Category Pets

I made a last minute vacation request to take Monday off.  My work anniversary date is approaching in mid-August and I have a week of vacation I need to use up before then.  I used the day to mostly chill, only helping Cindy do a few chores around the house and little else.  The rest of the day I mostly did whatever I felt like doing which included watching YouTube videos, playing Overwatch/Hearthstone, and reading a few more chapters of my third Warcraft novel.  I felt a bit uncomfortable not accomplishing more during the day but I survived.

Unless you have been living under a rock you have probably heard about the latest craze, Pokemon Go, a game for your smartphone.  It basically uses your phone’s GPS and camera to superimpose a Pokemon universe onto your surroundings.  The end result is people wandering around the streets, staring at their screens trying to capture virtual “pets” and discover other stuff.  I have heard proponents of the game say it is great because it gets an increasingly sedentary society to get off their ass and walk around outdoors, delivering an exercise benefit to the end user.  The caveat is the person is experiencing the outdoors while staring at their phone which seems contradictory and dangerous as people ignore their surroundings.

I can say with 100% certainty that I will not install the game out of principal alone.  I hear it is “fun”, I hear it is “addicting”, but that does nothing to influence my decision.  Anything that requires me to walk the streets staring at my phone like a screen zombie just is not the sort of entertainment I will ever be looking for.  If I see you walking down the sidewalk flicking Pokemon balls at virtual beings just know that a little part of me is hoping you walk face first into a pole.

I got a very sad email last night from my dad that one of his three dogs, Charlie, had died yesterday.  Charlie was found by my dad and Teresa a little less than 4 years ago wandering around.  He was in rough shape and Dad assumed he had a pretty difficult life up until that point, more than likely living outside full time.  He also had a bit of a mean streak that would come out unexpectedly.

When we met him during our last winter PA trip he was a little sketchy when he first met us but by the time we left he was much better, letting me pet him as much as I wanted.  Sadie and he got along as well, playing a bunch along with Dad and Teresa’s other dogs, Maggie and Clara.

Well in recent conversations I had with dad he said that Charlie was having some mobility problems with his back legs, something I was very familiar with because of what Nicki went through.  In the last few months dad had taken Charlie to the vet a number of times.  Yesterday while dad was outside doing stuff Charlie was out there hanging around, trying to be part of stuff like he normally did.  He got tired and was cooling off in the shed.  A little later my step mom found Charlie dead in the yard.

I know how much dad loves his dogs so I knew he was crushed by Charlie’s demise.  I waited until this morning to call him although I knew not nearly enough time had passed to soften the blow.   As I expected Dad was in rough shape.  I tried the best I could to make him know I understood how he felt based on what we went through with Nicki.  I said Charlie was lucky to find a loving home like he and my step mom provided, even later in Charlie’s life.  Most of the conversation I spent just listening, allowing dad to get out some of the painful emotions that surround the death of a loved one, it’s all you can really do.

The only other thing I could offer was that with time the pain will slowly subside although the sense of loss will always be a part of you.  I still think of Nicki and my mom quite often. When I do it still will glass over my eyes with tears in a matter of seconds.  Death, pain, and loss is all a part of life.  The older you get the more frequently you are reminded of it.  R.I.P Charlie, you will be missed. I am glad he got a chance to give and receive love the last few years of his life.

Friday night Cindy finished off her 22 kill push up challenge where you do 22 push ups per day for 22 days to bring awareness to the PTSD epidemic with US veterans and the corresponding high suicide rates.  On the final day she actually did not do any push ups and instead concentrated on the real reason the movement started, showing the pictures and names of 22 veterans that are no longer around as a result of PTSD.

She originally shot the video in her phone using the Facebook Live app. I thought it was really touching stuff so I extracted that video and turned it into a YouTube video.  Even though I am actually a pretty emotional person, I don’t express it outwardly very often.  Cindy on the other hand has the gift of not only being an emotional, caring person, but also being able to reflect that out to the world around her.  I think the video is a perfect example of it.

Saturday morning I was out early getting the weeding done before I once again had to drive into the office to work on a server issue.  I managed to get home right around lunch time after getting the issue handled.

Saturday afternoon Cindy and I headed out to the coop to install the upgraded surveillance system. We replaced the Samsung 4 channel 720P box with a Night Owl 8 channel 1080p system. The Night Owl is backwards compatible so I could leave the existing Samsung 720P cameras in place and just add the four new 1080P cameras to the system.

In total it might have taken us around 90 minutes in the hot sun to get the new system online.  Now we have full camera coverage of the back yard as well as a view of the bar park and the west part of our property towards the road.  Of course the cameras are not going to prevent a coyote attack but will make sure we know exactly how/when/where it happened.

Saturday night we got out to see the new Independence Day.  I was mostly a fan of the original even though it had a some dumb moments.  Well somehow 20 years have passed and the movie follows that timeline in real time.  The 20 years gave the Earth time to prepare for a new attack using the alien tech left over from the first film.  Unfortunately the 20 years evidently was not used to hire some good writers.  The movie was really, really dumb.  Early on I thought the film was going to be decent with it reusing most of the cast from the original except for Will Smith.  The special effects are as cool as you would expect but nowadays that is expected.

