Sunday, November 25, 2007

Thanksgiving Full Moon

We had around 135 members here at Thousand Trails Resort for Thanksgiving dinner. The room was full, plus a few sat outside to eat. This was my 2ND Thanksgiving dinner.

Beautiful weather here, back into the lower 80's in the daytime with 60's at night.
Picture I took Thanksgiving night. Been off of work all of this week as the kids had the whole week out of school for the holiday. Back to work Monday.

Monday, November 19, 2007

BELIEVE THIS!!!

These 2 dogs are Samoyed, direct descendants of the wolf. Yesterday these two dogs got into a fight & bit the owner while trying to separate them. I tried to let Pickle up to their cage to see if they would play, but they scared Pickle. Samoyed dogs are used as sled dogs in Russia.








So here is just a bag of dog hair? Well, not really. It is Chiengora. Look it up on the Internet: http://reviews.ebay.com/Chiengora-It-apos-s-Not-Just-Dog-Hair_W0QQugidZ10000000000023868 Chiengora means dog hair in French.
Two ladies here were demonstrating it Saturday as I cam into the park. You can use any animal with long hair. I can remember when angora was so nice & soft. Angora is rabbit fur.
She makes different items with the spun yarn. Shaws, hats, etc.

School bus Thanksgiving Dinner

This past Friday we had the Thanksgiving Dinner for school bus employees. Mr. Daggett is the head honcho & so he is carving the turkey.
We got started at around 11:15 AM as some of the drivers have to go on routes at noon.
As you can see there was plenty of food. I took deviled eggs filled with onion & olive pieces. Sure was some tastee sweet potatoes. I got 2nds on that. I got 3 pictures of people with food stuck in there mouth, BUT NOT PUTTING THE PICTURES ON HERE, LOL.
Lori is leaving us as her family is moving. It was a sad day to see her leave. She is such a nice lady. Besides the balloons & cards, they presented her with some pictures of days gone by.

Sunday, November 18, 2007

Dog tricks

At the Golden Coral they gave us veterans a sticker to put on our shirt to show we served, so when I got home, I put it on Pickle's forehead. He absolutely hated it & rolled & tried everything he could do to get it off of him. He finally got it off.

During the past week he has chewed his halter apart partially & his leash of which it now has a knot that I tied it back together.


I had a butterfly fly in the window. I was really surprised he didn't eat it. Maybe it doesn't smell like food, LOL.
He did follow it around though until it flew out another window.
When he is good, I give him treats. He has 3 different treats. One is these generic Cheerios, which I don't care for, but he likes. They were given to me, so I am making use of them.

Got chilly here the last few nights, but we are in a warm up trend now. Suppose to be around 80 on Thanksgiving.

Hope you are having a good weekend. Kids are out of school here for the week of Thanksgiving, so I am on vacation. I have been driving morning & afternoon, both halves with all those BRATS!!! Ron

Monday, November 12, 2007

Orange Juice & more

Today I spent over an hour squeezing juice from oranges. It is an electric juicer, but you have to hold down on the 1/2 orange as the juicer turns. I got almost 1 gallon out of 2/3rds bucket of oranges. The oranges were given to me by a gal at Bowling Green who was just picking them up & throwing them away. Worst part is getting the seeds separated.
Last night I received these miniature vegetables. So a fork lift operator dumped a whole skid I heard. I remember once getting a whole case of bananas when a load was refused somewhere in Indiana. WE HAD BANANAS COMING OUT OF OUR EARS, LOL!!! Banana bread, pie, & whatever.
This morning I went to the Veteran's Day program. This is the Honor Guard marching to the ceremony outside.
Placing the wreath was a local lady. I didn't get the picture I wanted as I went to the next picture of the bugler playing "TAPS"
Tonight I am riding with 3 other friends to Lakeland, Fl. to Golden Coral to the free Veteran's supper.

Weather is still beautiful here & the weather forecast is good for all week. Ron

Sunday, November 11, 2007

Pineapples & Bananas in Florida?


I seemed to assume these came from Hawaii or South America, but here they are close to the campground. A gal here sells oranges, etc. to the snowbirds. Since I took my camera, she showed me around. I'll have to go buy some from her myself this year. She only had a few pineapple, but quite a few bananas. Some are a smaller type. The red piece under the bananas is the bloom.
This is a Navel Orange tree & the oranges are starting to ripen. She also showed me a lemon tree & she said the lemons she has are real juicy.
This is some kind of a thorn (by name) that Hummingbirds like. She had lots of other flowers there also & some trumpet flowers that she said will be open shortly. She has a lot of variety of plants.
Here is the Papaya tree with fruit on it. You can go read more about it at: http://www.crfg.org/pubs/ff/papaya.html Guess I'll wait till she says they are ripe & try one.

