom Lacey
enjoys the ride. |
Gabby always enjoys a ride, especially with me in
the back seat with her. |
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| Interstate 77 takes a
curve as it passes through Canton. Inside of that curve lies a
string of beautiful city parks, behind Mercy Hospital and across the
highway from the Football Hall of Fame. Through the center of the
parks runs the Tuscarawas River, allowing the walking path to have
several bridges crossing the water. The park is also filled with
several beautiful waterfalls. |
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Of course, taking several
dogs for a walk in the park
also entails a lot of tangled leases
along the way. |
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| Finally untangled, we
began our stroll.
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This was an unusually rare nice day for
this time of year, and the park was still filled with flocks of
geese and ducks. The ducks were busy paddling in the water, while
most of the geese where roaming peacefully around the banks of the
river. |
Peacefully, that is, until
DO let Rosita loose!
It seems Rosita LOVES the geese. She loves to chase the geese! |
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| Click on the two pictures
to watch some videos of Rosita chasing the geese
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