The story, dialogue and acting in the movie is pretty much atrocious.  I described in Facebook as seeming like the target audience for the film were People of Walmart subjects.  Repeatedly during the movie I was laughing out loud, not because of humor but because of stupidity of what I was seeing/hearing.  Let’s just say I was very disappointed in the film and would not recommend anyone laying out additional cash to see it.  Catch it on Netflix in a few months while you are drunk. It gets a C-.  Before the movie we at least had a nice dinner at Stir Crazy so it wasn’t a total washout.

On Sunday I started off with a run on the treadmill.  I didn’t feel like slogging through the humidity.  Cindy was heading out early for an all day cycling seminar for a possible job opportunity down the road.  After taking a shower Sadie and I jumped in the truck for a trip to Rural King.  I had the GoPro along so Sadie got to star in her first vlog entry during the drive.  I was going to Rural King to take a look at their electric fence supplies which turned out to be pretty extensive.  If I decide to electrify the fence I will probably get the majority of the stuff online but it’s good to know I can run out and get stuff to fill any gaps at RK if needed.

When we got home I rolled into a number of chores including weed whacking the yard.  I did 5/6 of the yard with my new battery powered DeWalt unit.  For the majority of the yard it works well however trimming along castle stones is not one of them.  For whatever reason the trimmer head on the DeWalt spins counter clockwise, the opposite direction my gas powered trimmer spins.  With the way I hold the trimmer and the direction I normally go it just doesn’t do a great job against the uneven stone surface.  When the battery died I switched to the gas trimmer and was apply to knock down the castle stone barrier with ease.  Even though the cordless trimmer has good power it doesn’t approach the brute force the gas trimmer can apply to targeted areas.  I’m ok with having both in my yard arsenal.

I was a sweaty mess after working in the hot sun so I went in the pool to cool off which of course Sadie was excited about.  When I go in the pool when she is around we play the “splashy, splash” game where I go side to side in the pool and splash water on her as she runs around the deck.  After splashing her for awhile the deck was quite wet.  I was moving to the opposite side when I heard a splash from the deep end.  I turned and saw Sadie had slipped in and had just gone completely underwater.  I was concerned for a split second and quickly moved in her direction however she popped up and immediately started swimming towards the steps on the other end.  I praised her repeatedly as I dried her off for getting out on the pool herself.

Even though I spent a good portion of the day doing chores both inside and outside the house solo I didn’t mind much.  Sometimes I am most productive when I am in that situation.

We got through the weekend without any further chicken incidents, continuing our revised free ranging schedule that keeps them in the coop longer in the morning and back in the coop earlier in the evening.  Our hope is shortening that window will keep the chickens out of harms way during dusk/dawn timeframe when the attack on Cocoa occurred.

I have a short week coming up, being off Thursday and Friday as well as having Monday off for the 4th of July.  I hope to get my shelter constructed over the sprinkler controller and water cleaning equipment during that time.  We also will be going to the Miami Supercon on Saturday, staying overnight and returning Sunday so that will be a different type of experience for sure.

Yesterday my Airsoft AK-47 arrived.  I had Cindy throw the battery on the charger while I was at work so we could try it out when I got home.  I have to tell you, I was very surprised by the gun.

First of all it looked very realistic.  If you did not notice the orange Airsoft band around the muzzle of the gun you would think it was the real thing.  Not only does it look real, it feels real in terms of weight.  I could not believe it weighed between 7 and 8 pounds.  A good portion of the gun appears to be metal. It comes with two ammo clips, each capable of holding over 300 plastic bb’s so if you fully load each one you have a long time between fill ups.

Installing the stick battery that powers the gun is a bit clumsy but I eventually got it all in place.  I went out front and leaned a pretty thick cardboard box I had in the garage against one of our oak trees.   I stepped about 40-50 feet away and took a couple shots in semi-auto mode where you get one shot per trigger squeeze.  I was immediately impressed by the power of the gun which is advertised as 495 FPS, far exceeding the single shot, spring loaded Airsoft gun I bought awhile back.

I then flipped the selector to full auto mode and squeezed the trigger.  I was amazed at the fire speed for this “toy” gun.  It ripped into the cardboard box, quickly filling it with dozens of holes in a few seconds.  Damn this thing was no joke.  Not only is it powerful, it’s pretty accurate as well.  Later Cindy was in the backyard picking off small targets from 90-100 feet pretty easily.

I have no doubt that if we have an opportunity to use the Airsoft gun against a chicken predator it will quickly be running/flying the other direction.  I saw some videos of dumb kids shooting each other with similar guns with less FPS and they had real nasty, painful welts as a reward.  Check out the video if you want to see what it looks/sounds like when you squeeze the trigger.

At the end of the video I reiterated my viewpoint on real assault weapons which may seem hypocritical since I bought a toy version of one.  I would never suggest that the Americans should be denied the right to own guns.  My problem is with the availability of weapons that are clearly for offensive versus defensive intentions.

Yesterday I discovered Virtual Box, a free virtual machine product from Oracle.  The reason I discovered it was after I wasted a couple days trying to get a virtual Windows 10 machine running on my Windows 7 workstation utilizing Microsoft’s VirtualPC.  When I would try to run the Windows 10 install it would bomb out saying I had insufficient memory and CPU power even though I allocated virtual resources far above the minimum requirements.

After a lot of frustration I found other people did what I was looking to do easily with Virtual Box that evidently doesn’t have the same limitations.  I downloaded and installed the product in a few minutes and a few minutes later I had the Windows 10 installation successfully running.  If you are looking for a flexible and powerful VM solution definitely give Virtual Box a look.