Weather is beautiful here again today. Yesterday I talked to a friend & Indiana & he said he'd like to be down here, but can't come for maybe another several years. Ron

Saturday, November 10, 2007

Pickle or Pickleball?


When a birdie couldn't be found from a badminton game & out of boredom, a new game was created back in 1965. It had all the elements of tennis, ping pong, badminton, a whiffle ball, & A GREGARIOUS COCKER SPANIEL DOG NAMED "PICKLES", who would run away with the whiffle ball & hide under a tree if he got the ball. Gee, strange my dog's name is "Pickle". He has 2 toys he runs with & doesn't want to return them. If you'd like to see more history of Pickleball, go to: http://www.sportsknowhow.com/pickleball/history/pickleball-history.shtml

Well, I'm checking out of the campground today for a week, so wanted pictures for you of me playing Pickleball. Should have worn something other than a yellow shirt what with the yellow ball. Need to exercise more & get that gut in too!!!

Weather is beautiful here & supposed to warm back up to around 80 this next week. Have a nice weekend. Ron

Friday, November 9, 2007

Cattle, horse, & elephants?

This morning as I was headed to Sebring, I stopped by the house of a couple I had helped when their car broke down in front of the salvage yard. We pulled their car in off the highway until a wrecker came & got it. Then I took the man back to his house you see here. The cattle were up by the house, BUT I DIDN'T HAVE MY CAMERA WITH ME!!! So the next day I took him to town to pick up his pickup which was being released from the body shop, but the cattle weren't near the house. They used to have several hundred acres, but now have retired to just 7 acres. As you can see, the mowing is kept to a minimum with livestock in the yard. I liked the Palm trees in their yard.
This horse was real friendly & walked right up to me of which I petted him. Then the Mrs. came out & fed him.
ELEPHANTS? Well, I counted 22 buses lined up. About half of them leave from the Jr. High School to go to the Sr. High school. LOOKS LIKE A PARADE OF ELEPHANTS GOING FROM 1 SCHOOL TO THE OTHER. We drive through the west side of town. One stoplight has a crossing guard who also has a key to the stoplight box & she controls the light so all the buses get a green light.

Since both schools are out in the countryside, almost every kid rides the bus. You can't see the beginning of the line, but I am the 10th bus in line, route 494. As you can see there was a beautiful sky yesterday & the weather is great here today also.

Thursday, November 8, 2007

Pickle & Alligators

I got Pickle for me to get more exercise & also companionship, but he likes to run & I can't run anymore. Took him about a day to get used to running along beside the scooter, but he does great now, UNLESS HE SEES ANOTHER DOG THAT BARKS AT HIM, or a squirrel.

Looking in the background of this picture, you'll see the campgrounds is still nearly empty there, but up here on higher ground, it is filling in rapidly.


From the 1st night I got him, I have allowed him to sleep with me. Last night he was at the dinette asleep, so I tried to trick him & let the bed down quietly, but he heard me & was on the bed before me. Sometimes I have to chase him off of my pillow. I took this picture of him this morning. He always seems to take his share out of the middle. At least he is real good about being ready to go to sleep instead of play when he gets in bed. Yesterday he got 2 play toys. One I found on the ground at McDonald's & one a friend gave to us. He likes both of them.
This is a saloon on the way back from the flea market Sunday. the sun was in the wrong position, but gives you an idea that they had murals painted on it.
At the flea market they also had an alligator show. I wasn't there at the right time to see them feed these alligators, but there were 3 ponds of small alligators 2-3' long, so I imagine they could really be scrappy. They had a big one also, but it was in a place I couldn't take a picture of it.
This is one of the small ones. He looks like he is alert & those toenails look like they could rip you apart. I bet his teeth are sharp also.

Got down to lower 50's here this morning or maybe even a little colder. Supposed to be in the nice 70's today. Ron

Tuesday, November 6, 2007

Aussie slang dictionary & New counter

http://www.koalanet.com.au/australian-slang.html#D is the Aussie slang dictionary.

I also have have a blog counter thanks to http://www.britsontour.blogspot.com So look to see what # you are to go to my page & enjoy their blog.

