{"id":9760,"date":"2026-07-08T14:39:32","date_gmt":"2026-07-08T14:39:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bigcountryexpat.com\/?p=9760"},"modified":"2026-07-08T14:45:25","modified_gmt":"2026-07-08T14:45:25","slug":"happy-independence-day-or-treason-day-if-youre-a-brit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bigcountryexpat.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/08\/happy-independence-day-or-treason-day-if-youre-a-brit\/","title":{"rendered":"Happy Independence Day (or Treason Day if you’re a Brit)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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<\/strong>.

My bass pond in the back has never<\/em> 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<\/em><\/strong> all them fish rotting away… Plus the sulfer-ish stink that goes with it.

I really<\/em> 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<\/em> 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<\/span>!!!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

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That about sums it up donnit?
I mean FFS, THIS is the redhead I remember:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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She was juuuust<\/em> 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:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

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We’re a bit<\/em> 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<\/em> 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<\/strong>) 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<\/em> 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 <\/strong>rocket that aggressively <\/em>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<\/strong> 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<\/em><\/strong> about this particular Troonytoon was the weapons that he was supposedly found with. Pics as such:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

JUST within view we got what appears to be at least<\/strong><\/em> $150,000.00 in high-end toys…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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