I woke up this morning to see that Britain voted to officially leave the EU which is sort of a big deal.  It was a divisive issue very reminiscent to American politics of the last 16 years.  Both sides thought the other were idiots more or less.  My thoughts as an outsider are mixed.  In theory the EU seems like a good thing, free trade between nations with minimal restrictions should be good for an economy.  The standardized currency, the euro, that the majority of EU countries use was again an attempt to promote trade free of exchange rate differences.

Well the downside for Britain has been a loss of direct control in other areas. Being a member of the EU meant some important decisions that affected citizens of the country were being made by non-elected EU officials based out of Brussels.  Some of the most polarizing of these is the requirement for Britain to accept immigrants based on EU requirements which has created a very American-like resentment of these immigrants being granted benefits in the generous British system.

The vote to leave certainly was not a landslide, winning 52% of the vote.  Shortly after the vote, Prime Minister David Cameron who was on the pro-EU side announced he would be stepping down in the fall in a very gracious speech.  The process to leave the EU will be a slow one but it will be interesting to see if it proves to be a smart move down the road.  Britain’s exit could give legs to movements in other countries to leave the EU such as France.

This weekend I will be busy.  I purchased the 8 channel security DVR to upgrade the surveillance of the coop/backyard so I want to get it up and running.  I also would like to take a harder look at electric fence options although that will be a longer term project.  I still have the raw materials in my big shed to build the cover over my wi-fi water sprinkler controller and water equipment but I think I need to wait to get that done until the stitches are out of my shoulder.

On the fun front hopefully Cindy and I can get out to see the new Independence Day.  I was a big fan of the original.

So we got through the day yesterday with all 10 chickens intact.  Cindy kept them in the coop later in the morning and we put them to bed about an hour earlier than they would on their own.  I might be going to Tractor Supply this weekend to look at their electric fence equipment.  I could buy everything I need on Amazon but I’d like to see some of the stuff in person before pulling the trigger.  The dollar expense would be less than $200.  The installation time would be more costly.

So last night was more than likely the last we will have with Tank in the house.  Enough time has passed that he should be able to go back to his normal environment with his brother, Bowser.  Although the first few days were a bit of an adjustment period, overall it has been fun having Tank around.  His personality is very endearing and his appearance is cute in funny sort of way.  The biggest negative has been the sleep penalty both Cindy and I have paid but even that has gotten less severe the last few days.

I know Cindy really loves having him around and I know she is going to be sad to see him go home.  Luckily we have Sadie for the next 10 days so it should help to fill the void.  Of course I’ll miss him too and feel badly he won’t get quite the same level of attention he has been accustomed to the last couple weeks.  He’s a good boy.

I got my new coffee maker set up in my office today.  Even though I am using the same coffee as normal, it tastes significantly better.  I suppose the fact that I did no real maintenance on the old coffee maker in the dozen or so years I had it might make a difference.

The DVR I set up in the house a few weeks ago is offline.  For a week or two I started to notice it was getting increasingly noisy.  I at first was afraid it was the hard drive but it later became apparent it was a fan, more than likely the processor cooling fan.  Since the box is only 4 months old I wanted to get it covered under warranty.

I have been less than thrilled with the support from Night Owl, the company that made the DVR.  I called and sat on hold for at least 15 minutes,  I was then without choice redirected to voicemail where I was told to leave a message after which I was hung up on.  Someone did call me back about 6 hours later and took my info, indicating Night Owl should drop ship me a new box, however the RMA was handled by a different group.  I now had to wait for that group to contact me to actually process the claim, stupid.   As of now I still have not had that secondary contact.  I have a feeling I am going to have a very frustrating experience trying to chase down the warranty repair.

So as soon as I got home last night I went out in the backyard with Sadie to look at the aftermath of yesterdays coyote attack on our chickens.  Seeing the large collection of feathers near the rear of the coop made me sick to my stomach.  The trail of feathers lead towards the east side of our property where the coyote evidently jumped the fence.

I went outside the fence line with Sadie hoping to find more evidence of what direction he/she went.  I saw a few feathers  on the path I just had mowed leading towards the back of the property but that trail died out after maybe 25 yards. I was hoping if the coyote den was nearby Sadie and I would be able to hear/see something.  A few times I heard sounds that in my mind almost sounded like Cocoa although I knew that was just wishful thinking.

After striking out on foot I took my search to the air, bringing out my DJI Phantom.  I did big circles in the area around the back of our property, once again hoping to scare the coyotes out of their hiding place if it was nearby.  I carefully reviewed the 9 minute video looking for anything significant but once again saw nothing.

Last night we put the chickens back into their run earlier than normal as we read that if a coyote does hunt during daylight it is typically going to be closer to dawn or dusk.  We also plan to not let them out as early in the morning to again avoid additional opportunity for the coyote.

I spent some considerable time educating myself regarding electric fence options.  There are a lot of options and it seems most systems are designed to electrify fence lines MUCH longer than what we have.  There are also different fence energizer options.  Along with varying power (shock) levels, you can power them via AC power, a 12 volt battery, or even stand alone solar.

My initial assumption was the best place to put a hot wire would be across the top of the fence posts.  However in a situation where the animal is jumping a fence, if it hits the hot wire while not grounded it has no effect whatsoever.  I read about another configuration that may be more useful where you mount the hot wire about a foot off the ground on the outside of the fence.  The wire goes on insulators that hold the wire a few inches away from the fence.

