Happy Independence Day (or Treason Day if you’re a Brit)

Greetings and Salutations!
It’s me I’m back!
I know I’ve been a bad bad BC but hey! LOTS of ‘life’ going on.

This being the 4th, OF COURSE we started to get a lil rain (the first we’ve seen during daylight hours) when I was planning on BBQing on the Weber this afternoon… Not a big deal really, as we desperately need the rain.

My bass pond in the back has never been this low in the 25+/- years I’ve been here. In fact I a wee bit worried that if we don’t get some rain in decent amounts I’m seriously concerned that it’ll go anoxic. For those of you who don’t understand this, when a pond goes anoxic, it means the dissolved oxygen (DO) level has dropped to near zero…

Which means all my fishies die…

It happened to a housing area aways over from mine, and if the wind was right, you could smell all them fish rotting away… Plus the sulfer-ish stink that goes with it.

I really hope that doesn’t happen as we have this big ole Bass who lives in the pond… the pond itself is catch and release, and he’s been caught quite a few times. In fact waaay back in the day when DC was here, the Babydaddy (Adriana’s dad) caught him, and after we got pictures, he put him (the fish, not the Babydaddy) back into the pond.

He’s pretty hefty, but as he’s a Bass, and pretty much inedible, he’s been around for a long stretch. Hope he’s OK right?

Sad that I have more empathy for a fucking fish in my pond in the back yard that 90% of the rest of humanity amiright?

So lets see…

The Dooney Abides.
The (current) growth spurt seems to have subsided. He really had a tough couple of weeks, and because HE had a tough few week, WE had a tough few as well. No sleep, constant feeding and he’s learned how to growl now when he doesn’t get what he wants. It’s very cute but still… a behavior we do NOT want to encourage.

We haven’t (unfortunately) seen the Nukular Powered Redhead for a LONG minute as there are only so many hours in a day and days in a week… We’re hoping to be able to see her in the near future. I DID however get a pic of her on the day she ‘graduated’ from Second Grade!!!

Oh my aching knees/back (insert your age-related pain)!!!
8 Friggin’ years old!?!
2nd Friggin’ Grade!?!
Drinker, if you would:

That about sums it up donnit?
I mean FFS, THIS is the redhead I remember:

She was juuuust a little under what Dooney is right now (he’s at 6 months and two weeks…) Red, OTOH? In that pic she was just at 6 months +/-. She still has the blue-blue eyes, whereas the Dooney seems to be turning to brown.

Which dovetails into the ‘middle sister’, Addy:

That was her First B-Day party.
You can see a LOT of the similarities w/the Dooney
And her current status:

We’re a bit worried as one can see, she tends to take after her bio-mom in being a chunky-monkey. However, she’s happy and being well cared for as we talk on the regular. Today her and her Dad are headed down to the shore to see the fireworks so I’m sort of jealous.

Here at the Casa, I might light off some ‘stuff.

I have some new 37mm fireworks to try as well as a smoke and flare combo that needs testing. The last time I messed around with a smoke mix, I accidentally made it too ‘hot’ as in it burned FAR too quickly. (turns out I used too much sorbital I found out later… it’s a sugar substitute that burns like a mother) In fact the ‘grenade’ I made was out of a Red Bull can.

The vents on it were fine, but unfortunately AND unexpectedly when I lit the fuse and Sapper and I scrambled back away as a precaution, when it lit off?

Instead of a ‘pop’ and slow burn?

The sucker took off like a damned rocket thru the vent holes.

An out of control rocket mind you.

Instead of a nice thick layer of white smoke pouring out at a leisurely pace, I had a very LARGE rocket. A heavy rocket that aggressively took off like I said, and THANK YOU GOD! when it hit the neighbors house (sorry about that Barry!) it missed the windows and only left a soot mark where it impacted.