No pictures today. Weather is beautiful here though with the highs in the 70-80 range & lows in the 50-60 range. Ron

Friday, November 2, 2007

Halloween

This is "BA Babbette". No, not the BAD ASS WITCH. She is a good witch & was reading stories to the people around the campfire here at the resort.

The lady in pink & green was our waitress at the Country Club, named Kelly.

The lady in the white gown is the daytime bartender, named Donna. I sang a song to her with her sitting in a chair beside me. Louis Armstrong's "HELLO DOLLY".



The cheerleader is Tammy & a great singer of Karaoke. Her Halloween costume was actually her "Hardee Senior High" cheer leading outfit & she can still fit into it, even though she is maybe 30. She said she had to suck in hard to get her skirt fastened, LOL.

The couple is Sunnie & Robin, our Karaoke KJ's. He was dressed as "Beetle Juice", which I had never heard of. Sunnie was a kitty cat. I don't like how the pictures & description came out on this blog, but sure can figure it out, SINCE I CAN'T CONTROL IT!

I had a good time taking pictures of other people in Halloween costumes also. Not room for all of them. Weather is beautiful here.

Pickle is doing fine. Several people here have petted him & 2 people even offered to take him if I decided to get rid of him. I was given a anti-bark "SHOCKER" which I put on him, but it was a little to bit for him or I need to train him so he doesn't bark & shock himself.

Have a nice weekend. Ron

Thursday, November 1, 2007

Dill Pickle?

Well, I saved a dog from the pound. The dog catcher came back to take my info & collect the money. I got him for just $45, much cheaper than I had seen other places where they wanted $75. Before I even decided on him, we took him out of the cage & I sat down & he jumped up on my lap & started kissing me. I knew right then that we'd get along fine. He has such pretty markings. He is a Jack Russell mix.

He didn't bark that day like the other dogs that were in their cages. Being small, (12#) it would cost less to feed him & less to clean up after since we have to clean up after them here in the campground. So the dog catcher told his name was Dill. I asked her to repeat it as I didn't hear her for sure. Well, I thought other people wouldn't understand Dill either, so I started calling him Dill Pickle. Well, a friend of mine said that was a goofy name for a dog, so she suggested "Pickle", so that is what it has been ever since. He is about 1 year old & wasn't dog trained, but getting better now, since I walk him a lot & several times a day. One reason I got him was so that I went walking also, AS MY DOCTOR TOLD ME TOO!!! Well, maybe I get 1/4 mile per walk that I haven't been getting. He likes to go even more, so I hop on the scooter & he runs beside me.

He doesn't like to be closed up in the bus. One day he must have been hungry, so he got up on the table & got ahold of a box of uncooked spaghetti & ate part of that. Also he has gotten into pecans that were by the driver's compartment. He just crack those shells with his sharp teeth & separate the shells from the nut & leave the shells on the floor, LOL. He is doing better as to me leaving him, but he wants to be outside. He doesn't bark if I leave in the car, but if I walk away he barks & barks. So Debbie, the Mgr. here at Peace River, gave me a BARK STOPPER. Well, I finally put it on him & walked away to carry trash & throw it away. He started barking like he had been HURT BADLY, so had to go back & take it off of him. Guess I will just have to spend some time with him training him how to keep it from shocking him. OH, BY THE WAY, I ACCIDENTALLY GOT SHOCKED BY IT ALSO. I put fingers on both contacts & it GOT ME TWICE!!! Well, Pickle is learning & is a very loving dog. He likes being in my lap & sleeps with me also.
Now this is a semi-truck from Chapman Fruit Co. Not really a load of fruit as you can see here. Really, not much of a load, but the trailer was all loaded, decorated up for the homecoming parade here at Wauchula.
Now this is one heck of a way to celebrate Halloween. I wish I had asked her if I could have signed it. I like doing stuff like that. I didn't notice what was on the bottom until of the cast till I saw the picture on the PC. She said a cow broke her leg. I had a black Angus pin me in a corner of a truck once when I was taking him to the slaughter house.
This is just a cute mailbox that is out on my bus route. It is almost to the end of a dead end road.


I didn't get a picture of the full moon this month, so here is May's full moon.

Maybe tomorrow I will get another blog made, one with some Halloween costume pictures. Weather is much nicer & we are supposed to be getting some nights where the low is into the upper 50's. Daytime has been 75-85.

If you are in an area you turn back the clocks, this coming weekend is the time. Ron