Typically a predator like a wolf or coyote will pace back and forth by a fence line looking for it’s weakest point.  With this configuration the animal would get zapped before it even thinks about jumping which in many cases is enough to make it steer clear.  So I think for maximum protection a hot wire down low and across the top of the fence line would be best.

This morning I also made another addition to our non-lethal arsenal, buying a high powered, battery powered Airsoft gun.  It is a high end gun with semi and full automatic modes.  In full auto mode it can unload bb’s at a rate of nearly 10 per second traveling at 400-500 FPS.  It should be a very effective way to turn around any potential chicken predators if they show their face when either of us are around. Hopefully our efforts will be successful.  If we would lose more hens they might just have to be locked up for their own safety.

Cindy and I got to watch this week’s Game of Thrones last night.  Wow that was an INCREDIBLE episode featuring the death of a character that I was as happy to see bite the dust as when Geoffrey did.  It is just an epic show.  This weeks episode was as good as a full feature film.

So I got a message from Cindy to call her which is generally never a good thing.  As she was crying, she told me she couldn’t find Cocoa but did find a large collection of feathers behind the coop.  When she sent me a picture of the feathers I knew it was not going to be a good scenario.  There were a lot of them and a trail leading towards the back of the yard.  It seemed pretty obvious one of our chickens was killed by a predator, the question was what kind and how.

My first suspicion was a coyote although typically they are nocturnal predators.  A couple weeks ago our neighbor called me one morning saying he saw a coyote in the back of his property that he scared away. He said it was headed towards our yard.  Of course this news made Cindy and I nervous but we said the chickens have a lot of spaces to hide around the property, thinking that would hopefully be adequate to keep predators at bay combined with our fence.  Unfortunately research showed us that a 4 foot fence is nothing for a coyote to jump over.

So based on where the feathers were I told Cindy that we may be able to see something on one of the coop cameras.  Cindy started reviewing the footage and found a very tragic event right around 7:15AM where you can see Cocoa being carried off by a fcking coyote.  It was a tragic confirmation of one of Cindy and my worst fears when it came to the chickens.

Long time blog readers may recall how much we were affected when our original three chickens, Betty, Wilma, and Pebbles were killed one night by a raccoon that figured out how to open the side doors of our original chicken tractor.  It was their death that made me spend so much time, money and effort constructing the new chicken housing to be pretty much predator proof, which it is, the only problem is the hens are only in there at night.

During the day we have left the birds free range pretty much from sunrise to sunset.  Our success with doing so for the past year or so may have lulled us into a false sense of security.  The realist in me knew this was always a possibility.  Pretty much every source you can find will tell you that if you let your chickens free range it is not a matter of if but when you will lose some to predators. As you can imagine, I feel guilty and very sad that despite both my and Cindy’s efforts to give the hens a safe environment we failed, even if it is just the course of nature taking place.

So now the question is what do we do.  The safest option of course is to keep the chickens contained  in their safe haven 24/7 but I have never been a fan of that approach.  I always felt that the birds having a high quality of life trumped a life of captivity, even if they are kept in the relatively large confines of their coop and outdoor run. I could attempt to live trap the coyote but from what I read they are very tough to trap in a cage like I used to catch the raccoons.  I could try to run an electric wire around the top of the fence but I’m not sure how effective it would be.  I read situations where coyotes cleared a five foot fence (mine is four) without touching it. I could somehow expand onto the outdoor run area of the chicken coop but nothing will match the freedom they have now of course.

Usually in most situations it does not take me very long to evaluate a situation and come up with a viable solution.  This is one of those times that solution is not clear to me.  All I know is Cocoa is gone and the predator that did it is surely going to try again so something needs to change before that happens.

So I finished up my week of at home training Friday.  I was happy it ended up mid-afternoon, giving me a slightly longer weekend. During the day on Friday I got a head start on my weekend chores getting around the house to weed the property.  I wanted my weekend as open as possible although I knew that more than likely I would find a way to fill that time with more work.

Sadie, who we picked up Thursday night had a dog companion brought in the house when Cindy came home with Tank, her daughter’s dog.  Tank is a french bulldog.  He had surgery done to help alleviate problems that plague the breed with breathing and swallowing.  Cindy had offered for us to watch him for a couple days as the vet said it would be good if Tank was separated from their other dog as they like to roughhouse and play like most dogs do.  Tanks was supposed to keep “calm”.  Well that lasted all of 30 seconds.

You would have never known Tank had pretty serious surgery the day before.  Other than the spot on his front leg that was shaved for a catheter he seemed pretty much fine.  We were a bit concerned how Sadie and he would get along but it wasn’t much of an issue.  Sadie made sure to emphasize she was the main dog when it came to my attention and Tank was content emptying out dozens of dog toys from the basket.

Originally Cindy planned to have Tank sleep in his crate at night despite him normally sleeping in bed with her daughter when he is home.  I told Cindy he could stay in the bedroom with us although it was rather crowded until Sadie jumped down to sleep on the floor.  Tank does not sleep soundly, my last few nights of sleep have been interrupted on a regular basis.

On Saturday morning we thought it would be fun to take Sadie and Tank to our two dog friendly stomping grounds, Rural King and Home Depot. We brought a towel and let Tank cruise around in a cart while Sadie walked conventionally.  Tank seemed to enjoy the experience and other shoppers seemed to enjoy him.  French bulldogs are cute in a bizarre sort of way and garnish a lot of attention.