No windows nor people were injured thankfully.
My nerves however?
Notsomucho.
Thankfully, Neighbor Barry was cool about it. He had been observing from his driveway while I did this as he would occasionally show up when I played like this to see what the Local Kook” was going to burn/blow up this time… he did say that when it came at him, he was mildly concerned, but it worked out and like I said, he was cool about it.

Unfortunately he moved away about a year ago to be closer to his Grans… bit of a bummer to lose a good neighbor but it is what it is.

Needless to say I’m MUCH more proactive with safety measures when playing around with my fireworks. I do the aerial ‘stuff’ over the bass pond, and any smoke producing things get lit off inside a burn cage that Sapper and I use to toast up leaves and yard refuse in. Much safer that way right?

Otherwise, lets see.
The AC went out for a wee bit earlier, but I managed to fix it. Seems that I had to do a hard reset of the thermostat, as we had a power outage the other day, and sometimes, more often than not, the “smart” thermostat gets whonky after an episode like that. So a full power down for 10 minutes, reboot/reset and we’re good.

Oher things
We all saw the INSANITY of the Vegas wannabe-mass-murderer Troon unfold. Now there’s usually a LOT of these “we caught them before they could act” sort of incidents, and they get memory holed pretty damned quickly.

What was oh so notable about this particular Troonytoon was the weapons that he was supposedly found with. Pics as such:

As Sherriff Beauford T. Justice would say “Ooof!”

JUST within view we got what appears to be at least $150,000.00 in high-end toys…

As in this pic which, as far as I know has NOT seen as much ‘press’ if you will:
Nevermind…
I went in to get the pic out of my twitter account, and it seems I got nuked from orbit by Elon and the gang…

For which and/or WHAT I said or did sort of seriously confuses me. Outside of deriding an anti-White Groid and telling him something to the effect of “Go back to Africa you Australopithecine” or the like, I’ve actually been a good boy, so needless to say, I was a bit confused…

So I went into my timeline/profile where all of your posts and reposts are supposed to be. Guess which posts are completely missing?

Yep
Any and all reposts dealing with my analysis of the Troony firepower… HIGHLY sus IMO.

The other weapons in question were, no shit, a M-72 LAW rocket tube that I think was already fired as it didn’t have end-caps and had that ‘oldish surplus’ look to it. In the same pic was a for real (not sure if it was/is operational) Russian RPG-7 (no rocket in sight) and a Mosin Nagant M91/30 or maybe a M44 rifle…

The one EVERYONE has been having a cow over (of course) is the M2A1 .50 BMG:

As one can see, that’s the new ‘quick change’ barrel, which can be identified by the carry handle and the muzzle device. I’m more than familiar with them as I assisted with the RFI (Rapid Fielding Initiative) in 2006 when the Florida Army Reserve and National Guard kids got them issued to them.

Pretty wild shit eh?
____________________________

So… back again. Took a few days but we had a LOT on the plate. The Dooney had his (late) six month checkup and unfortunately, shots.

This meant having to swap out a doctor to one who was more tractable and understood that if he continued to give the “Party Line” regarding that utterly retarded Big Pharma “recommended vaxx list” that his life span had the half-life of a loogie on a white-hot steel plate. Doctor Number One… well

Let’s just say he didn’t get it until I made sure that no one could hear my close-in discussions as to how not even dental records would assist in his missing person case… what pushed me to this was the empty threat of calling CPS and the Sheriff on us for being “Anti-Vaxx” without understanding just how well I’m known and tight with the local authorities.

“Nice practice here Doc… be a shame if something untoward happened to it and you amiright?”

The killer is all I wanted (and ended up getting) was the MMR vaxxes one at a time. NOT the big ole Thimerosal preserved one-and-done shot… The “Autism R Us” One Shot is what I call it.

Measles? Absolutely. Especially with the recent importation of all the turd worlders and outbreaks of same.
Mumps? Sure. Same as Rubella. Better safe than sorry.

BUT

One. At. A. Time.