During Saturday afternoon I got out on the tractor and mowed the grass.  We are now getting to the time of year unfortunately where weekly mowing is required to keep the yard from looking ragged.  Originally we had plans to go see the Warcraft movie Saturday night but I suggested we postpone due to Tank being there and the fact that we had a Netflix disc in the envelope to watch.  Cindy endorsed the plan.

So this movie was Steve Jobs 2.0, where Michael Fasbender took a shot at portraying the tech legend after Aston Kutcher did the same a couple years prior.  I thought it odd that this movie picked up in the timeline pretty much where the first movie left off.  This film focused more on his relationship with his daughter but didn’t touch what I would think is the most interesting portion of his life, when the iWhatever devices started and the degradation of his health.  I think Fasbender is a better actor and did a better job, no pun intended, but the narrow focus on 15 years of his life just seemed odd to me.  I wonder if any Steve Jobs film in the future will try to portray his entire life instead of just portions of it.  I’d give the movie a B, a decent rental.

On Sunday morning Cindy was not feeling like running in the humidity.  I jumped on the treadmill and did 3 miles at nominal pace.  It’s not as effective as being out on the open road but better than skipping a run altogether.  We made a return trip to Home Depot with the dogs, this time in the Tacoma.  We tried to dog proof the cab the best we could.  We already have seat covers up front.  We draped the old SSR seat covers over the rear jump seats where Cindy and Tank sat.  We also had a large towel along for more protection coverage.  Tank seemed very happy to ride in the truck.  The back window was a perfect size for him to see the world.

We took the truck because I was buying construction materials for another project.   After installing the Rachio I decided I’d like to get some sort of additional shelter over the box and the water cleaning equipment that resides there.  I envisioned a simple design, somewhat similar to what I did for chicken run using high durability corrugated pvc panels.  I plan to attach a 2×4 high on the wall and support the front of the “roof” with two 4×4’s that are screwed into the concrete.  At first I had ideas about doing the project during the day but the oppressive heat and humidity put an end to that plan.

Instead I decided to take on another project which I envisioned as pretty simple, replacing one of the blade spindles on the mower deck.  Last week the one spindles felt like it’s bearings were going bad so I thought I would be proactive and replace it.  Despite owning the Craftsman tractor for somewhere around 5 years I have never had the mower deck off yet.  I am able to change blades without pulling the deck but replacing the spindle required deck removal.  Getting the deck out was not too bad, it’s mainly just pulling out about a half dozen cotter pins.

When I was unbolting the old spindle two of the four bolts securing it snapped on removal.  I was glad I followed the advice I received online and ordered four new bolts along with the spindle.  So after some grunting and groaning I got the new spindle on but noticed odd behavior.  Despite my having the bolt on the pulley that is attached to the spindle cranked down as hard as I could manage, the blade was spinning independently of the pulley.

After a few minutes of head scratching I figured out what actually happened.  If you look at the image of the pulley to the left you will see the hole in the center has groves that slide over the center spline in the spindle.  When I looked at the old spindle I saw the spline had been stripped and presumable the pulley had the same damage.  I’m not 100% sure how it happened but I suspect it had to do with the way I was changing the blades.  Instead of blocking the blade movement with a block of wood I would do it by having a wrench/socket on both the blade nut and the pulley nut.  I think I may have accidentally stripped it using that technique.

I was frustrated that once again a job I thought would be simple had now grown into something more aggravating.  I went online and ordered not only a new pulley but the parts to redo the other side as well as a new drive belt.  I figured while I have the deck off the tractor I may as well do both sides of the blade drive train equally.

Cindy and I decided to go and catch Warcraft as a matinee late Sunday afternoon.  As long as I have been waiting to see the movie, not getting out on opening weekend would have been a minor letdown.  The movie has been the victim of a lot of “me too” negativity, something very common nowadays.  People love to jump on the negativity bandwagon with films.  Batman versus Superman was a recent example of this, a movie that certainly was far from perfect but not at all deserving of the heaps of shit that was piled on it.

Warcraft had a bunch of negative reviews from people very quick to dismiss it as another bad video game based movie.  I, as a long time World of Warcraft player and fan, was very interested in seeing what the 160 million dollar film could do to depict the world I have experienced virtually for so long.  I have to say that I found myself swimming upstream from the current of bad feedback on the film.

Visually I thought the movie did an amazing job of bringing the up till now virtual world to life.  They obviously paid a ton of attention to detail.  The story line of the movie actually is prior to the story the game started at so even with all of my experience I was not familiar with the details.  I heard that the movie script has some major departures from official lore in the Warcraft books but I didn’t really care.

I think people that play the game had a major advantage as patrons of the film as a lot of the back story on the characters was already filled in for us.  I can totally see how somebody that was new to the Warcraft scene would have a hard time following what was going on 100%.  The two hours of the film was not nearly long enough to get someone up to speed on the deep and involved story.  Even so I think it was entertaining and interesting.  Cindy, who only knows a little bit about the game, mostly from watching me, really liked the movie.  The movie was far from perfect but I was not disappointed.  As a Warcraft player I give it an A, for the average Joe that is into sci-fi, Lord of the Rings type story I’d still go B+.

Shortly after we got home last night the skies opened up accompanied by a ferocious lighting and thunder storm which shook the house repeatedly. Both dogs were scared and looking for comfort as the strikes rained down.  I was glad I got the grass mowed the day before.

So of course I saw the news about the latest mass shooting at a gay dance club in Orlando.  The 50 total casualties set a dark and disgusting record as the largest mass shooting in American history.  There is sure to be a lot of blowback as the man that committed the murders was evidently the subject of two FBI investigations yet somehow landed a job as a security guard and was able to legally buy the assault rifle used in the attack.  I’m not quite sure how that is possible but it points a bright burning light on the just how screwed up the system is.

The shooting has of course fired up all sorts of ancillary debates some of which never really seem to lead anywhere like banning assault rifle sales.  I have yet to hear a reason why an individual needs to own an assault rifle that makes any sense.  This tragedy fans the flames on multiple fronts, the gun debate, gay bigotry, and muslim hatred.  There have been so many mass shooting tragedies the last decade yet none of it has lead to any substantial change in gun policies or enforcement of existing laws.  It’s gotten to the point where I almost have shoulder shrug response to it all.  Here we go again, mass shooting, outrage, calls for change on the left, calls for “they are coming for our guns” from the right and nothing ultimately changes.

If the country as a whole can not get behind finally doing something to make a discernible effort to at least making it more difficult for these type of situations to occur in the future we should be ashamed to be ashamed in words alone. Words without action mean next to nothing.  I am not sure what sort of tragedy it will ultimately take until some degree of change can finally be seen as reasonable by enough people to make it happen.  Hopefully the world doesn’t burn to the ground before that day finally comes.

So yesterday I saw the electronic lien was cleared from the title of the SSR so I had a paper copy printed.  I now figured I was officially ready to sell the truck so I created my Craigslist ad and posted it.  I was sort of surprised I got a call within 30 minutes.  That call was from a guy that lives in Panama City, some 5 hours away.  He seemed interested and said he might actually make the drive down this weekend to see the truck.

I got a second call from a Wisconsin number.  He is from there but recently moved to Estero.  Frank said he had been looking at SSR’s for a short while as a perfect cruising vehicle for his retirement lifestyle.  He said he could come by last night to look at the SSR, I told him that would be fine.

Cindy offered to give the SSR a thorough bath during the day which was great since I had not had a chance to do it myself yet.  Frank pulled up in his Tundra just as I was finishing up doing a few things outside.  He immediately struck me as a nice guy.

Very early on in the conversation he identified himself as a serious lifetime car hobbyist, the hard core type that restored vehicles from the 40’s and 50’s.  The guy knew way more about cars than I did, that was very clear to me very early.  During the test drive I knew if he made an offer on the truck it wasn’t going to be very close to my $25,500 asking price.  He talked about another SSR he looked at that only has a ridiculously low 9000 miles and untouched from factory original options.  I actually saw this truck on Craigslist myself when I was looking at comps.  Anyway the seller had that truck listed at 32-33k.  Frank told me he could get that truck for 24k.

He asked me what I needed to get out of my SSR dollar wise.  I didn’t have a clear answer for him.  I told him that since I am under no pressure to sell the truck, I just listed the truck as being for sale, and I have a guy from Panama City that seems very interested I wasn’t looking to give the truck away.  After the test drive we were discussing dollars further.  I told him I could agree to dropping the price to 24k.  Frank clearly already had his number in mind and it wasn’t close to mine.  He offered 21k and said it would be a simple all cash deal that could be completed the next day which of course was appealing.

I went inside for a couple minutes and talked to Cindy about it.  Frank’s offer was a lowball but the reality was it would still more than easily allow me to execute my plans for the new Tacoma.  She came back outside with me.  I was hoping Cindy’s friendly personality could possibly help me disarm him enough to accept a counter offer.  I came back with 22 and he wouldn’t budge, not even a little bit which of course was annoying.  He claimed with some of the work he would want to do on the truck he couldn’t justify going any higher, especially with the 9000 mile SSR as another option.  After exchanging some glances with Cindy I told him I would do the deal. The appeal of a simple cash deal and getting the transaction completed quickly was appealing enough to be worth it to me.

I did some paperwork regarding the sale.  Frank suggested that he could take the spare parts now so I wouldn’t have to try to jam them into the back of the SSR tomorrow.  We planned to do the transaction at my office on Friday morning.  He gave me $100 deposit in good faith and headed out.  Although I didn’t feel great about the negotiation or lack there of I was happy everything was falling into place quickly.  I felt good that the truck would be going to a true car enthusiast that would take great care of it.  That good feeling faded away about 7:48PM.

My phone rang and I saw it was Frank’s number.  He told me that he thinks he may have jumped the gun and he reconsidered.  He said with the work he wants to do on the truck the dollars will get out of hand.  I was shocked at first.  When he was at the house he seemed pretty sure of himself and his number.  Him taking the spare parts now seemed to further cement it was a done deal.  I expressed my surprise but wasn’t a dick about it.  I am not sure if his wife at home was the fulcrum behind his reversal.  The whole thing seemed extra weird when I realized I had a voicemail from Frank at 7:30, asking me to take the ad off Craigslist, not something a person that was having buyers remorse would normally do.

So whatever the reason behind his decision, we made plans to undo what we did.  He agreed to meet me at work today to give me back the parts.  He said I could keep the deposit if I wanted which of course I refused.  When I met up with him this morning he apologized for the trouble and indicated he could still be a potential buyer at an even lower number which I pretty much brushed off.  At this point I will see what comes my way the next couple weeks.  Like I said, there is absolutely no pressure on me to move in any particular direction so for now I will just chill.  In some ways I am glad to have an opportunity to potentially get more for the truck but also a bit sad to not have quickly turned the transaction around.