Just because you’re a lazy piece of shit and/or your fat fuck RN doesn’t want to take the time to do three different appointments, well, as they say that’s a “YOU problem” and not a “ME issue”. However, MAKING it a “ME issue” gets you a one way ticket to a place I know of where the gators can make an ENTIRE human corpse literally ‘go away’ in less than 8 hours… there’s a big ole nature conservancy area, 4800 acres of untouched wilderness up the road a spell… that gators there are fucking HUGE and that is something to know about right?

Handy to say the least…

The second Doc (the one who got our biddness) actually listened to me…and when I took out MY shot record and showed him that no, I’m NOT anti-vaxx but anti-bullshit, well then he was cool, and set everything up. It also helped that Gretchen and I BOTH towered over this little dude… he even went along with the “No” to the Hepatitis vax. I asked him if a 6 month old baby really needed it? Of course he went along… I mean I was radiating all sorts of ‘implied threat’ so to speak…

That and my Vax Record is sort of insanely impressive, as since I had to do a few weeks in Djibouti, the list of ‘must haves’ is INSANE. The County had to special order half of the shots I needed as a regular Doc-in-a-Box couldn’t even GET said shots and even the RN at the County was like shocked at what I had to get…

Djibouti required a yellow fever, MMR, Tdap, Polio, Hepatitis A & B, Cholera, typhoid, and finally rabies. Needless to say my fucking body was sore AF for a week. Never mind smallpox and anthrax… that one.. I had faked the funk on that particular one back in the Hood back in the day… Doctor Ulysses S Grant took care of that with the medic marking on my card that I had GOT the ‘thrax shot…

So he got his shots.
Both of them that he’s supposed to have…
DTaP (Diphtheria, Tetanus, Pertussis) #3 b/c the first two were already given w/no issue and the Pneumonia shot.

That’s it.

And as far as I’m concerned, I’ll make sure the rest are up to date as we go along… I.E. making sure the paperwork ‘Alles in Ordnung’ when and IF he ever needs said-aforementioned paperwork.

He also got to have his first real BBQ:

Gretchen had a B-Day coupon for Texas Roadhouse so the Dooney got his first rib(s). After which he didn’t even make it to the car because “meat coma”:

He really enjoyed the two that he had…
Loved him some ribs.
OH!
BTW: Latest Stats on him.
29 Inches Long
24 Pounds
47cm Head Circumference
Holy. Shit.

Even the Doctor was like “That’s a BIG Sumbitch!” He’s MAXXED his full size-to-age. In fact as of today, he’s exactly 7 months old.
Wearing 2T to 3T sizes.

FML. I’m going to have to buy and freeze half-a-fucking-cow in the near-future JUST to keep this Beast in groceries… I mean sheesh!

Also, on other things:
I got not one but two jobs. One starts in August, and the other is the Antarctic Gig in February. Now… I’ve heard and seen all the “need to stay home” stuff regarding Gretchen and the Dooney. Believe you me, trust me when I’ve thought this out. It’s NOT my first overseas Rodeo. I’m aware of the inherent risks.
HOWEVER
Time is Money
Money is Power
“…but I thought Opium was Money?”
Sorry, ‘Volunteers’ reference…

Yeah… the thing is IF I get stuck down here, as I stated in my last missive, I’m utterly and completely fucked. Ain’t no exfil from that joker. Just ask  Robert F. Scott (whom the South Pole Station is partially named after) and his ill-fated  Terra Nova Expedition.

Soooooooo… The South Pole is a back-up plan.

The primary is in place and I’ll be keeping THAT one close to the chest because I know a thing or two, especially in light of the scum that float around out there these days. No need to give any ammo to my enemies right?

And on that note, I’ll save a rant for another day.
I also promise to try and poast more frequently, but as they say, the life of a ‘new’ Dad is a busy one, even when not working per se. I appreciate each and every one of you who’s stood by me and continue to do so, and have assisted me in this transitional time.

So More Later
Big Country