After I got the call from Frank I headed out to the coop to put the chickens to bed.  Stephie, the chicken that gets picked on the most by the others seems to really like Cindy and I.  When I went in the coop to count heads I didn’t see her at first.  I called her name and she immediately sat upright so I could see her.  She then started to move around the perch to get to the front where I was.  As she was maneuvering closer one of the other hens pecked at Stephie.  I put my arm up to scold the pecking hen and as I did Stephie instantly hopped on my forearm and used it as a perch.  She immediately lowered her body like she was making herself comfortable for the long haul.

It was so cute.  I let her there for a minute or two as I petted her.  She seemed as content as a chicken can seem.  It almost looked like I was a falconer with a big hawk on my arm.  I eventually coaxed her back down on her perch.  I have a feeling she will be using us as human perches more often. It was a nice moment to lessen the disappointment of the phone call.

This weekend I might start tackling adding a second row of castle stone to the pool landscape border to stop the incessant chicken vandalism.  It should be lots of fun.

So yesterday it was off and on rain for most of the day.  When we were eating dinner one last heavy deluge rolled through, almost like Mother Nature giving us a nice FU before the nearly 3 days of wet weather relented.  I am pretty sure outside of tropical storm and hurricanes, this is the MOST standing water we have had at the house, ever.  The fact that this occurred in the middle of winter is flabbergasting and a testament to the power of climate change.

Once the rain stopped I got a head start on race prep loading up all of the timing mats, 15 in the Tacoma and another 9 in the Prius.  The mats in the Prius and a bunch of other stuff I won’t be needing for the race will be dropped off to the running club today as part of the equipment purge.  I have been housing all of the timing equipment and a bunch of other race related stuff in my house for close to 10 years, it felt good to get some of that space back.

As I mentioned before, having this race be the last I time for the club feels appropriate. It is the 10th year for the event dreamed up by Ali in response to our adoption of Nicki.  The early versions of the race website that I created had Nicki’s puppy picture plastered all over the place.  This year the race could potentially draw close to 1000 participants which is simply awesome.

This race has it’s own set of challenges, the biggest of which is the distance between the start and finish line which is damn close to a 1/2 mile.  Luckily I should have the club golf cart to transport me back and forth.  The thermometer will add more excitement since race time temperature is forecast to be in the 40’s.

By this time tomorrow the race will be well underway and I will be coasting towards my own personal finish line of close to a decade of involvement with the running club.  I am proud of the countless improvements I have helped facilitate over that time.  Life is all about change and doing what makes you happy. My relinquishing of my role as the dedicated club race timer will be big examples of both.

This has been the oddest winter weather I have ever experienced since moving to Florida.  At first it was like there was no winter at all with highs near 90 degrees for extended periods of time.  Recently we have been having summer-like storms as well including the storm last weekend that cancelled the half marathon. Last Friday’s storm was bad enough that it actually placed standing water on our property, something that has NEVER happened in January.  Usually this is the the heart of the dry season where the time between precipitation is measured in weeks or even months. On Saturday we had extreme amounts of wind as a cold front blew through with some gusts topping 50 mph.

Of course our weather didn’t hold a candle to the massive snowstorm that pounded the northeast.  I saw pictures from my old stomping grounds in PA with snow 2 1/2 feet deep with drifts much, much higher.  I was also shocked at the pictures of many of the Jersey/Delaware shore areas I used to vacation in under water from terrible flooding. Despite the bad weather we have been experiencing locally, pictures from the NE this weekend make me feel quite glad to be 1200 miles south.

We picked up Sadie for a weekend visit after an errand run that included stops at Home Depot, Rural King, and Pet Supermarket.  While we were at Rural King we saw they got a new shipment of baby chicks.  I joked around with Cindy about picking up a couple Sicilian Buttercup chicks that looked particularly cute.  We could accommodate a couple more birds if we had to but I hate to mess what seems to be a pretty good balance with our chicken family now.  I also think we are forgetting just how much maintenance the chicks required while they were in the house.

When we got home I decided to finally rip into the Tacoma which has been sitting in the driveway all week.  I had my new set of plugs and wires that I ordered on Amazon.  The winds had not only continued but intensified at that point.  My tools and supplies were blowing around everywhere.  The hat I was wearing got thrown in the garage after it blew off my head four times.

The first step was to gap the 6 new plugs.  Since the Tacoma uses dual electrode style plugs gapping them takes twice as long as normal.  I then got under the hood and got busy.  My plan was to do one wire and the two corresponding plugs as a set to make sure I don’t get any coil/wire connections screwed up.

Normally any automotive project I do I will film as they are some of my most viewed entries on my YouTube channel.  Unfortunately with the amount of wind going on I knew it would be pointless as either you wouldn’t be able to hear me or the camera would get trashed from blowing over.

The plugs on the passenger side are easy to get to.  Once you remove the intake rubber tube there is nothing in your way. The driver side is much more annoying because the intake plenum looms above the plugs.  I ran into various problems with the driver side plug/wire removal.  I had to use my long extensions with a swivel attachment to get on the plugs.  Plug six, in the right rear of the engine compartment was especially tough to get swapped out for a couple reasons.

I had mentioned last week the entire reason I went down the plug/wire path to address my cylinder 4 misfire was I discovered the terminal in that wire was falling apart.  Well when I pulled the wire for cylinder 6 once again the insulating boot stayed down in the hole, requiring another tedious fishing session with my hooked small wire so I could pull it out.  I am really disappointed with the quality of these Duralast wires that I bought from Autozone,  I installed them maybe three years ago.  To have two of the three wires fall apart already was very aggravating.  I have used Duralast parts for many other repairs and have had good luck.  I won’t be getting their plug wires ever again, that is for sure.

I also had an issue with my spark plug sockets.  I had two 5/8″ sockets, one from my big socket set and an Autozone socket.  I had different problems with each.  The one socket had a loose rubber boot that is used to keep the plug in place as you stick it back in the hole.  The end result was after I would get done torquing the plug back in the socket would come back up sans rubber boot, it was stuck on the plug terminal.  So I had to jam the socket back on, back out the plug and try again.  The Autozone socket had a maddening precise fit, making it very difficult to get the spark plug securely inserted.  In total between the two socket issues I bet I wasted another 20 minutes of futzing around.

So finally I had all six plugs and three wire sets replaced.  I hopped back in the truck and turned the key, hoping to hear the engine roar to life.  Instead it fired up for a split second and then shut down.  I was not happy.  I jumped out and did a quick survey under the hood, hoping I just forgot to reconnect something.  Luckily I quickly spotted a coil connector on cylinder 5 that I forgot to snap back in.  After clicking it together the truck fired back up and sounded normal.

Now last week during my testing the truck also sounded normal briefly until I got it out on the road so I knew I was not in the clear yet.   I took the truck east on Immokalee Road and was encouraged that I did not feel the chugging engine the truck had when the misfire was present.  In total I did a 10 mile test and the Tacoma passed with flying colors.  I drove it a few more times over the weekend and to work today without a problem so I feel confident declaring the issue as fixed.  I feel very fortunate that the simpler solution fixed the problem this time.  Replacing fuel injectors would have been a much, much larger pain in the ass.

On Saturday night we decided to stay home and plow through the remainder of the Making a Murderer.  If you are looking for a happy ending out of this documentary, look elsewhere.  The story is such a bizarre collection of situations all cross contaminating the other.  The theme of the documentary is basically how Steven and his nephew Brendan are unjustly in prison for a crime they did not commit, largely in part to shady activity by the local police department.  Although Steven’s guilt or innocence is a bit foggy, it is crystal clear that Brendan had nothing to do with the crime, yet he is in prison until the year 2048 at the earliest.

My friend Cheryl found this well thought out explanation that does a good job of unwinding the various evidence and points the finger in a direction not really touched on in the documentary.  After you watch the series, read this explanation.  It makes a lot of sense and connects a lot of dots.

We woke up Sunday morning to some cold for Florida temperatures in the upper 40’s.  We decided to go out and do a short run, something I have note done for at least a couple of months for a myriad of reasons.  Our goal was a simple two miles around the middle school track.  I really like running in colder temperatures, I just feel better.  Cindy does not, the cold air can make her lungs feel like they are closing up.

Despite the cold Cindy was actually the pace setter, I constantly was a stride or two behind her, working to keep up.  I was surprised when Cindy said we averaged right around 9 minute mile pace, 30-45 seconds per mile faster than what we were carrying for a normal pace for most of our runs in 2015.  Of course it was only two miles of running but still it felt like a minor accomplishment.

I added two more pieces of tech to the chicken coop on Sunday.  The first thing was adding a Ring doorbell to the front of the run.  It allows us to take advantage of the coop based wi-fi network to monitor back yard motion and do two way communication if one of us is in the house and the other in the yard.  Is it overkill? Yes.

The other addition was another WeMo smart outlet that is used to control the LED light in the coop.  The light is used at dusk to provide light in the coop so the hens can get themselves situated on their perch.  Since the chickens like to push their bedtime right until the edge of darkness, without light in the coop they would be nearly blind in there.

With the WeMo switch I now have the light on a precisely controlled time cycle that is controlled by my phone.  I can use the phone to also turn the light on and off whenever I chose from anywhere I have internet service.  Plus the coolest thing of all is we can control the light with our voice via the Amazon Echo.  A simple, “Alexa, turn on/off the coop” gets the job done.

Early Sunday afternoon I was debating if I wanted to tackle the rear brakes on the Tacoma.  I really hate taking on an automotive project on a Sunday.  I decided to be productive in another way, hopping on the tractor (after jump starting it with the Tacoma), and mowed the front and back yard.  Nearly a month of no mowing with ample precipitation had left areas looking somewhat ratty.  A couple hours later things were looking much more uniform.

I got to catch a good amount of the Patriots/Broncos game.  It was what you would hope out of a conference championship.  Although I was pulling for the Broncos for Peyton Manning’s sake, there was no denying just how great Tom Brady and Gronkowski are.  Brady got hit CONSTANTLY the entire game yet somehow managed to convert on a do or die 4th down situation twice to put the Patriots in the position to tie the game with time running out.  Only a deflected pass on the two point attempt halted the epic comeback attempt.  It was a hell of a game.  The Panthers/Cardinals game was a different story with Carolina winning in a blow out.  The Carolina offense versus the Denver defense should make for an interesting Super Bowl.

This week I begin my final week of preparations as the running club timer.  To have the finish line so close is intoxicating.  To have it all wind up with the race Ali started in Nicki’s honor seems fitting as well.  By this time next week this chapter in my life will be written and I can move on to whatever comes next.